"The art of Linux" -- that's where the name for the Artix distribution comes from, and this modern, independent take on Linux takes the art in its name seriously.

But don't be misled; Artix (an Arch-based rolling release distribution) isn't geared toward artists (although it certainly could be). Rather, Artix is about the art of creating a unique Linux distribution while replacing several of the usual bits and pieces.

Also: France is replacing 2.5 million Windows desktops with Linux - and I mapped out its new stack

For example, Artix eschews systemd in favor of either OpenRC or dinit (user's choice), as well as XLibre or Wayland, in place of Xorg. According to the Artix FAQ, the developers "love systemd," but would never use it. And by cutting out systemd, the developers can be certain that upstream changes won't eventually affect the project and that systemd cannot creep into the binary packages.

I don't want to get in the weeds, but I will say this: Systemd may not be loved by all, but it has become the standard. Because of that, the distributions that refuse to adopt it will struggle to gain much ground.

That's a shame, because some of those systemd-less distributions are actually quite good. Such is the case with Artix. Upon installing Artix (which was very easy), the first thing I noticed was how fast it boots; we're talking ChromeOS-speed here. Don't blink; otherwise, you'll miss the bootup.