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Let's have a little tech update. Which is the best Linux distro in the market right now?

Depends on who you ask. Some like Slackware, some like Debian, quite a few like Mandrake, some like RedHat, so like SuSE. A few nutters will like Gentoo, the PPC crowd likes YellowDog, etc.

I tried Debian, but I never got past the installation questions. I stopped at question #19,351. Heard it was good, but I gave up before starting - seven times.

Redhat is neat. Has RPMs which I have heard aren't as good as Debian's DEBs

Mandrake is apparently Redhat, but more optimized (they compile the i586 versions instead of the i386 ones, I think), and has a nicer install. Kinda evil though, tends to format drives without asking (or AFTER it asked and you said NO PLEASE GOD PLEASE DON'T I'LL BE GOOD!).

Slackware is, well, bare. It does have a semi-decent package system (tar.gz but behaves a bit like RPMs. These are "special" SW tar.gz's) I even managed to get X-Windows running with an old KDE - it comes with a VERY old version.

Can't talk about the non-PC ones.

DEB is superior to RPM (and also has the lovely apt-get - there's a port for "apt-rpm" but it isn't quite as good).

Shinova wrote:Let's have a little tech update. Which is the best Linux distro in the market right now?

For stability and sexiness:

Debian

For cutting-edge packages and speed:

Gentoo

For the technically impaired:

Mandrake

For nice support:

RedHat

For Debian people who like more of a challenge:

Suse

And for people who don't fit into any of the above:

One of the other distros on the megalist

Then there's LinuxFromScratch for those control freaks (me).

Seriously, I like using ./configure; make; make install; but since I'm using Red Hat, unless I use rpms, I'm screwed.

Yogi wrote:Then there's LinuxFromScratch for those control freaks (me).

Seriously, I like using ./configure; make; make install; but since I'm using Red Hat, unless I use rpms, I'm screwed.

It'll be a cold day in Hell before I do that for Mozilla.

Sorry, I like Microsoft NT4 and Server 2000...

Oracle sales for NT/2000 right now are catching up with Unix while Oracle sales for Linux sales are falling (or should I say fallen through the floor).

I don't mind linux, but what does it do?

BrYaN19kc wrote:I don't mind linux, but what does it do?

Operating system. The most significant bastion of freedom against Microsoft. Dramatically speaking.

Xisiqomelir wrote:For stability and sexiness:

Debian

Isn't that the distro that's basically a Linux that you program and make your own?

Shinova wrote:

BrYaN19kc wrote:I don't mind linux, but what does it do?

Operating system. The most significant bastion of freedom against Microsoft. Dramatically speaking.

Unfortunately, you have to be somewhat of a Unix geek to understand how to use Linux.

Yogi wrote:Then there's LinuxFromScratch for those control freaks (me).

Seriously, I like using ./configure; make; make install; but since I'm using Red Hat, unless I use rpms, I'm screwed.

Tried LFS, got tired of having to recompile everything when I screw up (tried to install PAM, f*cked up my installation, so reinstalled. Don't need it now that I have a computer that is decently fast, and has a large enough HDD not to require a superslim distro. Great educational experience though.

BrYaN19kc wrote:Sorry, I like Microsoft NT4 and Server 2000...

Oracle sales for NT/2000 right now are catching up with Unix while Oracle sales for Linux sales are falling (or should I say fallen through the floor).

I don't mind linux, but what does it do?

Well, duh, who needs oracle when there are free alternatives.

Name me a single free SQL solution that can possibly compete with Oracle or DB2 at the high end. You can't.

For something basic like a dynamically-updating webpage or webforum, PostgreSQL or MySQL probably is fine. When you're working with truly important data, you go to the big boys.