antiX Linux is user-friendly, is compatible with the superior Debian repository, AND is lightweight enough to work on computers from the Windows 98 era. I consider antiX to be the gold standard.

What I don't understand is why other distros have to be so bloated. Look how much the hardware requirements have escalated in Ubuntu. Today, you need at least 512 MB of RAM to comfortably run Ubuntu, Kubuntu, or Xubuntu. In the early days of Ubuntu, the hardware requirements were only a fraction of this.

I know that GNOME and KDE are considered resource-hungry, but even Debian with GNOME requires substantially less RAM than Ubuntu with GNOME.

What exactly makes distros like Ubuntu, Fedora, etc. so bloated? For more of an apples-to-apples comparison, what exactly got stripped from MEPIS and SimplyMEPIS in order to make antiX Linux?

I find it disappointing that so many Linux distros have been falling into the bloatware trend given that one of the selling points of Linux is avoiding the bloatware of Windows and being able to use that old computer long after it becomes junk in the Windows world. Somebody should take bets on when and which distro will be the first to be as resource-hungry as Windows Vista. I know Linux distros are trying to appeal to Windows users by providing the Windows feel, but I didn't know that was supposed to extend to bloatware.

In my opinion, distros should be tweaked so that the default arrangement is lightweight and user-friendly. The bells-and-whistles should be optional. Even though I use OpenOffice, I don't mind having it excluded from the default installations of antiX Linux, and providing OpenOffice out-of-the-box is NOT a change antiX Linux should make. Most people can get by fine with AbiWord and Gnumeric, and those of us who want the heavier OpenOffice can just get it from the repository. EVERY distro out there offers the option of OpenOffice.

Feature creep.

Almost all software company's and developers have this problem. If someone writes some code, what are the chances they are gonna say to themselves,"Ok, that is perfect. I will leave it like that and never add to it or change it." One idea for an improvement leads to seven more ideas, and thus the creep begins.

Also, many distro's, like Ubuntu, try and meet the need of the not so savvy computer user. Adding a nice gui and easy visual tools that a novice can use drives much of the bloat. Trying to provide features that Linux novice's find in their familiar Windows Systems creates a sort of competition that is always driven to add new features.

It's not all bad. We would still be on the command line with out the urge to innovate. Browsers would be missing their tabs, and youtube would not exist.

But all that leaves the PII and PIII's of the past by the way side. AntiX to the rescue!

I understand Ubuntu markets to the less savvy computer users, but I think antiX would also work for less savvy computer users on older computers with much less RAM and processor speed. With Rox Pinboard (which I think should be standard, not optional), antiX provides the Windows feel without bloat.

I am still curious: What gets stripped from MEPIS/SimplyMEPIS in order to create antiX Linux?

To create desktop shortcuts with PCManFM just link a .desktop file from /usr/share/applications to ~/Desktop

See short video attached.

More on the subject of your question...desktop environments like Gnome and KDE are called liked that because they are a suite of applications configured to be integrated between themselves. If you join that with the presence of a lot of stuff that some people may need and some others don't, you get bloat. So you get the bloaty ubuntu-desktop package which almost certainly has more bloat than the already bloaty for some, standard gnome desktop.
This may be just one point since I'm just a GUI Linux user, so to speak.

Regarding antiX, I myself often find some little app or setup change that could make antiX friendlier or easier to use, but I think antiX has a big value for being a so complete o.s. capable of working well with a system with 256 MB of RAM, for example. For it to keep like that it actually has to have not only light apps but the lighter ones that pass the sieve of our quality control __{{emoticon}}__ (we, antiX users/testers).