Fedora

Cutting-edge and community-driven. The proving ground for Red Hat Enterprise Linux.

Desktop Development Beginner

Overview

Based on	Independent (RPM)
Package manager	DNF
Package format	.rpm
Release model	Fixed releases every ~6 months, ~13 months support each
Default DE	GNOME (vanilla)
Init system	systemd (Fedora created systemd)
Website	fedoraproject.org

Why Fedora?

Bleeding edge, stabilized - Ships the latest GNOME, kernel, and toolchains within weeks of upstream release
Vanilla GNOME - The purest GNOME experience of any major distro
SELinux enabled by default - Enhanced security out of the box
Developer favorite - Linus Torvalds uses Fedora. Great for kernel, systems, and container development.
Red Hat pipeline - What ships in Fedora today becomes RHEL tomorrow. Great for career skills.
Flatpak-first - Flathub integration out of the box

Editions

Workstation - Desktop with GNOME
Server - Headless server with Cockpit web admin
IoT - For Internet of Things devices
CoreOS - Minimal, immutable OS for running containers
Silverblue - Immutable desktop variant (rpm-ostree based)
Spins: KDE, XFCE, MATE, Cinnamon, i3, Sway, LXQt editions

Package Management

# Upgrade all packages
sudo dnf upgrade

# Install a package
sudo dnf install neovim

# Search
dnf search nodejs

# Install a group
sudo dnf group install "Development Tools"

# View history and undo
dnf history
sudo dnf history undo last

# Enable RPM Fusion (for codecs, NVIDIA, etc.)
sudo dnf install \
  https://mirrors.rpmfusion.org/free/fedora/rpmfusion-free-release-$(rpm -E %fedora).noarch.rpm \
  https://mirrors.rpmfusion.org/nonfree/fedora/rpmfusion-nonfree-release-$(rpm -E %fedora).noarch.rpm

# Install multimedia codecs
sudo dnf group install multimedia
sudo dnf install ffmpeg

RPM Fusion: Fedora's default repos only include free and open-source software. You almost certainly want to enable RPM Fusion for codecs, NVIDIA drivers, Steam, and other proprietary software.

Setting Up for Development

# C/C++ toolchain
sudo dnf group install "Development Tools" "C Development Tools and Libraries"

# Python
sudo dnf install python3 python3-pip python3-devel

# Node.js
sudo dnf install nodejs npm
# Or use nvm for version management

# Containers (Podman is pre-installed on Fedora, Docker alternative)
podman run hello-world

# Docker (if you specifically need Docker)
sudo dnf install dnf-plugins-core
sudo dnf config-manager --add-repo https://download.docker.com/linux/fedora/docker-ce.repo
sudo dnf install docker-ce docker-ce-cli containerd.io

# Rust
curl --proto '=https' --tlsv1.2 -sSf https://sh.rustup.rs | sh

# Go
sudo dnf install golang

Tips

Fedora ships Podman instead of Docker. It's daemonless, rootless by default, and uses the same CLI. Most Docker commands work by just replacing docker with podman.
Upgrade between Fedora releases with sudo dnf system-upgrade
Use Toolbx (toolbox) for containerized development environments without polluting your host system
Fedora defaults to Wayland. If you need X11 (for screen sharing in some apps), select "GNOME on Xorg" at the login screen
Consider Fedora Silverblue if you want an immutable base system with Flatpak apps