Replace Etcher in installation guide

[danirabbit]

What Happened?

Etcher is doing shady privacy invading stuff

Steps to Reproduce

https://tails.net/news/rufus/index.en.html

Expected Behavior

Move to something else

OS Version

8.x (Circe)

Session Type

Classic Session (X11, This is the default)

Software Version

Latest release (I have run all updates)

Log Output

Hardware Info

No response

[1enify]

The only all-platforms FOSS alternative I found was USBImager. I thought it wasn't user-friendly at first, but the interface looks alright. If that issue gains more traction, we at least have an alternative.

[o-alquimista]

https://tails.net/news/rufus/index.en.html

That page is now 404.

Is it about the "analytics" problem? I found this from their blog and this in their bug tracker. They said they removed it in version 2.1.2.

[LuminousHustler]

I'll take a stab at writing a PR for this. Etcher doesn't do a great job anyways, and has left me with USB sticks that aren't bootable. The MacOS instructions may stay as Etcher because, I have no idea what to use as an alternative. Perhaps the installation instructions should be updated to use:

• Windows - Rufus (with screenshots from Windows 11 so it's nice)
• Linux - Popsicle https://github.com/pop-os/popsicle

I'm a fan of popsicle, it's been fast, reliable, an it's available as an appimage so it runs on all distros

[LuminousHustler]

@danirabbit I converted this into a discussion, because I wanted the regular website maintainers to weigh in before I commit time to working updating/changing the recommended installation method. #3945 (comment)

I'm looking for some input to these questions:

1. If we change the installation instructions to move away from Etcher, should we unlink the video tutorial on the installation page? - There is some inertia around using Etcher right now, including an installation video/tutorial that I'm talking about is [here](https://
   elementary.io/docs/installation#recommended-system-specifications.)
2. How do people feel about Rufus being the recommended USB creation tool on Windows?
3. Would we recommend UEFI over BIOS? - I'd be happy to put a note saying that the user should decide based on their system, but if UEFI is supported, then we recommend it...or similar.
4. How does the community feel about Popsicle? - I'd include a flathub link, and a link to the Releases page on Github so folks that don't have flatpak installed can still use the universal image.

Thanks!

[ryonakano]

Not her, but coming here from your comment on Discord and leaving my opinion.

1. If we change the installation instructions to move away from Etcher, should we unlink the video tutorial on the installation page? - There is some inertia around using Etcher right now, including an installation video/tutorial that I'm talking about is [here](https://
   elementary.io/docs/installation#recommended-system-specifications.)

Yes, I agree with removing the tutorial video unless we don't eager to update it. It looks like we created it when OS 5.1 was in development and quite old.

2. How do people feel about Rufus being the recommended USB creation tool on Windows?

I think it's good to suggest Rufus. I always used it to create bootable USB media of elementary OS, Ubuntu, Fedora, etc. when I used to use Windows.

3. Would we recommend UEFI over BIOS? - I'd be happy to put a note saying that the user should decide based on their system, but if UEFI is supported, then we recommend it...or similar.

I agree with recommending UEFI over BIOS. We already recommend it for installation on VM:

We do not recommend virtual machines as they don't perform as well as a full install. If you are attempting to install in a virtual machine, enable EFI if possible but understand you may encounter other issues.

4. How does the community feel about Popsicle? - I'd include a flathub link, and a link to the Releases page on Github so folks that don't have flatpak installed can still use the universal image.

I'm not sure about Popsicle because I have never been heard of it. But sounds good for me because it uses GTK and available on Flathub. It would be a good choice if it does the job.

[o-alquimista]

I see there's a GNOME Circle app called Impression, which is a simple image writer not associated with any OS. It looks new, and I've never used it. It's on Flathub too.

Honestly, I've never used Popsicle either, as I prefer to just use good old dd. Do you think it's a good idea to add dd instructions there as a kind of fallback in case the recommended app ever stops working?

[danirabbit]

We used to recommend Rufus for windows. It was nice to be able to recommend the same app across platforms because it simplifies the documentation a lot. If we can at least recommend something that works on both macOS and Windows that would be nice. And something with a less overwhelming UI would be really helpful. Seeing something like Rufus, I'm sure there's a not insignificant number of folks that would immediately think, "oh wow this is too hard for me, nevermind"

Impression looks really nice. I'm a lot less worried about documenting ISO burning for folks running Linux. They're most likely to already know how to do it, have a favorite iso burning tool, and they represent a minority of the folks downloading our OS

I would definitely not support ever recommending an AppImage. Both for technical reasons and political ones

[LuminousHustler]

I'll give Impression a try and see how it works. This may be a better solution since it should be available on Ubuntu whereas popsicle isn't unless it's an appimage. I'll also do some research on the Windows side of things. It's definitely the go to for many guides which mention installing Windows, since it sets some registry keys on your behalf if you opt to.

@danirabbit you got me in tangles with this double negative "I would definitely not support ever recommending an AppImage. Both for technical reasons and political ones". That's a thumbs down for appimage right?

[danirabbit]

@LuminousHustler yes huge thumbs down for AppImage. The author is a Nazi sympathizer and it's a garbage technology anyways

[LuminousHustler]

This would address #3135 and #2863