BananaTrifleViolin

Did you set your Mint to autologin to desktop? If so then your Keyring is then locked and you get prompts to unlock it when you want to use anything that needs it - websites, software like email etc. The keyring holds your passwords and credentials to pass to on as needed and keeps your system secure. If you set your desktop to not autologin - i.e. have a login screen - your keyring is unlocked automatically as you log on to the PC and you don’t keep getting prompts to unlock the keyring. You can disable the keyring entirely or give it a blank password, but it’s better to use the login screen to keep your device secure, and let the keyring do it’s thing in the background even though “login automatically” is so easy to tick and use. The wallet is the same concept on KDE desktops.

Otherwise the only password prompts you should get are similar to windows - when you want to make system level changes.

I’d recommend OpenSuSE Leap with KDE. User friendly, stable, with a good GUI for making all system changes. Fedora KDE is also a good popular distro; I’m not sure how good it’s GUI is but I’d be surprised if you need to use the terminal. People often recommend the terminal (because it IS quicker - often one step instead of “go here, click here, click here”) but there is usually a GUI way of doing everything.

The text here on the fediverse is the prologue; bit confusing but click through the link and it makes sense.

Interesting read, thank you. Also I recognise this type of procrastination: sit down to do one thing, end up installing a whole different OS :D

KDE is genuinely incredibly flexible - you can make it into pretty much any GUI that exists. The default windows like set up is fine, but there are so many easy tweaks and changes you can make to get it however you want. I have a floating dock-like set up instead of a window-like taskbar, with application launcher, icon-only view, system tray, clock and power button.

For simple tweaks yoy can right click on most component of your KDE panels and select “Show alternatives…” to see different official versions of the same component. For example, the Application Launcher offers an alternative Application Menu with cascading menus like an old-school windows start menu, or a full screen gnome-like Application Dashboard. And there are also loads more user made tools if you right click and select “Add or Manage widgets”. Every component of the desktop is a widget and can be moved, swapped out, duplicated or replaced.

It’s really not that difficult with a Global Theme; anyone can do it. There are step by step tutorials on line (such as this one from howtogeek) for people who want to do it manually. The benefit of manual is if there is a major KDE update it is more likely to be completely unaffected; very rarely Global Themes can break and need their own updates.

The Mac ones are the 2nd most popular in the Global Theme store and well maintained though.

Yeah KDE is incredibly flexible. You can get most of the way there downloading a Global Theme from KDE’s settings menu (such as MacOS Big Sur) - that lays out all the panels, including the top bar context menu, power menu, dock, left sided window buttons. There are then some extra visual themes such as cursors, icons that people can get separately if they really want to completely mimic a Mac.

No one is born knowing this stuff; everyone learns it somewhere. But omg it’s still frustrating after you spend days taking the difficult route and someone says “oh you could have just done this in 2 mins”. My sympathy to you! :D But GG on getting your parents onto Linux and saving them from wasting money on a new laptop!

I’d go with Fedora. If you will be their source of help, then it makes sense you know it. It’s also a widely known, stable distro with good and reliable packaging.

Mint is a good distro but there is a huge load of outdated advice out there, and I think it’s getting risky as a result. Like I still keep seeing tips to add 3rd party repos to install software, rather than pointing to things like Flatpak. However it remains very userfriendly and there is loads of support out there, so it’s still a great choice.

Another consideration is Fedora offers a better selection of DEs to use “officially”. Personally I like KDE, but also having Gnome available as a default option is good. Mint is somewhat limited in that respect by focusing on Cinnamon, Mate and XFCE as the official spins. They’re all decent but I feel like people coming into Linux should be introduced to the big 2. When I mained Mint a few years ago, I moved to KDE and it was actually a little frustrating how bloated it got to have lots of unneeded Cinnamon tools left behind, and some essential to the system.

I’d avoid Ubuntu. It’s big but it’s increasingly compromised by Cannonical’s behaviour, and personally I object to Snap. Snap as a technology is fine but the Snap store is closed source and controlled by Cannonical. And in Ubuntu so many apps are forced onto users as Snaps now - for example web browsers which are slow to start up. This is not a good experience for users.