[Tfug] Thinking linux

[christopher floess]

Well, thanks everyone. I'll let you know how it goes once I start. I'd let
you know what I end up running, but I still haven't picked. At first it was
slack, then gentoo, now I'm leaning toward debian. Anyway, I'll keep you
posted


On 2/5/07, Jim March <1.jim.march at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> On 2/5/07, christopher floess <skeptikos at gmail.com> wrote:
> >
> > Wow, lots of help. Thanks. I kind of figured it would go this way, and
> am
> > glad it did. Options are good. As far as the headless thing goes, when I
> > did
> > it in freebsd, it worked, but I ran into some probs. Some of the things
> > like
> > backspace, insert, etc, didn't work, they gave weird characters. It was
> > over
> > a null modem cable (is that the same as a crossover serial cable?). So I
> > would want to connect some other way. I guess telnet, or ssh would be an
> > option. I guess it would be nice to become proficient enough to have the
> > linux machine act as a gateway or file server, and have the fbsd machine
> > be
> > something else. I'm sure you don't want one machine
> > acting as a file server and router. I can't imagine that being a safe
> > setup.
> >
> > I looked into Gentoo a little, and it seems alright. So maybe I'll go
> that
> > way. By established distro, I mean one of the *major* ones. I know
> that's
> > relative, but there always seem to be new ones popping up, and since I
> > decided to leave windows a while back, there have been certain ones that
> > seem to have been consistent: debian, slack,
> > suse, mandrake, redhat, etc., with ubuntu seeming
> > to be the new comer with strength, but again, it's based on debian any
> > way,
> > right?
>
>
>
> Ubuntu is based on Debian, yeah: the "unstable" branch.
>
> That's not my term, that's Debian's.
>
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ubuntu_(Linux_distribution)
>
> The people behind Ubuntu took the more bleeding-edge bits in Debian
> Unstable
> and tried to "stabilize it" while adding a far better installer.
>
> They got the installer right, and with Dapper (ver.6.06) they got the
> stability to a good degree.  With "Edgy" (v.6.10) they failed.  Bigtime,
> in
> my opinion.
>
> The reason there are all these Debian-based distros is that Debian has one
> of the longest development cycles of any distro.  About 18 months on
> average.
>
> But: Linux in general is about to hit a "golden age" in a lot of people's
> opinion, and the next full-tilt Debian Stable is about to ship.  Some of
> us
> are thinking it'll be a hell of a good starting point and can be
> maintained
> for at least a couple years as a desktop platform, more than that as a
> server of course.
>
> The Debian family tree is now dominated by Debian itself and Ubuntu.
>
> The RPM family tree is dominated by Fedora Core 6 now and soon Fedora 7
> (as
> two branches of Fedora are going to be re-combined into just one and
> called
> Fedora 7).  FC6 is very, very good.  F7 has a "shot at the title" to
> become
> THE dominant Linux variant as M$ partially implodes with Vista.  The F7
> installer will have to significantly improve and the auto-update process
> will need to have the idiots running it kicked in the behinds some...
>
> I think OpenSuse is out of the running, with Ubuntu's next flavor a
> contender, Debian Stable 4.0 likewise and Madriva a dark horse.  Most
> others
> are going to be "also rans".
>
> I would suggest that sometime around May we need to revisit this subject
> in
> more depth and as a group become part of the process of sorting out what's
> going to dominate - which really means "what are we going to start loading
> on the Grandma Millie machines so we don't see them nuked by the hoard of
> virii when Vista is pwned by the scammers, spammers and botnet
> barsterds"...
>
> Let's ask this right now: if the choice is down to Debian Stable 4.0 (the
> upcoming cut) and Ubuntu Feisty (ditto), if setup takes longer with Debian
> but the result is more stable, is that what y'all would rather load on
> Grandma Millie's rig?  Because my answer would be "hell yes"...spending an
> initial hour at the desk to load MP3 drivers and whatever beats hours of
> phone calls later when it pukes....
>
> BUT Ubuntu might learn from that last disaster and get it right...
>
> Jim
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