# Which is your Favourite Linux?



## Weinter (Nov 21, 2008)

OK OK I know ALL of us LOVE BSD 
But I am sure you all played with Linux before conversion?
So which is your favourite?


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## dima (Nov 21, 2008)

I love FreeBSD but on 30 Oct 2008 was released Ubuntu-8.10 (server edition based on Debian) and I have tried to install and use it. I'm very glad as big african elephant


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## ninjaslim (Nov 21, 2008)

Fedora, Red Hat Enterprise Linux, and Debian are my favorites.  They follow Unix principles relatively well, are quite stable, and have good quality.  However, nothing beats BSD.


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## SPlissken (Nov 21, 2008)

Debian Sid, but i tried also ArchLinux and it seem quite good


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## ninjaslim (Nov 21, 2008)

Arch is similar to BSD, but it isn't polished enough.  It's not mature enough, and nor does it have the quality.


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## LaR3 (Nov 21, 2008)

FreeBSD 7.0 -> AIX -> Red Hat


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## SirDice (Nov 21, 2008)

They all suck compared to FBSD :e


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## darkstar (Nov 21, 2008)

I love Slackware Linux, Because it almost similiar with FreeBSD, and sometimes i still use it.


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## keramida@ (Nov 21, 2008)

*Debian seems to be nice*

When I have to use Linux, Debian is the one I can tolerate.

I still have to install my own .bashrc and other HOME configuration files; some of the default shell startup scripts in /etc drive me mad; clearing the screen on logout in the default .bash_logout script triggers several obscene curses in Greek or English to exit my mouth; and I sorely miss ^T whenever I work through Linux terminals.

But Debian's "apt" package installer is really nice.  A bit nicer than portupgrade some times.


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## susanth (Nov 21, 2008)

Hi,

These are my choice :
For Server   : "Debian" http://www.debian.org/
FOr Desk Top : "Ubuntu Desk Top Edition" http://www.ubuntu.com/


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## Ico (Nov 21, 2008)

I started out with Slackware and that was the one I used for the longest time so I suppose that would be my favorite...


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## Weinter (Nov 21, 2008)

I tried Ubuntu then move on to Debian then move on to FreeBSD (got stucked here :e) I really like the ports system 
FreeBSD is very well documented and the layout is neat and standardized
I also trial installed Fedora, OpenSUSE, Slackware 
My votes goes to Debian and Slackware


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## braveduck (Nov 21, 2008)

Gentoo rocks - portage is very much like FreeBSD's ports
And yet there is ArchLinux, with its ABC and prebuilt packages if you want them.


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## ninjaslim (Nov 21, 2008)

Gentoo is everything that FreeBSD isn't.  ArchLinux's ABS system is quite complicated to use.  Ports is very automated and simple, which makes it a treat to use.


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## rocky (Nov 21, 2008)




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## kamikaze (Nov 21, 2008)

I never tried Linux before starting with FreeBSD. And I haven't tried it, yet. Whenever I have to work with a linux system I'm annoyed by all the subtle differences and by package management systems that exchange the kernel during an update.


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## DutchDaemon (Nov 21, 2008)

I work in an office with three BSD guys (including me) and three Linux guys. The Linux guys usually spend loads of time rolling back patches that screw up their systems, can stare for hours at Yast screens (it's apparently hypnotizing), and I haven't seen a single upgrade gone right without at least walking over with a USB stick to fix something. The BSD guys have working servers and drink coffee. No Linux for me, ever.


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## braveduck (Nov 21, 2008)

> ArchLinux's ABS system is quite complicated to use.
> Ports is very automated and simple, which makes it a treat to use.



I haven't said that Arch or Gentoo is better than FreeBSD, neither that ABS or portage is better than ports. They are just similar to FreeBSD ports, which makes me choose Arch and Gentoo amongst all the linuxes out there.


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## doena (Nov 21, 2008)

At work I have to deal with Linux on our severs.
Unfortunatelly we use SuSe and Yast, but I'm not responsible
for them, only for the FreeBSD systems 

When studying I started with Linux at home and especially SuSe, Debian and Ubuntu. But after having first experiences with
FreeBSD, I now have FreeBSD instead of Linux systems at home.


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## gilinko (Nov 21, 2008)

For desktop I haven't found anything that beats Ubuntu, and if I had to run a linux server it would be a Slackware Linux as it resembles FreeBSD.

Have tried ubuntu and debian on server which I just didn't get along with. RHEL4 and gentoo on desktop. RHEL4 is quite nice, but this is usually a forced alternative from a software vendor. Gentoo is like a shopping trolley at the supermarket: it starts in a straight line, but then one wheel wobbles and were of to the ditch.

The big question for me on a desktop system is: Do I need a special version of something or optimized software? the answer is usually: No, how much opimization do you need to run firefox


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## Almindor (Nov 21, 2008)

DutchDaemon said:
			
		

> I work in an office with three BSD guys (including me) and three Linux guys. The Linux guys usually spend loads of time rolling back patches that screw up their systems, can stare for hours at Yast screens (it's apparently hypnotizing), and I haven't seen a single upgrade gone right without at least walking over with a USB stick to fix something. The BSD guys have working servers and drink coffee. No Linux for me, ever.



Interresting.. me and my friend have exactly the opposite experiences with FreeBSD and Gentoo compared to Debian and Red Hat.

But then again ours are based on desktop. Now don't get me wrong I like FreeBSD, but on the desktop it doesn't have the proper install method and "sane defaults" + integration. Not to mention that source-based desktop is going to hit you when you need it least.

Our case was a Gentoo guy who reinstalled for some reason once. My friend also reinstalled but he went with Debian. Needless to say his desktop was ready and configured in 1 hour. The Gentoo guy spent 3 days "tweaking" the damn thing.

Likewise for me to get this laptop running FreeBSD as a workstation. I spent 2 days "tweaking" and port installing.

As for the original question, Debian and Ubuntu. Nothing beats their package management (in speed, stability or availability)


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## vivek (Nov 21, 2008)

We have mix of *nix in our data center:

FreeBSD web, smtp, pop3, squid  server
Redhat used as Mysql cluster
Debian used as Load balancer using LVS to send traffic to all freebsd nodes.

My laptop has both FreeBSD and Ubuntu Linux. All desktop at works run on either Windows XP or Fedora.


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## oliverh (Nov 21, 2008)

I started in the early 90s with NetBSD - of course no Linux ;-) - and some time later with Slackware. If I need some Linux today I'm using Slack or sometimes Arch. The latter for some multimedia machine only. I do know Debian from servers, but I try to avoid it if possible the decrease of quality during the years is obvious. I'm prefering *BSD, especially FreeBSD and I can live with Linux too - I'm fine with everything FOSS, as long as noone tries to sell some proprietary crap to me


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## DutchDaemon (Nov 21, 2008)

@Almindor

Using ports on a desktop/laptop sounds like overkill to me. I will only use ports on heavy servers where I need the extra edge of compiling in a certain way. On the desktop, I use packages 95% of the time (I will use a port if I need a quick security upgrade, or if I just don't want to wait for new functionality).

My latest laptop was up and running in 1.5 hours (STABLE compiled + 478 installed packages, X11/windowmaker). If it takes more time, you're doing it the wrong way.

By the way: GenToo and FreeBSD, while 'alike in spirit', are still very different beasts. I don't think a less-than-optimal experience with GT has any reflection on BSD (one of my colleagues ditched GT for BSD, and he couldn't be happier).


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## Anonymous (Nov 21, 2008)

In 90ies, after OS/2 I started with Debian, Slackware, try SuSE and back to Debian for long time than try Arch and back to Debian, first try to FreeBSD 7 beta ad now is on the computer just FreeBSD 7.0 about one year. I am sorry that I didn't try it ten years earlier


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## oliverh (Nov 21, 2008)

@DutchDaemon I'm compiling once in a while with the help of ccache on one machine and distribute it to the laptop etc.


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## lazyBSD (Nov 21, 2008)

emulators/linux_base-fc4 is most useful linux. :e


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## SeanC (Nov 21, 2008)

SuSE 9.2 was the last linux I can say was my favorite.


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## hitest (Nov 21, 2008)

I run several Debian 4.0 boxes at work.  Apt-get is a good package management system.  At home I run Slackware 12.1 and FreeBSD 7.0.


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## graudeejs (Nov 21, 2008)

braveduck said:
			
		

> Gentoo rocks - portage is very much like FreeBSD's ports



Oh, no gentoo doesn't rock. I have used gentoo for about 1 year. At time i did like it. mostly because i learned many nix things using it. But otherwise it's a nightmare.

Compiling ports(ebuild or whatever, don't remember gentoo's name), sux bigtime. Upgrading ports mostly will fail ever few days.

If you build from sources. it's like russian roulette. you can never be sure that you will be able to successfully compile system.

From point of view of documentation gentoo rocks, but from usability it greatly sux.


I like arch, even if it's not ready yet.

also for new ppl, i recommend Mandriva (well, when i used it it was good, for newcomers)


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## hugo (Nov 21, 2008)

Weinter said:
			
		

> OK OK I know ALL of us LOVE BSD
> But I am sure you all played with Linux before conversion?
> So which is your favourite?



Not necessarily, I know at least one person that got started with FreeBSD 

That said, I've been giving kubuntu 8.10 (desktop) a chance lately. All I'm going to say about it is that it's not ready for the masses (my opinion, of course), as some claim.

I managed to fix most of the problems, and some others I'm sure are KDE4's fault and not ubuntu or linux, so I'm willing to live with them for now. Wouldn't say it has been a negative experience, but I was expecting more.


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## anomie (Nov 21, 2008)

My favorite is RHEL / CentOS. They're stable. They have a long support life cycle. And the updates that are put out (which vary based on life cycle phase) are generally non-disruptive. 

Where possible, I run RHEL like it's a FreeBSD system - I choose the minimum package installation, and configure everything in files, rather than using their system-config-* programs. 

One of the big downsides of RHEL vs. FreeBSD is the package selection. (I am not in the business of adding non-vendor supported repos to RHEL, and I prefer to not compile from source unless totally necessary.) Ports provides an astounding number of useful apps to choose from.


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## fonz (Nov 21, 2008)

darkstar said:
			
		

> I love Slackware Linux, Because it almost similiar with FreeBSD, and sometimes i still use it.



Second that, on both accounts.

In my opinion most Linux distros are usable from an end user's point of view (it's all Linux and it all looks pretty much the same), but when I have to admin the box as well, Slackware causes me to utter the least amount of profanity hands down.

Fonz


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## yks (Nov 21, 2008)

Sometimes Linux crosses my way. For instance, recently tried OpenSUSE 11. Well, it looks quite nice, much nicer than (some very widespread proprietary OS). But as I used it further, I once again came to a conclusion that there's nothing as logical and well-documented as FreeBSD. It always takes so much expensive time to tune something in Linux, and its graphical tools are just a small top of a huge iceberg, that I always give up and return to my favorite OS. But I think one can expect that Linux and (Free)BSD will gradually become closer to each other, and despite all license issues help each other to develop, rather than compete.
BTW FreeBSD license is of course my favorite one, the GPL's "do what we say" can some time turn its dark side to the Linux community.


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## ninjaslim (Nov 21, 2008)

On the subject of GNU, they introduced their own brand of proprietary software that hinders development and quality.  That's why Linux is so far behind.  The BSD license gives more absolute freedom.


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## kantor (Nov 21, 2008)

Debian and sometimes Ubuntu


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## estrabd (Nov 21, 2008)

xubuntu


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## Jay7 (Nov 21, 2008)

/me is using ALT Linux on desktop


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## james89 (Nov 21, 2008)

Slackware and Archlinux.


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## smooth (Nov 22, 2008)

linux sucks FreeBSD rules thats it 
in my world there is only 
*BSD, windows, MAC OS X 
no linux hell no


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## macbias (Nov 22, 2008)

freebsd, windows, osx. same here


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## tomh009 (Nov 22, 2008)

hugo said:
			
		

> Not necessarily, I know at least one person that got started with FreeBSD



  First started with 4BSD, then bought BSD/386 (sources!  I could buy UNIX with sources!).  That turned into BSD/OS, but I moved to NetBSD to run on Alphas.  Now FreeBSD for the last five years or so.

I never did fully get a hang of the System V admin tools, that's why Linux system administration feels so odd.  :\


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## cmc4bsd (Nov 22, 2008)

I support AIX at IBM and first installed FreeBSD at 
home (in the 90's) because it seemed closest to AIX.
I found it easy to install and maintain.

Later I went through a period of running Slackware
and liked it but eventually came back to FreeBSD.

My wife runs Ubuntu because that's what her brother
installed on her computer and she finds it a very
easy to use desktop. I am staying with FreeBSD, only
change is I would like to buy a bigger disk drive
for my PIII (have 17GB now, getting a little tight).


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## Ranguvar (Nov 22, 2008)

Arch, by far. The only feature I miss is Use flag / ports-like functionality. The entire distro is focused on simplicity (NOT ease of use!), vanilla-ness, minimalism, and tweakability. ABS is similar to ports except, sadly, no config flags. To the person that said ABS was hard, it only takes two commands? One to build the package from the PKGBUILD (another feature, Arch packages are built simply through a bash script called a PKGBUILD, which is very easy to write), and one to add through pacman. Pacbuilder makes this even easier. There's also the AUR for user-made packages.

Right now, the only two things I can see FreeBSD has over Arch are stability and the ports configs. I've never had stability problems under Arch, I can just see from a technical perspective why FreeBSD would be more stable. The rolling release is actually more stable, for me, than most scheduled-release distros. *BSD does a very good job of having rock-solid stable releases, as does Slackware (never tried Debian), but I've had too much misery where I'll upgrade the system and three things are broken, with no clue what caused them... with rolling, I can tell what upgrade broke what, and I can downgrade or at least have a starting point towards fixing the problem. Note, this has never happened with Arch so far 

If there was no Arch, I'd likely use Slackware (not as cutting edge, less dependency management means less minimalism since it's more likely that unused packages will be left on the machine, 64-bit version not supported much) or Gentoo (needs more KISS and focus).


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## kantor (Nov 22, 2008)

smooth said:
			
		

> linux sucks FreeBSD rules thats it
> in my world there is only
> *BSD, windows, MAC OS X
> no linux hell no



windows ??? wtf ? so linux sucks but windows is ok ? you are payed by bill gates to write things like this ?


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## mfaridi (Nov 22, 2008)

I use Debian and like it.


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## lyuts (Nov 22, 2008)

My Unix experience started with FreeBSD. After that i worked with different linuxes: Red Hat, Ubuntu, ASP. But again and again i realized that FreeBSD is the best.


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## Almindor (Nov 22, 2008)

DutchDaemon said:
			
		

> @Almindor
> 
> Using ports on a desktop/laptop sounds like overkill to me. I will only use ports on heavy servers where I need the extra edge of compiling in a certain way. On the desktop, I use packages 95% of the time (I will use a port if I need a quick security upgrade, or if I just don't want to wait for new functionality).
> 
> ...



Not if you want to have latest (and in case of freeBSD is usually latest-1.. see e.g: gnome) desktop software.

Also since 7.1 is so close I went with beta and using 7.0 packages would be like having Ubuntu Edgy.

You didn't get me tho. The port installation. while taking time, isn't something that bad (I don't compile suicide ports like O obviously). The problem is the amount of configuration it takes for the system to behave integrated-like (mime-types, defaults etc.)

But it's not a FreeBSD fault, after all it's a server OS.


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## Black (Nov 22, 2008)

Trying a lot of different distros (starting from RH4), I found Arch to be most suited for my needs, but of course after FreeBSD


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## Reza-Khoshbakht (Nov 22, 2008)

My favorite is CentOS.but I use *FreeBSD*
just *BSD* family.


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## none (Nov 22, 2008)

I used to be a brave slackware user and apps compiler. that time I did compile almost all software to use.

then when I had another pc to test and take the first steps to make freebsd home. then I got used to ports system and now I'm a lazy apps compiler  kernel and base I do compile every now and then, from stable.

when I got to know pf, I never ever want to use iptables again ...

none


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## developer (Nov 22, 2008)

ubuntu ...easy....


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## empty (Nov 22, 2008)

Started with Redhat then FreeBSD. Never changed back, and never will!


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## Jeff (Nov 23, 2008)

Started off with Slackware in 1994. Used it for about 8 years then got tired of compiling all the time so switched off and on between: Fedora, OpenSuse, Ubuntu, Debian, Mint, FreeBSD.

My server has been running Debian for 2 years but I'm just about to switch back to FBSD.

I distro hop so much on my laptop its crazy. I was running Mint for the longest time but currently I'm on Kubuntu. 

Hated KDE 4.0 so much I switched back to gnome but I find myself currently using KDE 4.1.3 and getting use to it. Still has a lot of bugs to iron out though.


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## Nicholas (Nov 23, 2008)

I started with Knoppix and Ubuntu LiveCD, cause it wasn't allowed me to install anything to hard drive.  Then was freebsd.


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## Speedy (Nov 23, 2008)

smooth said:
			
		

> linux sucks FreeBSD rules thats it
> in my world there is only
> *BSD, windows, MAC OS X
> no linux hell no



I did not intend to reply here. Hell no. Threads like this simply "suck in" most incompetent opinions. But putting Windows over Linux ... 
Windows is an operating system that should not be connected to the internet. It's so damn broken, and the anti-virus s/w they have to use is the most pathetic measure. For instance, anybody at their right senses could secure a building by blacklisting known bad guys? 
Linux is versatile. Red Hat for point'n'click guys, bloated. Ubuntu for "Linux users", bloated. Debian has certainly it's niche. Slackware gives you really nice feeling. And who said installing Gentoo takes 3 days? Yes, it may take 3 days. And you have a fully customized OS after that, if this is what gives you satisfaction, why not? I install FBSD the same way, after installing the base system I tweak my make.conf and rebuild the world. With customizing all the s/w may take three days, too.


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## ninjaslim (Nov 23, 2008)

Gentoo gives no one satisfaction.  Gentoo installations barely lasted three or four months for me, and I was fairly conservative with upgrades and such.  Gentoo is a broken system.


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## Speedy (Nov 23, 2008)

ninjaslim said:
			
		

> Gentoo gives no one satisfaction.  Gentoo installations barely lasted three or four months for me, and I was fairly conservative with upgrades and such.  Gentoo is a broken system.



Speak for yourself. I'm posting from a Gentoo box, installation is three years old, updated weekly. Gives satisfaction to me. So your statement "Gentoo gives no one satisfaction" is clearly not true. Unless you consider me "no one"?

Edit: Gentoo is not a distribution, it's a framework to build your own Linux. So you cannot say "Gentoo is broken", you can say "My Gentoo is broken" though.


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## ninjaslim (Nov 23, 2008)

You seem to be the exception.  If you look at Gentoo forums, you'll see how many people have left for other distributions, or better yet, a Unix.


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## nske (Nov 24, 2008)

ninjaslim said:
			
		

> Gentoo gives no one satisfaction.
> [...]
> You seem to be the exception.  If you look at Gentoo forums, you'll see how many people have left for other distributions, or better yet, a Unix.



He is not the exception. Gentoo has it's issues, which are indeed more than other projects', imo due to it's more demanding software management system, somewhat loose organization, serious lack of manpower, and political disagreements among the developers.

I don't argue against the fact that FreeBSD has some important advantages, I wouldn't be using it otherwise. It is obvious that it is a more mature project, with higher quality standards and more solid foundations that is standing much better on it's feet. No one said otherwise.

The point is that for me and for many others, regardless of some occasional very specific hic-ups -none of which had devastating consequences, so far-, gentoo works great (in my case has been for over 5 years in multiple boxes) and provides flexibility which does not exist in other operating systems or distributions.

Other people might not be willing to sacrifice quality for that flexibility, or may not even consider the system flexible. That's perfectly reasonable. I would also be hesitant to choose Gentoo for a role in which even the smallest downtime would be castastrophic, even though it hasn't failed me in the past.

It is, non the less, a system that works reasonably well for some of us and provides some unique features that some of us appreciate.

So please don't be so absolute in your judgement.


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## UNIXgod (Nov 24, 2008)

Gentoo Gentoo Gentoo Gentoo Gentoo Gentoo Gentoo Gentoo Gentoo Gentoo Gentoo Gentoo Gentoo Gentoo Gentoo Gentoo Gentoo Gentoo Gentoo Gentoo

Is a great toy if set up correctly!


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## dtknowles (Nov 24, 2008)

I started on Debian and then switched to Slackware before adopting FreeBSD. You can see a definite progression there. While I have heard the accusation that BSD-derived operating systems are harder to use, I have found that not to be the case at all. The ports collection, complete system source tree, and complete documentation are definite advantages in FreeBSD's favor. Everything is just designed to work together. The only thing I really miss is the native flash player.


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## ninjaslim (Nov 24, 2008)

BSD-derived systems seem harder to use because they give you a barebones system upon install.  That has never bothered me.  I setup my system the exact same way each and every time.  When I had to setup a second desktop, I just wrote a post-install script that automates system configuration and application installation and configuration, while spitting enough information so that I know what's going on.  Within an hour or so, I have my familiar system setup.


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## brd@ (Nov 24, 2008)

anomie said:
			
		

> Where possible, I run RHEL like it's a FreeBSD system - I choose the minimum package installation, and configure everything in files, rather than using their system-config-* programs.
> 
> One of the big downsides of RHEL vs. FreeBSD is the package selection. (I am not in the business of adding non-vendor supported repos to RHEL, and I prefer to not compile from source unless totally necessary.) Ports provides an astounding number of useful apps to choose from.



I'm stuck with RHEL at work for MySQL and Java Tomcat boxes, everything else is FreeBSD. I do similar things trying to keep RHEL thin, but it is a pain when the installer works against you. I sorely miss the ports collection, cause I hate going outside the RHEL supported repo for things I need.

I started with RH, then when RH7 came out, it was too bloated so I tried FreeBSD and never looked back. That was in early 2003.


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## ninjaslim (Nov 24, 2008)

I actually like RHEL/Fedora.  Those two (not any other offshoots or re-brands) and Debian are the only Linux systems that seem close to Unix ideology that I'd use.  The rest are just too foregone.  Also, to me RHEL/Fedora are comparable to Solaris/OpenSolaris, not really to BSD as BSD vision is so different from SysV vision.


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## hitest (Nov 24, 2008)

ninjaslim said:
			
		

> I actually like RHEL/Fedora.  Those two (not any other offshoots or re-brands) and Debian are the only Linux systems that seem close to Unix ideology that I'd use.  The rest are just too foregone.



The two versions of Linux that I primarily use are Debian 4.0 at work and Slackware at home.  I've found Slackware 12.1 to be stable, secure, and highly reliable, just like FreeBSD 7.0.  Also, in Slackware you are free to compile programs, install binary pre-built packages, or you can install source code using build scripts (you are not locked into only compiling software).
At the risk of being branded a heretic I am very happy to be a member of both communities (Slackware, FreeBSD). :e


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## Barnon (Nov 24, 2008)

*Favorite Linux ?*

Currently my favorite OS with a Linux kernel , is Ubuntu, but
I would like to briefly share my history with FBSD and Linux
kernel OS's.

The year was 1996, MS did not have a secure stable OS out yet so
I went to a amateur radio swap meet and picked up copies of
Slackware, and a couple of other Linuxes. The seller suggested
that I try FreeBSD, which at that time I had never heard of.

I spent 2 days trying to install Slackware , 2 days trying the
other Linuxes (I think RH and/or Suse) without much success.
The partioning, compiling and dependencies that did not get
automatically installed drove me to reconsider using MS NT 3.5.

As I was cleaning up, I found the FreeBSD 2.2 install disks. I
decided to try it, what the heck , there was one more day left
this week. In about 2 hours, I had FreeBSD installed, networked
and X running. I have gone back to trying RH, Suse, and lately
Ubuntu, but I find that I am most comfortable with FreeBSD.

The thing I love most about FreeBSD is its stability. After 14
years running it, I have never had a crash that wasn't caused
by hardware , and wasn't easily recoverable. I have introduced
many many friends to FreeBSD, most of with dual boot to it.

Thanks, FreeBSD.


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## businessgeeks (Nov 26, 2008)

been using ubuntu for the desktop and freebsd for servers. but now, im starting to move my laptop to freebsd...


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## BuSerD (Nov 26, 2008)

I have access to two virtual servers provided by my employer personal use & testing. I am to lazy to test anything so I manage to ignore them for the most part. One of the virts is of course FreeBSD 7.1 Beta(for bug reporting) while the other is RHEL 5 to allow me to screw up things in a controlled environment prior to giving a customer an even bigger headache. On to the point of the thread. My personal desktop runs FreeBSD 7 exclusively. My work desktop/station runs Gentoo by choice which has not failed me in the 2+ years it has been running. The only reason my work station does not running FreeBSD is that our stations are not allowed to run virtualization software and I need things like flash available to fix websites for less(shall we say) astute customers. With the flash support in FreeBSD 7.1 i may be able to correct in the near future. I have tried many linux distros but Gentoo, ELive and Debian top the list in that order.


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## vermaden (Nov 26, 2008)

Favorite Linux you say ... if it had to be Linux let it be *Draco Linux*, it uses OSS4 by default instead of ALSA and PulseShit and pkgsrc.org for package management, also all configuration is based on /etc/rc.conf file.

The second one is *Arch Linux*, which comes with ALSA by default but OSS is in their repository and configuration is again in /etc/rc.conf

I stay away from *Debian* as far as possible, their package management (APT) is rubbish, every package split into these small thingies for every occasion: -dev -bin -common -not-very-common -full -extra -asd -wtf ... I am not surprised that they like to mention how MANY packages they have.

Also I hate thirs configuration files schemma, like for apache or nginx for example. sites-enabled sites-disabled modules-enabled modules-disabled asd-disabled asd.conf asd.d asd.modules-not-sure and so on.


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## drhowarddrfine (Nov 26, 2008)

I have no use for Linux.  FreeBSD does everything I need, and better, except play flash properly.


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## anomie (Nov 27, 2008)

brd@ said:
			
		

> I sorely miss the ports collection, cause I hate going outside the RHEL supported repo for things I need.



Exactly. Ports contain a great variety. One small example: when I moved a web server to RHEL recently, I had to switch to a new log analyzer (because I make a practice to stay within the repos, unless it is simply not possible). :\


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## vermaden (Nov 27, 2008)

anomie said:
			
		

> Exactly. Ports contain a great variety. One small example: when I moved a web server to RHEL recently, I had to switch to a new log analyzer (because I make a practice to stay within the repos, unless it is simply not possible). :\



Have you tried to run *pkgsrc.org* on Linux? Its one of the supported platforms.


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## Eponasoft (Nov 27, 2008)

CentOS and Arch. By the way, this thread is in the wrong subforum.


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## anomie (Nov 27, 2008)

vermaden said:
			
		

> Have you tried to run *pkgsrc.org* on Linux? Its one of the supported platforms.



No, I haven't - but that is an intriguing idea for experimentation. (I ran NetBSD for a short time on one of my laptops, FWIW.) 

For production RHEL servers my philosophy could probably be summarized as: keep it simple, secure, "standardized", and easy to maintain.  That is why I'm staying with officially supported repos wherever possible. (Even if it is limiting at times.)


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## dodo1122 (Nov 27, 2008)

I have used gentoo for quite some time, but it went hownhill quite drastically. Right now I use freebsd and exherbo, which is basically Gentoo done right. Unfortunately it's still pre-alpha, and doesn't have some essential packages, but with some bash scripting skills you can write exhereses (like ebuilds in gentoo) in no time.


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## vermaden (Nov 27, 2008)

anomie said:
			
		

> For production RHEL servers my philosophy could probably be summarized as: keep it simple, secure, "standardized", and easy to maintain.  That is why I'm staying with officially supported repos wherever possible. (Even if it is limiting at times.)



*pkgsrc.org* would be kept only at one dir /usr/pkgsrc + /usr/pkg so I do not see any "bad" things here, only matter of of adding additional PATH.

Also *openpkg.org* is kept in similar way, only /openpkg and nothing more, even all scripts are kept there.


----------



## Nulani (Nov 28, 2008)

Gentoo, Draco and Arch.


----------



## hydra (Nov 28, 2008)

I also work with Gentoo, it works very well as a server. I use FreeBSD for desktop and also works great.


----------



## tangram (Dec 2, 2008)

I like Gentoo though I have nice memories of Debian. Gentoo is used on a desktop machine to run mainly VirtualBox and flash. My laptop does run OpenSUSE as my wife likes it.

Gentoo has very good documentation, loads of packages and I can customize it as I see fit. From it I'd say the logical step is to move to FreeBSD due to some similarities such as the organization of ports/portage, documentation and customization.

I guess that the killer feature that I look for in a system is documentation and in the Linux land I'd point to Gentoo as its best example.


----------



## tenq (Dec 2, 2008)

Started from ASPLinux, not so clear. A bit later  I'm took FreeBSD 5.2.1 install CD from friend, who worked at this time in local ISP. And from this time actively using FreeBSD, as server\router and as desktop. 

Answering a theme question I will tell that the favourite distribution kit linux - slackware because it really GNU 
PS:Has tried many distribution kits linux & other systems, but really cosy I feel only in FreeBSD.


----------



## sT4k3 (Dec 3, 2008)

The best linux - FreeBSD!!! ))


----------



## ikehack (Dec 4, 2008)

I like Slackware. My biggest thing with Slackware is how 99.9% of anything I've had to compile on it, compiled with no problems. That is, didn't ask me to get this library or this dependency; you know, the usual.


----------



## Coplen (Dec 13, 2008)

I really dug Debian for a long time so I'll go with that.


----------



## gullit (Dec 13, 2008)

I use Slackware and Gentoo Linux, like FBSD they are very stable and simple to use.


----------



## r-c-e (Dec 13, 2008)

For servers I always use CentOS, with the EPEL and RPMFORGE repositories added to yum. For desktops Ubuntu all the way.


----------



## z0ran (Dec 13, 2008)

i don't even think about linux...how can i, i have most powerful OS in the world, why would i downgrade it to like..ubuntu..or something.


----------



## r-c-e (Dec 14, 2008)

z0ran said:
			
		

> i don't even think about linux...how can i, i have most powerful OS in the world, why would i downgrade it to like..ubuntu..or something.



never underestimate linux as a decent mysql server!


----------



## DutchDaemon (Dec 14, 2008)

I find it very difficult to underestimate linux.


----------



## cmanns (Dec 16, 2008)

r-c-e said:
			
		

> never underestimate linux as a decent mysql server!



You should try MySQL on FreeBSD and then edit your post, or learn how to tune MySQL while you're at it and then edit it. I've had nothing but performance gains with FreeBSD & MySQL, and I'm not really biased.

I use Debian sometimes, it's half decent. Also someone said Windows should never be connected to the internet, I've ran windows without anti-virus and such and I've never gotten virus's, when I used to fix computers the ones filled with virus's were filled with pornographic material... soo yeah. If you browse safely with windows you shouldn't have a issue, it's very insecure though regardless.


----------



## r-c-e (Dec 16, 2008)

cmanns said:
			
		

> You should try MySQL on FreeBSD and then edit your post, or learn how to tune MySQL while you're at it and then edit it. I've had nothing but performance gains with FreeBSD & MySQL, and I'm not really biased.



Having "tried" MySQL on thousands of FreeBSD and Linux systems I think I might leave my post as is, but thanks for the invitation. I have found Linux w/ SMP gives me more performance even after tuning so I use it on dedicated systems. On systems with both web servers and MySQL, FreeBSD is my choice.

What I have found to be true, more than performance between the two; performance is dictated by the least competent query creator on the system.


----------



## alik (Dec 17, 2008)

I used or tried Corel Linux, some old RedHat, Mandrake, SUSE, Arch, Debian, (Woody and Sarge), Zenwalk and Ubuntu (all since 5.10). I have Xubuntu 7.10 on my computer in work, so it is good time to reinstall (waiting for FreeBSD7.1)


----------



## meeb (Dec 17, 2008)

I am using debians PowerPC-Port on my iBook but mostly used Slackware before switching to FreeBSD.


----------



## Pushrod (Dec 29, 2008)

My favourite Linux is that "FreeBSD version of Linux" that Microsoft made. 

http://www.computerweekly.com/Articles/2002/02/28/185399/on-the-campaign-with-big-bill.htm


----------



## cloud (Dec 31, 2008)

Debian is the only distrib I can support.
I have run Gentoo for many years but finally it's so useless. The same spirit than FreeBSD but with all the inconvenients of Linux ... Using it in production is boring.

And finally FreeBSD > * :f


----------



## rliegh (Jan 6, 2009)

I've got OpenSUSE 11.1 on my desktop and laptop -so far it seems to be stable, fast and easy to use. At this point I definately prefer it to Ubuntu (and I'm no longer all that fond of wasting my time on minimalist distros like Slackware).


----------



## jb (Jan 9, 2009)

+1 Arch


----------



## oliverh (Jan 9, 2009)

If I'm looking for quality and reliability, nothing compares to Slackware. It may drive some people nuts because of the missing dependencies but that's a feature of this distro 

Slack I say - within the plethora of Linux distros it actually sucks less


----------



## vermaden (Jan 9, 2009)

oliverh said:
			
		

> If I'm looking for quality and reliability, nothing compares to Slackware. It may drive some people nuts because of the missing dependencies but that's a feature of this distro
> 
> Slack I say - within the plethora of Linux distros it actually sucks less



You can use *pkgsrc.org* / *apt-get (slapt)* / *openpkg.org* with Slackware to provide package management with dependency handling.


----------



## oliverh (Jan 9, 2009)

vermaden said:
			
		

> You can use *pkgsrc.org* / *apt-get (slapt)* / *openpkg.org* with Slackware to provide package management with dependency handling.




Yes I know, but I don't see this as disadvantage. As much as I like the ports in FBSD, I do like writing my scripts in Slack ;-)


----------



## rliegh (Jan 9, 2009)

vermaden said:
			
		

> You can use *pkgsrc.org* / *apt-get (slapt)* / *openpkg.org* with Slackware to provide package management with dependency handling.


I've tried using pkgsrc with openbsd, slackware and opensolaris -and I've never been able to reliably get any of the more complex items (gnome, or even firefox) to build. That may be due to my lack of programming skills; but it makes me wonder if it's really possible to use pkgsrc as a full-out application/package manager outside of netbsd.


----------



## vermaden (Jan 9, 2009)

rliegh said:
			
		

> I've tried using pkgsrc with openbsd, slackware and opensolaris -and I've never been able to reliably get any of the more complex items (gnome, or even firefox) to build. That may be due to my lack of programming skills; but it makes me wonder if it's really possible to use pkgsrc as a full-out application/package manager outside of netbsd.



OpenSolaris is not one of the supported platforms unfotunelly (Solaris 8/9 is if I recall corectlry), althout I saw multiple howtos on blogs about making pkgsrc work @ OpenSolaris.

Also why use pkgsrc @ OpenBSD when OpenBSD has its own ports?


----------



## rliegh (Jan 10, 2009)

vermaden said:
			
		

> OpenSolaris is not one of the supported platforms unfotunelly (Solaris 8/9 is if I recall corectlry), althout I saw multiple howtos on blogs about making pkgsrc work @ OpenSolaris.
> 
> Also why use pkgsrc @ OpenBSD when OpenBSD has its own ports?



The same reason I tried to use it on FreeBSD; if you can use one framwork on multiple operating systems, then you only have to download one set of distfiles. It's more convient to build what you need in pkgsrc, archive the distfiles and then have them available when you feel like using another BSD -as opposed to having to re-download them seperately for Free and Open BSD.


----------



## ninjaslim (Jan 11, 2009)

I don't know, I haven't touched Linux in ages.  These days, my proven combo is FreeBSD and Mac OS X.  Total Unix and total productivity!


----------



## Oko (Jan 16, 2009)

rliegh said:
			
		

> I've tried using pkgsrc with openbsd, slackware and opensolaris -and I've never been able to reliably get any of the more complex items (gnome, or even firefox) to build. That may be due to my lack of programming skills; but it makes me wonder if it's really possible to use pkgsrc as a full-out application/package manager outside of netbsd.


It is of course possible on DragonFly which is tier one platform for pkgsrc  but you have a good point about other platforms. That was my personal experience as well on OpenBSD. I wonder if it had anything to do with the fact that I always install native XOrg.  
Maybe pkgsrc will work better when NetBSD switches completely to Xorg after 5.0 release.

To people how are wondering why would somebody use pkgsrc on OpenBSD I will give couple reasons.

OpenBSD is mostly binary source OS and packages are updated once in 6 months. Using pkgsrc will enable you to use OpenBSD in the same fashion like FreeBSD (moving target packages).
Obviously there are 3000 more pkgsrc then OpenBSD ports and almost 5000 more counting vip pkgsrc. 
Finally OpenBSD has no stable packages anymore while pkgsrc has constant security updates.


----------



## amorosso (Jan 18, 2009)

Hi, after reading all these post, but witch linux would be good for a web site server.. I'm very very new to this.. Thank you..


----------



## hitest (Jan 19, 2009)

amorosso said:
			
		

> Hi, after reading all these post, but witch linux would be good for a web site server.. I'm very very new to this.. Thank you..



Any version of Linux should ship with the Apache web server.


----------



## oliverh (Jan 19, 2009)

amorosso said:
			
		

> Hi, after reading all these post, but witch linux would be good for a web site server.. I'm very very new to this.. Thank you..



E.g. Debian and Centos - both with stability and reliability in mind.


----------



## Oko (Jan 19, 2009)

oliverh said:
			
		

> E.g. Debian and Centos - both with stability and reliability in mind.


Hi OliverH,

I know you have been using Linux since 1992 or so. Could you give some objective comparasion of four major Linux distros
CentOS, OpenSuSE, Debian, and Slack firstly for the server then for the Desktop.

I have been living most of my adult life in U.S. and seems to me that nothing compares to RedHat (CentOS) when it comes to enterprise level server and even a desktop. On the another hand for a hobbiest or non-proprietary applications Slack seems the best thing. In my personal experiance Slack people are also most competent Unix users closely followed by RedHat.I have really bad experiences with Debian people and pretend to be Debian (Ubuntu) people. I must confess though that Ubuntu is closest to Windows and OS X among non-proprietary systems but RedHat is 
really good IMHO for a enterprise desktop.OpenSuSE user base in U.S. is non existing in my experience.    

Thanks for any input.


----------



## oliverh (Jan 20, 2009)

Hi Oko

apart from *BSD I am long-time Slacker. Centos is in my opinion the 'new shooting star' at the os heaven. Debian is yet a good system, easy to administer but it has got some massive problems lately because of 'politics'. Compared to 'rpm hell' Debian _can_work like a charm, but in the end I would chose Centos because of the overall quality. So 'Gods own distro - Debian - is a very difficult case, it _can_ fulfill certain tasks but it has got - in my very own opinion - a tendency for failure.

Centos for servers, Slack for the Desktop of the somewhat experienced user.


----------



## ChickenWing88 (Jan 27, 2009)

Here is my operating system preference in order  of  most recently used 

1.FreeBSD	
2.PCBSD
3.Ubuntu
4.Mandriva
5.Fedora


----------



## PetrusValidus (Jan 29, 2009)

I don't have one favorite Linux distro, I use a few for different reasons.  I think a lot of people on here do the same.

Mandriva: Windows *desktop* replacement (websurfing, watching DVDs, games, fun stuff, etc)

Novell's SLED: Windows *workstation* replacement (All work, no play!)

Debian: Linux workstation

I haven't done too much with Linux servers so no opinion there.  But I would probably choose Debian.  When I do use FreeBSD it's for a workstation.  To me, Debian and FreeBSD are analogous to each other.  Both very reliable OSes.  Still not too familiar with FreeBSD but I hope to be soon.


----------



## Mad_Dud (Jan 31, 2009)

I'm still in love with Slackware


----------



## rghq (Feb 1, 2009)

Slackware would be the only "acceptable" Linux distro for me.

Personally I don't like Debian's "symlinking" - placing configuration files under /etc, then symlinking them across the system, also for some Webapps. Some people may get used to it, for me it's just confusing.


----------



## alie (Feb 2, 2009)

1) FreeBSD
2) Debian


----------



## gpan (Feb 8, 2009)

Arch Linux (another relatively unknown giant) with a great package manager (pacman). What I would like to ask is if there's a graphical package manager equivalent to Shaman (a graphical package manager for Pacman).


----------



## fronclynne (Feb 9, 2009)

When DOS was eaten by windows95, I went looking for a CLI, and eventually found slackware.  Whilst scrolling through the interminable comments of some forgotten /. article, I saw a reference to FreeBSD and decided to try it.  I still have a soft spot in my heart for slackware (hail Bob), but gentoo is fine for linux and I'm playing with arch (and it seemeth okay).  Ubuntu is what I installed for the GF.

Linux's /etc gives me the heebie jeebies, though.


----------



## Daisuke_Aramaki (Feb 9, 2009)

New user here, and relatively new to FreeBSD as well. But a longtime Linux user. My favorite Linux distributions are Lunar and Sorcerer. Two of my production machines are powered by them and will remain so as well. My first experience with FreeBSD was loading it on a Lenovo laptop, and everything works great. Eyeing my other laptops for the migration as well.


----------



## ligregni (Feb 12, 2009)

*The linux I would join with FreeBSD is...*

Hi!, This is my first post here!!!, I noticed that FreeBSD has it own forums... TODAY!!!

About the linux I like (and, as the Thread creator said, I love FreeBSD), it will be *Slackware*.

Why?, because it is not too easy, just like FreeBSD, I love that when you install FreeBSD, you must do everything, the OS will not do that for you, and, after a minutes installing, all you get is a simple CLI, and, WOW!!!, you can control the world with that..., about Slackware, I liked that, when installig, it says:

"You must partition your disk, use fdisk...", I toke it like: "I will not do that for you, so!, let's move!"... And thats why in the other side, I hate *buntus and the other linux distros.

The other linux I like is named *Austrumi*, it is a really interesting proyect, you burn your CD, boot from it, it loads the OS on RAM, the CD is ejected, and you have a very minimalist linux working on your RAM... like Live-CD but pretty much faster...

But, really I am a PC-BSD user (I know it is quite simple as Ubuntu, but it has FreeBSD behind...), and a FreeBSD newbie (I wanna use it all in CLI)

Greetings from MEXICO!!!


----------



## jemate18 (Feb 17, 2009)

My favorite GNU/Linux:
1. Ubuntu - easy to use and work with
2. openSUSE - Best KDE implementation ever


----------



## pradtf (Feb 20, 2009)

amorosso said:
			
		

> Hi, after reading all these post, but witch linux would be good for a web site server.. I'm very very new to this.. Thank you..



we've run our home servers with slackware, ubuntu, openbsd, debian and finally freebsd7. we have had no problems with any of them other than ubuntu when i followed an upgrade that crashed the server and didn't get fixed for a day or so as well as with openbsd where i did the regular upgrades which led to a deterioration of a system that had been running quite well for more than half-a-year.

on the freebsd-questions maillist i asked about upgrading and got some very sound advice from more than one person. if everything is working as you want it to, why would you want to upgrade?

we've been running freebsd7 for more than a year now and we're sticking with it!


----------



## pradtf (Feb 20, 2009)

rghq said:
			
		

> Personally I don't like Debian's "symlinking" - placing configuration files under /etc, then symlinking them across the system, also for some Webapps.



i agree! initially, i had thought this was a clever and flexible idea, but things felt a lot more unnecessarily complex afterwards.


----------



## pradtf (Feb 20, 2009)

jemate18 said:
			
		

> My favorite GNU/Linux:
> 1. Ubuntu - easy to use and work with
> 2. openSUSE - Best KDE implementation ever



1. ubuntu is nice, but typing sudo all the time drove me nuts 

2. it does seem to be very smooth so far and it is the 'recommended' linux of the kdedevelopers from what i understand:
http://www.kdedevelopers.org/node/3528


----------



## tankist02 (Feb 20, 2009)

Type

sudo su -

and get a permanent root terminal.


----------



## ChickenWing88 (Feb 23, 2009)

*Top Three Linux Distributions*

The fallowing  is a list of my three favorite Linux Distributions


Ubuntu ( Best For Laptops)
2. OpenSuse ( Mostt hardware support for Pavillion a6230n)
Debian (Best for Cli based systems (I.E. Servers and power user  Desktops))


----------



## crsd (Feb 23, 2009)

My favorite Linux is no Linux at all


----------



## alie (Feb 23, 2009)

@crsd: hahahaha. good answer! +1 for u


----------



## s3cur1ty (Feb 26, 2009)

Gentoo and slackware, I use them quite a bit


----------



## s3cur1ty (Feb 26, 2009)

killasmurf86 said:
			
		

> Oh, no gentoo doesn't rock. I have used gentoo for about 1 year. At time i did like it. mostly because i learned many nix things using it. But otherwise it's a nightmare.
> 
> Compiling ports(ebuild or whatever, don't remember gentoo's name), sux bigtime. Upgrading ports mostly will fail ever few days.
> 
> ...


Hey, but isn't that the fun of gentoo? Finding out what went wrong and fixing it, building a system to your liking.


----------



## ArtemD (Feb 26, 2009)

I use Debian when I have to use Linux. At work I am forced to use RedHat Enterprise thou


----------



## lissyara (Feb 27, 2009)

I start with FreeBSD.
I use many Linux, AIX, Solaris...
But, my desktop (home & works) - FreeBSD.
Many servers - FreeBSD (mail, db, www, filesharing & other)
But... Many servers with linux & AIX - for Oracle =(((
I love FreeBSD, and hate Linux =)
It stupid and non-logic system.


----------



## irkkaaja (Mar 6, 2009)

DutchDaemon said:
			
		

> @Almindor
> 
> Using ports on a desktop/laptop sounds like overkill to me. I will only use ports on heavy servers where I need the extra edge of compiling in a certain way. On the desktop, I use packages 95% of the time (I will use a port if I need a quick security upgrade, or if I just don't want to wait for new functionality).
> 
> ...


As I recall, the closest linux distro to FreeBSD is really CRUX, not Gentoo. I don't have any experience with it, though.


----------



## vermaden (Mar 6, 2009)

irkkaaja said:
			
		

> As I recall, the closest linux distro to FreeBSD is really CRUX, not Gentoo. I don't have any experience with it, though.


You should check Draco Linux, that I mentioned here:
http://forums.freebsd.org/showpost.php?p=3172&postcount=70


----------



## irkkaaja (Mar 6, 2009)

vermaden said:
			
		

> You should check Draco Linux, that I mentioned here:
> http://forums.freebsd.org/showpost.php?p=3172&postcount=70



I would have mentioned Draco, but it's still on a horribly outdated set of core components; kernel 2.6.*23* and gcc *4.1*. The whole "linux with pkgsrc" isn't a new idea, though: it's been done before, too, but voltalinux is dead.


----------



## oliverh (Mar 6, 2009)

>kernel 2.6.23 and gcc 4.1

Bleeding edge is the decease of the Linux-world.


----------



## fbsduser (Mar 8, 2009)

The one linux I like is Ubuntu Ultimate x64 
Next to it I got FreeBSD 7.0 x86.
(I like both OS's, but tend to use linux more since I'm on a laptop, and linux supports it better than BSD).
BTW: Dunno if it's just me, but, There are quite a lot of hate here towards linux (both in sig's and posts). I expected hate toward windoze, but didn't really expect such hate toward linux.


----------



## DutchDaemon (Mar 8, 2009)

Please let's not start a Linux/BSD thread again  It's all been said before. For example: you'll hardly ever find things like 'M$', 'Winblows' and 'Windoze' on a BSD forum. It's a different outlook, and it's geared toward Unix in general (the Big Friend), not Microsoft (the Big Enemy). I don't hate Microsoft, it hardly even exists for me; and I don't think any BSD is trying to overthrow and annihilate Microsoft; they just want to build a robust and secure operating system in its own right. Focus on their own work. Then there's the historic 'pain' of BSD getting caught up in and slowed down by a lengthy lawsuit because of licensing issues (UNIX), which paved the way for Linux steaming ahead, which still bothers some people who feel Linux only has quantity, whereas BSD has quality. There's the (perceived) "chaotic/unorganised/sloppy Linux" vs. "elite/tightly organised/smooth BSD" development process. Etc. etc. etc. etc. Really, Google has all the threads and history of Linux/BSD.. The twain shall probably never meet again.


----------



## FBSDin20Steps (Mar 8, 2009)

Right now. I use FreeBSD and Ubuntu as a desktop. Once virtualbox is ported to FreeBSD...(I hope it will). Then it's FreeBSD all the way

Greetz


----------



## alie (Mar 8, 2009)

yup... i am waiting for it also... now i am using OpenSolaris for my office desktop and FreeBSD for my home dekstop.


----------



## rliegh (Mar 12, 2009)

irkkaaja said:
			
		

> The whole "linux with pkgsrc" isn't a new idea, though: it's been done before, too, but voltalinux is dead.


It's my understanding they say the same thing about BSD too. 

Wrong in both cases.


----------



## oliverh (Mar 13, 2009)

>It's my understanding they say the same thing about BSD too. 

Yes BSD is dying for some decades now. That's humor, but comparing a mature and well-known operating system that drives huge parts of the internet to some distro is somewhat bewildering.


----------



## christian (Mar 14, 2009)

My favourite Linux is Slackware, it's the OS I use the most time. Linux and *BSD are great operating systems, both of them have got their advantages and disadvantages. 

BTW: I don't like BSD vs. Linux flamewars as well as I don't like Linux/BSD/Unix vs. Windows flamewars. Everybody can use the OS he want to use. For example for a user, who only wants to write letters, the OS is not really interesting, the most operating systems will provide capabilities to do that. FreeBSD and Linux are the operating systems, which fulfill my expectations, so I use both.

Best Regards
christian


----------



## Graaf_van_Vlaanderen (Mar 19, 2009)

For my desktop I use OpenSolaris.

My two compute servers run FreeBSD. (GNU Octave)

My file server runs OpenSolaris: ZFS

My laptop runs on Ubuntu.


----------



## fbsduser (Jun 14, 2009)

christian said:
			
		

> My favourite Linux is Slackware, it's the OS I use the most time. Linux and *BSD are great operating systems, both of them have got their advantages and disadvantages.
> 
> BTW: I don't like BSD vs. Linux flamewars as well as I don't like Linux/BSD/Unix vs. Windows flamewars. Everybody can use the OS he want to use. For example for a user, who only wants to write letters, the OS is not really interesting, the most operating systems will provide capabilities to do that. FreeBSD and Linux are the operating systems, which fulfill my expectations, so I use both.
> 
> ...



Funny thing is I tend to find the Linux+BSD vs Windows flamefests funny. But I guess that's because I tend to put Linux & BSD (since they both are opensource) in the same "team" and windows in the other one.

Also my Favorite Linux changed from ubuntu ultimate to M$Linux 11.1 x64.


----------



## DutchDaemon (Jun 14, 2009)

I see Linux vs Windows flamefests. I fail to see BSD vs Windows flamefests, really. We're not that bothered. We don't write M$ either..


----------



## ChickenWing88 (Jun 15, 2009)

*Dabbling wilt different  Dsirobutions.*

My personal preference is Refhat based distributions such as Fedora or CenTOS. I haver also dabbled with slackware, Ubuntu, Pre novel Suse Linx 9.0,OpenSuse and Debian.


----------



## ericbsd (Jun 15, 2009)

I prefer Ubuntu because the synaptic have all application like FreeBSD package and use gnome2 for desktop manager.


----------



## tangram (Jun 15, 2009)

ericturgeon said:
			
		

> I prefer Ubuntu because the synaptic have all application like FreeBSD package and use gnome2 for desktop manager.



And you like brown? (j/k)


----------



## hitest (Jun 16, 2009)

At the moment I'm running at home:

FreeBSD 7.2-amd64, Slackware 12.2, and Debian 5.0.


----------



## PetrusValidus (Jun 16, 2009)

I am running as of right now:

Primary workstation: Mandriva 2008.1
Laptop: openSUSE 11.1
Server: Debian Lenny


----------



## LateNiteTV (Jun 16, 2009)

debian.
i kind of want to try arch someday too.


----------



## gnemmi (Jun 17, 2009)

Mandriva 2009.1 running on my Dell 1318.
FreeBSD 7.0 running on my desktop.


----------



## drhowarddrfine (Jun 17, 2009)

Ok. This pathetic thread has been going on for 7 months now and is a duplicate of hundreds of other forums all over the 'net.


----------



## Bobarino (Jun 17, 2009)

drhowarddrfine said:
			
		

> Ok. This pathetic thread has been going on for 7 months now and is a duplicate of hundreds of other forums all over the 'net.



You're absolutely right.

But, since the thread is still open.....Debian


----------



## ckt1g3r (Jun 17, 2009)

Slackware Linux > FreeBSD > Arch Linux , is my favorite OS.


----------



## dburkland (Jun 20, 2009)

FreeBSD and if I can't get it to run on my hardware then ArchLinux gets installed.


----------



## copypaiste (Jun 25, 2009)

If only major vendors paid more attention to freebsd we could forget about all these linuces ^_^ Though openSUSE is ok for a desktop.


----------



## hitest (Jun 25, 2009)

When I run Linux it is either Slackware or Debian.


----------



## Allamgir (Aug 5, 2009)

Formerly Arch, now Slackware.


----------



## MG (Aug 5, 2009)

For a Linux distro I'd have a clean LFS system. Just a kernel, binutils, common base binaries and all  the sources. No files relating to any specific distro.

Anyone ever heard of Linpus Linux? It was once on my Acer netbook. Never seen a distro suck that much. It was completely infected by Acer to be sure nothing will work from shell.
I think it's important for the Linux community to keep the knowledge and not to become owned by companies. They are running a silent war against O.S.S, but will never admit that.


----------



## CodeBlock (Aug 7, 2009)

Well, I've only first tried FreeBSD about 2 or 3 weeks ago, and instantly fell in love with it. Most stuff seemed to *work* and when it doesn't there were many, *many* ways to get help.. Google, IRC, Forums, PR's, Mailing Lists, etc, etc..

I first started in the *nix world with FreeSpire, which I ended up hating, when xorg wouldn't work right, and moved to Ubuntu. After a few months, I grew out of that, and moved on to Debian. After sticking with Debian for a few _years_, people kept telling me to try ArchLinux. Right off the bat there were a few things I didn't like about it, namely how protective the Arch community is... I gave it a shot anyway, and stuck with it for a few months, and still to this day, dual boot it, with fBSD on my laptop. After Arch I decided it was time to try something new, and was pointed in the world of the BSDs. So I gave Free a try and instantly fell in love with it. Ports are amazing, the documentation is great, the community is very nice. Overall it was-- *IS* great.

Recently my friend told me to try Gentoo Linux, which I have now, on my secondary desktop. I think if I was going to back fully back to Linux, it would be Gentoo. However I really have no plans on going back.

So, to cap it up:
I run BSD when I can:
 - Desktop
 - Laptop (dual boot)
 - Test Server
I run Debian on my VPS
I run Easy Peasy (an ubuntu variant) on my netbook (considering throwing BSD on it though)
I run Arch on my laptop (dual boot) (thinking about replacing with Gentoo)
I run CentOS on my other home server. (once again, considering moving it to BSD).
I have a third desktop with a windows install on it, and XP on the second drive of my Desktop, but never used.

Phew- lots of typing xD.


----------



## kano (Aug 8, 2009)

I used to run Debian on my servers and ArchLinux on my desktops/laptops. Debian was nice and stable for the servers, but trying to use it on the desktop usually just frustrated me as stable is too old and the unstable I had things break too often.

Arch was nice on the desktop as things were very simple to configure (kinda like BSD, but not quite) and had the latest packages. The rolling-release system was not very good for server use though.

I've used tons of Linux distros over the years (Redhat, Mandrake, SuSE, Gentoo, Slackware, Ubuntu, Fedora, and probably more) and those were the two I liked the best.

Everything is FreeBSD (except one) now though.  I have the best of both plus more!


----------



## Bunyan (Aug 8, 2009)

My favourite Linux distribution is SLACKWARE. It is simple, BSD-like.


----------



## segfault (Aug 12, 2009)

Agreed, it's all about Slackware for me too. Gentoo was alright too.


----------



## gripek (Aug 12, 2009)

Hmm...
On the start with my travel I use "PLD 1.0" http://www.pld-linux.org/
After, I install Slackware and I love this distrubution.
Next, Debian. Nice, Simple, Many howto's, forums, docs. Apt-get is realy good...
SUSE Linux - no comment... This "yast" is a "M$ Win" Control Panel! Is not a linux for me 
RedHat/CentOS is very nice. Clean-up, order, simple system.
But... Fedora not like user instructions and preferences. I make have "Xfce4" - ok, but fedora autoinstall in my system 10000 dependence.
I don't like this! Wrr..! 

My like Linux is Slackware but I don't use him. 
RedHat/Centos and Debian is so good for me


----------



## pripiat (Aug 14, 2009)

Another vote for Debian.


----------



## bsdhosting (Aug 15, 2009)

debian is great   slackware is good but not very popular these days.


----------



## ninjaslim (Aug 18, 2009)

Sigh, seems as though I'm completely Linux-ed out.  I'm happier with running Matlab on FreeBSD than I am natively on Linux.  Just so many things about Linux that turn me off.  Oh well, it'll get there some day.


----------



## Saint0fCloud (Aug 18, 2009)

Gentoo, although right now Arch is the only linux I have installed and I rarely if ever use it since I definitely prefer Free/NetBSD


----------



## rokpa92 (Sep 6, 2009)

Wolvix http://wolvix.org/
or Tuquito http://www.tuquito.org.ar/ (argentina distroÂ´s) and is very easy.
but i like FreeBSD all my live


----------



## tcoffeep (Oct 6, 2009)

I used Funtoo up until I discovered FreeBSD, and before that it was Arch.


----------



## Mormegil (Oct 8, 2009)

The only Linux that exists for me in my personal life is Slackware, and it's only installed on my laptop because of poor FreeBSD support for my wifi card.  My first introduction to Linux was two years or so of RedHat, but I didn't learn anything until I switched to Slack, and I never felt like I was on top of the game until I moved to FreeBSD.

I do have to dabble with various other Linux distros for work, the most tolerable has been CentOS.


----------



## fonz (Oct 9, 2009)

Mormegil said:
			
		

> The only Linux that exists for me in my personal life is Slackware, and it's only installed on my laptop because of poor FreeBSD support for my wifi card.  My first introduction to Linux was two years or so of RedHat, but I didn't learn anything until I switched to Slack, and I never felt like I was on top of the game until I moved to FreeBSD.


Mental note: when time travelling into the future, try not to run into one's future self  

I could have written your post, except that I found a USB WiFi adapter that works with FreeBSD - wheee  But getting back on topic, I do agree about Slackware. I've seen several Linux distros old and new (and yes, I too started with RedHat), but Slackware has always been the one that gave the least reason for swearing and cursing.

Alphons


----------



## Eponasoft (Oct 10, 2009)

I tried the LFS route over the last couple of days. I have a project going on right now where I need a good-but-small distro of Linux, so I've tried out a few. None have fit the bill thus far. It HAS to be one iso only, and many distros are many isos and have essentials spread out amongst them. So now I'm downloading the latest archlinux, as that always did well for me. If this doesn't work, then perhaps I'll go the Debian route, as that has worked for me in the past as well. And for the record...I'm installing them into QEMU, not running them on a normal system. One might argue that this is a terrible idea...but I already have Windows 2000 running through QEMU with no problems and if that works just fine, then a Linux of some kind should too...and thus far, all I've tried have failed.


----------



## noobster (Oct 10, 2009)

Eponasoft said:
			
		

> And for the record...I'm installing them into QEMU, not running them on a normal system. One might argue that this is a terrible idea...but I already have Windows 2000 running through QEMU with no problems and if that works just fine, then a Linux of some kind should too...and thus far, all I've tried have failed.



You might want to try VirtualBox instead of QEMU, because in my experience it runs much faster and installing a Linux should work without problems.


----------



## CodeBlock (Oct 10, 2009)

I see a lot of you mentioning Slack, which is the one distro I haven't tried yet. I'm now tempted to throw it in a VM and mess around with it .


----------



## Eponasoft (Oct 11, 2009)

noobster said:
			
		

> You might want to try VirtualBox instead of QEMU, because in my experience it runs much faster and installing a Linux should work without problems.


If I could I would but virtualbox fails to build (after I spent over 2 days compiling a legion of dependencies for it), and there appears to be no prebuilt binary for it...unless there's one ready in ports now.


----------



## noobster (Oct 11, 2009)

Eponasoft said:
			
		

> If I could I would but virtualbox fails to build (after I spent over 2 days compiling a legion of dependencies for it), and there appears to be no prebuilt binary for it...unless there's one ready in ports now.



It is available now: ftp://ftp.freebsd.org/pub/FreeBSD/ports/i386/packages-7-stable/Latest/virtualbox.tbz


----------



## Eponasoft (Oct 11, 2009)

Awesome, thanks.


----------



## krynn (Oct 12, 2009)

*Vote: Slackware*

I must say that I agree with most in this thread, Slackware is the linux distro that I came to FreeBSD from and it will as such always be my favorite.


----------



## Eponasoft (Oct 12, 2009)

Hrm...even with the binary of virtualbox available, I still can't get it to work. I honestly don't have the patience to make it work either...it requires WAY too many dependencies and there are too many conflicts.


----------



## sasha-fbsd (Oct 12, 2009)

*There is no other kinds!*

Back in university years (early 1980, 81/82) I fell in love with the unix systems on campus. Have been using Apple plus/2c/gs, then mac classic etc. Always, though, have been missing unix. In 2004 (?), to my surprise, I found online and installed FreebSD 5.3. My love rekindled!!

As learning experience, I have also tried Mandrake, Yellow Dog, Oopen Suse, Ubuntu, Slackware, Xandros. I particularly liked the now gone Libranet.

I ALWAYS came back to my now 7.2 release FreeBSD. It always works, never fails. I run 7.2 Fbsd on my workstation, and PC-BSD on a Compaq laptop (to watch Flash videos).

I love my FreeBSD, and there is still so much to learn, to make it so much better.

Sasha


----------



## trash (Oct 12, 2009)

sabayon linux is based on gentoo with a binary package manager for the lazy working alongside portage. pretty good.


----------



## allbanddxer (Oct 15, 2009)

I jumped around for a long time, since the later 90's using Red Hat, Mandrake, Suse etc. I eventually came to the conclusion that less is more, and have avoided the big distributions ever since. I also found that Gentoo was more trouble than it was worth so ArchLinux was the best of both worlds. Minimalistic, fast, and stable enough...


----------



## Nylex (Oct 18, 2009)

Slackware.


----------



## system_serenity (Nov 2, 2009)

DutchDaemon said:
			
		

> @Almindor
> 
> Using ports on a desktop/laptop sounds like overkill to me. I will only use ports on heavy servers where I need the extra edge of compiling in a certain way. On the desktop, I use packages 95% of the time (I will use a port if I need a quick security upgrade, or if I just don't want to wait for new functionality).
> 
> ...



I pretty much have done the same thing.


----------



## gentoobob (Nov 2, 2009)

I use Ubuntu or Fedora for my desktop and laptop. Ubuntu is nice for laptops, as I always say, "It just works". I switched to FreeBSD awhile back, love it for server operations, built to stay running and fast.


----------



## Philippe-Pierre (Nov 3, 2009)

Binary distributions: Debian, Slackware.
Source based: Source Mage, LFS.

As for FreeBSD: it just has it all. Period.


----------



## foldingstock (Jan 7, 2010)

hugo said:
			
		

> Not necessarily, I know at least one person that got started with FreeBSD



My first experience with a non-Windows system was NetBSD 1.x in the mid 90's. After using it for a while a friend introduced me to Red Hat Linux. It seemed very backwards compared to what I had learned from NetBSD. 

I use Ubuntu Linux from time to time on the desktop and it is nice until I have to do anything other than routine desktop tasks. The underlying system supporting Ubuntu is very strange and feels hacked together. 

I am much prefer FreeBSD/OpenBSD when possible.


----------



## respite (Jan 8, 2010)

DutchDaemon said:
			
		

> I find it very difficult to underestimate linux.



Hah. :beer

After 10+ years fighting with various linux distros, i feel arch gave me the least of headaches. Default install is small and somewhat clean. Using pacman makes it easy to quickly build the desired machine.


----------



## MannyNix (Jan 12, 2010)

Which is your Favourite Linux? 
Slackware, hands down. Gentoo a close 2nd, then Arch.
Btw, If you ever need to recommend a 'Linux' to a friend or newbie, try linuxmint easier than *buntus and you won't get bugged as much.


----------



## homemade (Jan 29, 2010)

Debian for servers and Ubuntu for Desktops.

Ever since FreeBSD 8.0, I might be forced to leave FBSD for a more secure future; but I love FBSD.


----------



## conta (Jan 30, 2010)

i use sidux (debian sid) for everyday use... 

with bsd I have too much troubles ;]


----------



## head777 (Jan 30, 2010)

Debian Lenny :e


----------



## oliverh (Jan 31, 2010)

homemade said:
			
		

> Debian for servers and Ubuntu for Desktops.
> 
> Ever since FreeBSD 8.0, I might be forced to leave FBSD for a more secure future; but I love FBSD.



Microsoft or Apple? I don't think of Linux while talking of a secure future on the very desktop? Linux as *BSD is just not relevant on the desktop.


----------



## topher (Feb 5, 2010)

*Has anyone tried Kongoni?*

Its based on Slack and uses a ports tree.


----------



## CodeBlock (Feb 5, 2010)

topher said:
			
		

> Its based on Slack and uses a ports tree.



No, but according to http://kongoni.co.za/news/the-end, it is now unmaintained and looking for a new lead developer.


----------



## Ruler2112 (Feb 5, 2010)

I'm going to throw my preferences out there, but I know it'll probably provoke discussion.  The only nix OS I install anymore are FreeBSD.  I used to prefer Slackware, and before that RedHat, Mandrake, Arch, and Gentoo.  None are as stable as FreeBSD and all are more difficult to maintain due to the fact that all (except Gentoo) use binary packages, so you have to find a package built for your specific version or create one yourself.  The ports tree gets away from all that.  I may need to revise this if I ever have to reinstall my DVR; I've heard that the multimedia device support under Linux is much better than BSD.

The Linux I use most often is the System Rescue CD for troubleshooting, cleaning, and recovering data from systems.  I feel that this is the 'best' Linux out there - not to run your machine with on a regular basis, but rather as a rescue/troubleshooting tool.  I cannot count the number of times I've used it to save a system and have the CD laying on my desks, both at home and at work.  I regularly use ClamAV (antivirus), gParted (non-destructive partition table editor, ala Partition Magic), partimage (partition imaging tool, ala Ghost), and of course the regular system tools included in the OS (fdisk, dd, badblocks, ntfs-3g, ping, nmap, traceroute, etc) and find the CD as a whole to be invaluable.


----------



## jamesroy (Feb 6, 2010)

Hi
I've been installing PCBSD in Virtual box as guests under host Win XP, just tinkering really. I definitely hate Damn Small Linux, I thought it could be a cool lightweight OS but didn't suit my machine ?
VirtualBox has performed alot better than I expected, once I find a PCBSD I like heaps I'll setup a dual boot system but the idea of running a safe OS in a Virtual environment is a really interesting security environment, as long as I don't share folders with XP.


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## topher (Feb 6, 2010)

*I just re-installed Haiku Alpha 1*

Its not linux, but I like it. Its simple and minimalist. Nice community too, without the elitist 'tude I'm noticing in this thread.


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## fronclynne (Feb 6, 2010)

Ruler2112 said:
			
		

> The Linux I use most often is the System Rescue CD for troubleshooting, cleaning, and recovering data from systems.  I feel that this is the 'best' Linux out there - not to run your machine with on a regular basis, but rather as a rescue/troubleshooting tool.



I just fiddled with it a bit in qemu, an it's definitely plusgood.  What linux should be:  A fixit tool for real operating systems.


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## topher (Feb 6, 2010)

CodeBlock said:
			
		

> No, but according to http://kongoni.co.za/news/the-end, it is now unmaintained and looking for a new lead developer.



How sad. That was just yesterday that he posted it. I understood that it was on a short list of distributions approved by the FSF. Maybe someone there can keep it going. I will send the link to their mailing list.


----------



## ChickenWing88 (Feb 7, 2010)

I Have tried every Linux distribution and decided on Debian for several reasons. The lease of which the minimal footprint  of 80MB with a full gnome desktop.


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## darkshadow (Feb 8, 2010)

freebsd is enoth for me , so none


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## topher (Feb 8, 2010)

*My favorite linux is FreeBSD*

Since the majority of apps that I run were developed for linux before they were ported to FreeBSD. I'd have to say that running them on the FreeBSD kernel provides the best experience for me. 
I have also installed /usr/ports/www/linux-f10-flashplugin10 and /usr/ports/www/nspluginwrapper. Most new versions of linux distros no longer provide nspluginwrapper in their repos. Instead they suggest using the Adobe 64bit flash plugin beta or gnash while we wait for html5 to change the way media is streamed in a browser. 
By using the Fedora 10 port however I am able to get the performance that I remember having with nspluginwrapper in linux way back when.
In fact the older versions of almost all ported linux applications without the constant system updating to be in sync with a repository is what I like most about FreeBSD. Its so much more stable when not that much changes.


----------



## Orige (Feb 8, 2010)

Debian!


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## sossego (Feb 8, 2010)

It depends now on the equipment.
Fedora for the laptops, debian and freebsd for the desktops.
Openbsd for qemu, netbsd for stubborn machines.
I'd say that knoppix is a good one to keep, version 5.x. Also a customized debiab live cd is another backup.
Hmm.
I've used Netbsd live to fix.


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## blackrain (Feb 25, 2010)

I've tried many of linux distros: Debian, Arch, *ubuntu, redhat, fedora, gentoo. FreeBSD is like a magnet and has always been attracting me with its simplicity and robustness, so I've decided to leave the linux world for a while


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## Bapabooiee (May 15, 2010)

I'd definitely have to say Gentoo, because of its Portage system. And while Portage can sometimes have its problems, it's largely been very good to me, and has allowed me to keep very fine-grained control over my system with minimal issues. It's also really damn easy to tinker with your entire system (all forms of upgrades or rollbacks are usually painless), but very difficult to get your system into a bad state, where extensive troubleshooting would be required (as the more control you have, the easier it is to mess things up).

But other than Gentoo, no other Linux distros really tickle my fancy except for Arch Linux (and possibly Slackware), as the only types of distros I use anymore are "meta distros", which are essentially distros that let you build your software from the ground-up.

It shall also be noted that, for the record, I'm new to FreeBSD, and have only been using it for a couple of days. Admittedly, the main reason for doing so is because I heard that Portage had a lot in common with Ports - but also because a *BSD operating system has been something I've wanted to try for a while now.

So far, I like it, but I'm going to withhold my final judgment until I get some more experience with it.


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## sk8harddiefast (May 15, 2010)

I was using gentoo.Is "copy" of bsd.But i really prefer bsd from any other os


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## nekoexmachina (May 15, 2010)

I've used arch and debian. mostly.
After some sw&hw-update there came a problem called iowait, and some minor issueses. I've found zen-kernel that has no-such-problem as iowait by words of some of my friends. Than the other problem appeared - i totally hate configuring linux-kernel, because all of that make *config crap just sucks (e.g. - is not usable for me, i just get stuck with such many options there), and because .config does not has any comments in it. Ok, so i've tried the pkgbuild from arch's aur, but it did not work - with the root hdd disappeared from /dev (with the other two on the same controller still present). So, i gave up on arch and tried to look around for a good alternative with zen-kernel out-of-box or something. It's better to change my way to install software than to use unusable make configs or learn what is every last option in .config-file.
Then i've found that one of my local foss-community website members also has had such a problem back in 2006, so i've just reused his experience and installed freebsd (that was 7.2 at that moment). And i've liked the whole thing about it, except some things in the ports system (some of ports are just kind of strange if to talk about dependencies: why does minimalistic browser called uzbl want some gnome-monster things (gconf)? It is not the problem of the whole ports, but the local problem of one of the ports. It even could be considered as not-a-problem, yes. But still, i just do not want to have something that i do not use in my system. It is not hdd-free-space issue, or performance-issue - it's just emotions, yup). I've retried to stick back to linux with new ubuntu 10.04 release (no real reason - just wanted to see any improvements with bugs i've steped in earlier) - just to see that my hardware bugs are fixed, as i could know with ~3hrs of testing livecd. But i just do not feel like installing linux will give me anything good. And alsa sounds worse than oss.


----------



## richardpl (May 18, 2010)

tinycore linux


----------



## ah7013 (Jun 3, 2010)

I like arch and ubuntu. Its hard to decide what one comes first. They are both good for different things


----------



## carlton_draught (Jun 4, 2010)

I tried Linux for many years without success until it finally clicked. Redhat a couple times, Debian, Corel, Mandrake, DSL, PCLinuxOS, OpenSUSE, and finally Ubuntu, where I could finally ditch MS.

Now my intention is to ditch Ubuntu and migrate everything to FreeBSD to get ZFS features. For desktop systems, I still like Ubuntu, not too much hassle. FreeBSD is more elegant in its design.

I've also dabbled with OpenBSD.

For firewall/URL filter/QOS/WAP type applications I've used pfsense for a while, but found ZeroShell to be more versatile. It's really nice, I recommend it highly.


----------



## nekoexmachina (Jun 4, 2010)

Just updated Ubuntu for my fathers desktop.
He loves it, but he takes a look for fbsd on the virtualbox, and well, he says that it's kind of easier to maintain, update & reconfigure(for the base system), and he loves that easy rc.d scripts and rc.conf syntax, and he says it's kind of faster than new ubuntu on that virtualbox was, but he hates the idea of compiling some software like openoffice that is not present in the package-repos. 
Also he needs stable virtualbox or any other fast (e.g. qemu+kqemu is not fast enough, but kvm is) to get virtual windows environment for his work. Any suggestions?

Also, i've tried out openbsd as a desktop on qemu, and well, i've liked it - but i'll miss all that portupgrade stuff & framebuffer & mplayer-mt (has anyone compiled&tried it? As i understand what giant lock is, mplayer-mt won't work with obsd). And gpart hdd migration will be tricky, i think, as obsd doesn't support it  
Now I use 4.7 as my pretty-old-hardware-home-router thing.


----------



## mtspbr (Jun 8, 2010)

I've installed and used suse, slackware, redhat, ubuntu, debian, mandriva (conectiva/mandrake), etc in desktop a long time ago. Today I have two VPS debian, because I don't found a freeBSD VPS with best cost/benefit. In my work I use Windows  to develop Java apps. In my home I'm setting one development server with svn, trac, https, tomcat, postgreSQL, nexus (maven repository mirror), etc. on freeBSD 8 in a Dell server quadcore xeon and for develop my Java and Objective C apps, I use Mac OS X.


----------



## klanger (Jun 8, 2010)

nekoexmachina said:
			
		

> Also he needs stable virtualbox or any other fast (e.g. qemu+kqemu is not fast enough, but kvm is) to get virtual windows environment for his work. Any suggestions?



WINE + FreeBSD ?


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## sk8harddiefast (Jun 8, 2010)

I really don't like wine.If i wanted to run some windows apps i was using virtualbox or vmware


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## nekoexmachina (Jun 9, 2010)

> WINE


nope, applications he needs don't run on wine.


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## sk8harddiefast (Jun 9, 2010)

Then there are 2 things. Or dual boot with 2 os. Freebsd and the other one he needs but is something that always avoid and don't like it and the other is a virtual machine. I recommend vmware-server. Is free,more complicated than virtualbox but better and i have read somewhere that on vmware, windows run faster than if you install them on a desktop pc with the same system requirements!
I have played with vmware-server and is really veeeery good!!!


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## nekoexmachina (Jun 10, 2010)

There is no native version of vmware for fbsd, as i know, and linux-emulation-layer is, well, the thing i will not use if there is no need like 'die-or-use'. Now he's using virtualbox (on linux), and as i used virtualbox on bsd last time (a day after importing it into ports  ) it was buggy (e.g. segfaulted while installing some linux distro). May be it was not vbox problem - i didn't even bother to look - so i'll give it one more try some time like nearest weekend.
Also i've played around with some obsd things with qemu-kqemu on my fbsd-desktop; well, it was actually fast. Much faster than i expected it to be, something like the time i've used qemu-kvm on linux half-a-year ago. 
So, when i'll visit dad next time, i'll try to do an installation of windows under freebsd host with qemu, probably it will be fast enough 

Also he really liked the whole openbsd lyrics thing except for the first song


----------



## sk8harddiefast (Jun 10, 2010)

> I have played with vmware-server and is really veeeery good!!!


When i was using gentoo.
Now on my computer,i run virtualbox. Simple just to do the job. It runs fine and i haven't problems.
I didn't see if there is vmware on ports.
I have read about qemu-kqemu but i have never tried it so i have no idea if it worths.


----------



## SPlissken (Jun 12, 2010)

I discovered SalixOS some months ago , a slack based distro
It's slack for newbye,  easy to install and to use.


----------



## klanger (Jun 13, 2010)

SPlissken said:
			
		

> I discovered SalixOS some months ago , a slack based distro
> It's slack for newbye,  easy to install and to use.



Yeah, salixOS is nice & has a very good package manager, extremely fast.


----------



## pamdirac (Jun 14, 2010)

slack || t2sde


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## gore (Jun 17, 2010)

SuSE / OpenSUSE
Debian
Slackware

I've been using those for some time and I've not once had any major issues with them.

I hate Gentoo, RedHat, and Fedora.


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## zspider (Jun 21, 2010)

Arch Linux. However as soon as the day comes that the intel drivers run smoothly then it will be replaced with FreeBSD. As some other people said its just more elegant in its design. BSD is a bit like Windows Server in terms of how well things work together and that is a major draw for me.


----------



## Dereckson (Jun 22, 2010)

- back to 2004, knoppix for hardware support and the huge catalog of software available to test
- I also like archlinux because it's lightweighted and the colored output is very nice.
- I could have liked Gentoo, because the name were cool and the doc nice. It were before using it on a dedicated server x64: whois command not found (okay, a lot of small utilities to emerge...) and a lot of software marked unstable requiring a lot of config to install (by the way, the install process with all those flags is annoying).



			
				Weinter said:
			
		

> OK OK I know ALL of us LOVE BSD
> But I am sure you all played with Linux before conversion?
> So which is your favourite?



Well... not really, I've tried to install but never used Linux before FreeBSD.

1995 - tested Slackware. No mouse support (I had a mouse with a wheel).
1998 - wanted to test MkLinux on my PowerMac 7200. Model not supporhttp://forums.freebsd.org/images/ ... n10.gifted.
1999 - got a Corel Linux cd in a computer magazine. Can't install, no AGP support.
2001 - we've a project to get a dedicated server on an IRC channel, the sysadmin picks FreeBSD. I got familiar with this OS. It were good
2002 - in // we got a second server under Debian. Where is sockstat? What's the bash syntax for setenv? #@! I must apt-get install libfoobar-dev after libfoobar
2002-2004 - "Linux sux. FreeBSD rulez." phase.
2005 - Got Knoppix. Some months later, a crash on my laptop hard disk occurs. The time to get a new hard disk, I spend some days under Knoppix. Were a rather nice experience, especially a night with Stellarium.
2006 - Pragmatism and idealism lead me to prefer BSD licence to GPL licence.
2008 - After days to compile KDE and Gnome to use FreeBSD as desktop environment, I start to recommand Ubuntu to newbies instead to say than KDE or Gnome are still KDE and Gnome under Linux, FreeBSD or WhatEverOs and so they should use FreeBSD to learn something different.
2010 - I'm okay with Linux but don't really want to use it. I offer to some LUGs to present BSD systems at their install party and experiment to recommend PC-BSD to new users.


----------



## juniorsatanas (Jun 22, 2010)

windows xp dead
linux debian dead
now freebsd =  free live


----------



## cracauer@ (Jun 29, 2010)

Debian.

For my Linux use I ditched Fedora after F4, because I felt cheated about the time period for future updates and I had both F5 and F6 destroy partitions in situations where the old classic fdisk worked right. At the time I didn't have my test farm diskless and had harddrive with multiboot installations. I ran Debian on 64 bit boxes for Ubuntu on 32 bit for a while but Ubuntu has decided to turn itself into a toy that isn't suitable for my uses, so it's all Debian now. Debian also gives me a very wild ride now, in particular with bad udev updates, various other fiddling with device entry handling, stupid warnings about "you won't be able to boot" and botched /etc/rc updates.

One main reason why I use Linux in more than testing is that FreeBSD ports update me forcefully to newer Xorgs, and Xorg breaks things for me left and right. But alas all Linuxes also use broken Xorgs and I now run my Xorg server in a chroot (session in there not in chroot) and use an Xorg version of my choice. At this point I expect that Debian-stable can't satisfy the need for a working desktop much longer either and then I am back to square one and probably have to do pretty massive mixing of chroots to be secure where I have to, have old working versions of things where I need them and can have current versions where I want them.

I expect to re-evaluate Fedora, to maybe try REL/CentOS on the "outside" box if my desktop is chrooted anyway, or convert some Linux boxes back to FreeBSD. Some FreeBSD problems have disappeared.

I can't say that I am overly happy with the way that things are going with any of the above OSes. But hey I can post complaints on the Internet so it can't be all broken


----------



## martins (Jun 29, 2010)

Slackware, of course. What else is there?


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## zspider (Jun 29, 2010)

I tried Slackware a few times, but its too time consuming to hunt down dependencies and the automated package management systems that were available seemed to be rather out of date. That was probably about a year ago then I went back to Ubuntu got sick of it immediately and went on to conquer Arch Linux. Feels like it was an eternity ago now.


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## martins (Jun 29, 2010)

I don't really like package managers that track down dependencies for you. I used Ubuntu for a few weeks in the past, but gave up on it when I was trying to remove one package and apt-get wanted to remove the whole gnome desktop with it.


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## kpedersen (Jun 30, 2010)

Whilst I find no dependency checking (slackware) to be flawed, I do hate the way ubuntu and debian work with this overly complex repository and indexing (complete with many different names for the same packages)

I just wish unix developers would stop using so many damn packages for their applications. Or at least the linux package makers to stop splitting packages into such small parts.

Just to compile OpenMotif, I have had to install the following Debian (non-base) packages 

xorg
xorg-dev
x11proto-print-dev <-- Includes print.h
libxp-dev <-- Includes libXp (this should be in the same package as print.h)

I much prefer the fact that with FreeBSD, I only had to install xorg.

One thing I have never quite worked out is that FreeBSD packages are made via the ports system. How are Debian packages made? By hand?


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## zspider (Jun 30, 2010)

I do agree that alot of programs pull in too many dependencies. On FreeBSD you have a certain degree of control over that with the compile time options. I know what you mean about Ubuntu/Debian/others. You try to dump something like pidgin or some gnome gui app and it wants to take the whole desktop off with it.


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## Chuchubi (Jul 13, 2010)

I have an old Fedora core 3 machine for doing multimedia. But I have upgrade the kernel from source and it runs the latest versions of most programs. So this machine is not realy FC3 but it is my own fedora core whatever. I also run Fedora 6 and 7. In the past I have tried Suse, Mandrake, Debian, slackware and Ubuntu. But I like the Fedora stuff more than all.


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## Anonymous (Jul 13, 2010)

Screw fedora - Installed apache but couldn't view any of the index.html by default, had to go in and change directives when there was no reason to. Where are the codecs? Apparently in gstreamer-ugly but was never able to get that working after hours of searching the web and forums. Basically it sucks as a desktop and sucks as a server because it doesn't know which one it wants to be.

Screw ubuntu - The philosophy of ubuntu is "if you have to google a tutorial on how to enable su then the os is more secure, but don't ask about it on our forums because we'll just delete your post and then lecture you because we don't know shit about linux but we wrote a gui for it so that makes us experts" ha, what a joke.

Linux Mint is perfect for a desktop - Flash + codecs preinstalled, easy to use guis and software installation. All the good from ubuntu without the bad.

BSD is perfect for servers and network devices - comes installed with just the needed software and works perfectly + BSD license.

Oh and when it comes to forensics SCREW helix. "mount -o rw" should mount something as read/write, end of story. Use backtrack for that stuff. Even though I'm still confused as to why backtrack can auto-detect a single network card but won't auto-detect multiple ones.


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## Fleet (Jul 13, 2010)

My favorites are Debian, Fedora (+ RHEL) and Arch Linux. Arch Linux was the last Linux distro I used before started to use BSD. Arch Linux served as a good learning platform for me and I definitely liked its adherence of the KISS-principle. Its config files and ABS is very similar to config and ports in FreeBSD.


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## kpa (Jul 13, 2010)

Debian, I won't even consider anything else. Now that I have become more familiar with FreeBSD I wish Linux would adopt the same clear distinction between the core operating system (base in FreeBSD) and 3rd party software (ports).


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## gore (Jul 17, 2010)

kpa said:
			
		

> Debian, I won't even consider anything else. Now that I have become more familiar with FreeBSD I wish Linux would adopt the same clear distinction between the core operating system (base in FreeBSD) and 3rd party software (ports).



For me personally I've always hated having multiple update ways in BSD. I use FreeBSD and PC-BSD and I like it, but when it comes to updates and patches... Wellllll... freebsd-update is a step in the right direction, but when a Port needs to get patched because there is a security flaw in one, I can't stand it.

I have a lot of old machines because I simply can't afford to buy everything new, and all but one of my boxes, are single core Processor machines with ... Other than my new machine, and one that has 768 MBs of RAM, they all have 512 MBs or less of RAM, and only 3 are above 733 MHz Processors.

Patching security in Ports for me is generally going to take long enough that I can't most of the time. I run Debian on one machine that I use as a secondary Desktop / Workstation, which means I use it to check email with about 4 different clients (I'm picky and have a lot of stuff to check, and multiple accounts for whatever I use it for, such as personal accounts for family and friends, a few for mailing lists, and other stuff) and then some web browsing, and then I use it also to make most of my music with LMMS, and then LAME to turn that into an MP3 to upload on Myspace so people can hear it since I don't own a radio station, and then I use it for other stuff too. It has two hard drives; The 80 GB one it came with that has XP Home on it, and then the 160 GB drive I installed with Debian. Rarely boot into Windows.

My Laptop runs currently a version of Slackware that's modified, and I use it for basically whatever.

My FTP server runs Slackware 12.2, and I like that because, well, it doesn't need much, I don't use X on it, and log in mostly over SSH.

These things may not be the bottom of the line in terms of speed, but they're for sure dated. And for me to upgrade Ports, on stuff like that.... A cell phone would probably be faster most of the time, and the way Ports work, and how they are "separate" from the base system I can update with "freebsd-update" means I have to sit there for a LONG time. The last time I did a Port upgrade, it took like a week, and since I was fairly knew to it, I ended up having to reinstall because it didn't all work right.

I'd LOVE to have a tool that updated everything. In Debian, it's this:

apt-get update && apt-get upgrade

Done.

In Slackware, I can do a couple of things. I've used slapt-get before, and swaret a lot, and slackpkg works fine too, and I've also just downloaded each patch by hand with wget and upgraded them by hand, which was really easy too:
upgradepkg *.tgz
Done.

The FreeBSD system, would take a LONG time. I don't set compile time options because I'm not a programmer, don't really care about that stuff, and usually leave things as is when they get installed other than Window Managers that I may configure a certain way or something. But as for compiling, well, like I said, I'm no coder by any means, and I don't really WANT to sit there telling it how I want it compiled.

When I first started using FreeBSD, I was totally confused why the Security Mailing List was telling me to compile patches and reboot, and why freebsd-update didn't update ports, and when I learned how it did, I was like WTF, why is this so time consuming? I couldn't understand why anyone would want to do that, and as I got older, I started realizing why it has a benefit to it, but at the same time, for someone like me, or the average user, there really isn't many things that would make anyone who is just using their computer for web surfing want to actually spend that long to do that.

I think once someone does a system that upgrades / patches the whole system with one tool, it will be a LOT easier getting people to use FreeBSD instead of Linux. It's hard enough getting someone using Windows to try Linux where updates can be shown in the tray, or you have a tool like Yast, Yast2, or MCC from Mandriva, and the others, like APT, that grab all your updates for you and install them while you get Coffee or something, and then maybe a reboot if you updated the Kernel, and then you're done, to want to do what it takes to upgrade Opera, or Pidgin. I would LOVE for that to happen in BSD.

I'm not aware of anything that does this, and I'm actually reading through some of the docs right now because, well, it's been a while, but as far as I know, other than the Base system, the Ports still need to be upgraded all at once, and it takes a LONG time.


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## Anonymous (Jul 17, 2010)

I have on wife computer with Windows installed Arch Linux. It is fast, updated, everything works and as a desktop IMO is the same secure as FreeBSD.


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## gore (Jul 17, 2010)

My Wife's Computers run a mix of Windows, Slackware, and Solaris. She's actually better with Unix than I am I think lol. Arch Linux seems popular around here. That's good though, years ago when I first saw Arch, it was like, a really unknown project at the time, and I saw it, and thought it looked interesting, so I decided to download it. It was YEARS ago, and they only had one or two releases at the time, and when I got it installed I actually thought it was really nice. I was shocked a few months ago to see how it's grown so much. I haven't used it in a while, but all of this talk makes me wonder if I should install it on my laptop since I've been using that to test stuff lately anyway heh.

I've also started to really like Linux Console. It's basically a version of Linux that is made to work on older hardware, and it has a really nice look and "feel" to it. I like it, and I also thought the same of Mamba, and, of course, MoonOS, which looks beautiful.


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## jb_fvwm2 (Jul 17, 2010)

"the ports still need to be upgraded all at once..."
...
you can use csup with certain parameters to only fetch only
port updated ports tree, thus updating only one port.
...
Something I found out about...
hopefully I explained it better in another post (search on 'uniq")
Say you want to postpone the gnome upgrade.
And you presently have a lot of gnome ports to upgrade
You make a list of ports , tee it to a file, that need upgrading.
(pkg_version...
Wait a week or so.
cvsup the entire ports tree.
make the 2nd tee'd output file from pkg_version.
....
Run the cli,  the output should be ONLY those needing upgrading
per below::
SINCE the first pkg_version a week ago.
...

```
sort file.1 file.1 file.7 | uniq -u | lookat
```
(lookat, or less, or more, or just to a terminal)
...
Without that command line, you would not know how to
skip updating just a lot, and glance at the result
to update only the ports needing newly updating within
the last week (in this case, you would ignore results
from the uniq pipe, that are gnome - based).
...
Hope that is clear enough to serve as a mini-guide...


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## gore (Jul 17, 2010)

I know you CAN do that, but from the docs I'm reading, it can make the system unstable. I think the wording was "Although the BSD core team does what it can to make sure these work backward compatible, there is a chance" or something like that.

I still haven't updated my ports yet because quite frankly, the machine it's on right now, is a 433 MHz Celeron, with 192 MBs of RAM. That's going to take a LONG time.


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## henker (Jul 18, 2010)

gore said:
			
		

> I still haven't updated my ports yet because quite frankly, the machine it's on right now, is a 433 MHz Celeron, with 192 MBs of RAM. That's going to take a LONG time.



Why dont you update using packages instead? It`s not as up-to-date but it works and its so much faster


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## gore (Jul 19, 2010)

I'm using RELEASE, and it says on the docs you can only do that with... I think STABLE and something else.


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## DutchDaemon (Jul 19, 2010)

No, you got that slightly wrong  To use up-to-date packages on a -RELEASE, you must set PACKAGESITE to the -STABLE package repository. Search PACKAGESITE on these forums, there are a few examples around.


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## gore (Jul 19, 2010)

DutchDaemon said:
			
		

> No, you got that slightly wrong  To use up-to-date packages on a -RELEASE, you must set PACKAGESITE to the -STABLE package repository. Search PACKAGESITE on these forums, there are a few examples around.



So basically I could have set that to -STABLE whatever version, and then done all this WAY easier?....MAN!

I'm actually right now checking what to do with portupgrade and seeing if I can use my test machine to see how long it would take, because it's been a LONG time since I've done this. I'm so used to other OSs and how they work that I literally haven't in over a year or so.

Someone told me once it was easier to just run:

portupgrade -af

And let it roll, but that ended up breaking a lot of stuff for some reason and it took forever. Basically I spent almost a week having to come in and hit a button here and there for it to run, only to have a broken box once it finished heh.

Didn't bother me SO much, because I have back ups of everything important on like 7 disks and a bunch of other stuff, but the time...lol.

EDIT:

I just noticed something I hadn't seen before; "Portmaster"... This thing seems a little easier to work with than Portupgrade, and I'm actually using it right now on my test machine to do an upgrade of my Ports. Right now I'm in the UPDATING file reading there, and basically following along to see how it goes. I do kind of like this new one though, which probably isn't new at all, but I'm used to stuff from the books I have, which usually only talk about one or two ways.

So right now, I've done "portmaster p5-" and letting that run.

Originally I was just going to go "portmaster -a" but, the UPDATING file seem to have a method, so why not right?


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## raul_comodoro (Jul 20, 2010)

I have usued almost 20 different flavors of linux...so it;s a lot......among them Ubuntu desktop works fine.....but I don;t like Gnome so I've installed KDE, and works fine......Suse is very slow.....Slackware is almost a BSD system, but it has an issue......difficult to get applications.

I used Mint linux too as a desktop.....I changed Gnome for KDE again....

PC Linux 2009 y PC OS Linux are good too....

But after all almost I use FreeBSD 7.3 or 8.0.....I think the best in many situations at all.....good performance......an oustanding docs system on line.....and ports/paxkages go well once you have a good undestanding about them.

There is a program I would like ported to BSD, it is Xdosemu.....great to run DOS applications using X interface   (I apologize all the UNIX fans that hate DOS....but some programs are still useful).....does anybody how can I get it to BSD........oe maybe wich rpm or wathever kind should I install using linux emulation.


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## gore (Jul 20, 2010)

raul_comodoro said:
			
		

> I have usued almost 20 different flavors of linux...so it;s a lot......among them Ubuntu desktop works fine.....but I don;t like Gnome so I've installed KDE, and works fine......Suse is very slow.....Slackware is almost a BSD system, but it has an issue......difficult to get applications.



http://www.linuxpackages.net

There you go.




> But after all almost I use FreeBSD 7.3 or 8.0.....I think the best in many situations at all.....good performance......an oustanding docs system on line.....and ports/paxkages go well once you have a good undestanding about them.
> 
> There is a program I would like ported to BSD, it is Xdosemu.....great to run DOS applications using X interface   (I apologize all the UNIX fans that hate DOS....but some programs are still useful).....does anybody how can I get it to BSD........oe maybe wich rpm or wathever kind should I install using linux emulation.



BSD runs Linux apps just fine. Shouldn't be that much of an issue. To bad YAST doesn't work on BSD. I wouldn't be on my 5th try to get Ports updated.....My tree is up to date, the ports are now basically broken.


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## henker (Jul 20, 2010)

gore said:
			
		

> BSD runs Linux apps just fine. Shouldn't be that much of an issue. To bad YAST doesn't work on BSD. I wouldn't be on my 5th try to get Ports updated.....My tree is up to date, the ports are now basically broken.



Once you fix that and you just keep using packages instead of ports they will never get broken

At least that`s true for me


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## Crooksey (Jul 22, 2010)

Arch / CRUX / Gentoo

Usually Arch though


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## LateNiteTV (Jul 22, 2010)

how did you break your ports tree? just remove all installed ports, run portsnap, then everything should be working fine.


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## gore (Jul 22, 2010)

I was upgrading them, using the docs to do it, and apparently something didn't want to work, and it went down from there. Nothing will run right now, so I'm doing a total upgrade like this:

pkg_upgrade -a and then I set a few more options for it to show me stuff so I know what's going on. It's basically, HOPEFULLY, rebuilding all my ports and reinstalling them fresh.


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## zspider (Jul 23, 2010)

Were you mixing ports and packages? I find that sometimes that it causes conflicts and thus I stick solely to ports (on a laptop and it works fine)


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## gore (Jul 23, 2010)

I install my software with this:

pkg_add -r package1 package 2 and so on.

I don't really ever use anything else because it makes things easier to do that. And I can type out like 40 package names and hit enter and let it run.


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## mky (Jul 23, 2010)

If I must use Linux, my favorite is Debian, but I prefer OS X for workstation and FreeBSD for server.


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## gore (Jul 23, 2010)

I'd use OS X if I could afford a Mac. I've wanted a Macbook for so long, but the price.... Can't do it. I'm still running on some MAJOR old hardware here.

My Laptop - Pentium 4 M @ 3.06 GHz and 512 RAM, and a 32 MB Nvidia Ge Force FX GO5200 with 30 GB HD
MY FreeBSD test machine - Intel Celeron @ 433 MHz - 192 RAM - 8 MB ATI card, 80 GB HD
Other Deskrtop - Intel Celeron @ 2.40 GHz - 512 RAM - On board crap video - 80 GB HD it came with with Windows XP Home, 160 GB HD I installed, with Debian Linux
Other Desktop - AMD Athlon XP 2600 + - 768 MBs RAM - Crap on board video - 120 Gb HD it came with - No OS because the stupid thing keeps randomly shutting off. Took case off, think Over heating is the problem. Can't fix right now.
First Computer I ever bought - Using it as my FTP Server - Intel Pentium 3 @ 733 MHz - 128 MBs of RAM came with it, I upgraded that to 384 MBs of RAM - Came with a 43 GB Hd (Yes, 43. When I had Windows 98 SE on it, it said 42.9) and then I installed another 160 GB HD - Nvidia Card with 16 MBs Video Memory....Basically barely works now, and if I try to load a GUI, either Linux, or Windows... (I formatted the drive back about a year and a half ago, and tried installing Windows to see if the OS was the problem, and the video still looked bad. Basically one day years ago, I woke up and the video had lines all over the place. I tried to check it out but I can't really. I ended up formatting the machine, installing a new OS, and realized it wasn't the OS and that when you move the mouse in a menu, it has a line across the screen that seems to follow the Mouse. In other words, the video card is crapping out SLOWLY) If no GUI is loaded and it's just a Shell, it looks alright though. So I decided to use it as my Server, and don't use X on it really.

Main Desktop - Dell - Intel Core 2 Duo Processor...Can't remember the speed - 4 GBs RAM - 750 GB HD - 256 MB ATI card - Dual Boots Windows 7 64 Bit and Slackware.

As you can see, I've made what I have work. And the new one, I got that for Christmas this past year.


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## Anonymous (Jul 23, 2010)

gore said:
			
		

> ...
> I'd LOVE to have a tool that updated everything. In Debian, it's this:
> 
> apt-get update && apt-get upgrade
> ...



You like Debian, you like Slackware...Debian has this, Slackware has this and FreeBSD is as is. If you like it keep it if not install something different. I was Linux user from...I forgot...but on my computer is just FreeBSD which I use almost all the time. Yes, I have Arch on my wifes because I like K3b which is not yet on FreeBSD and I use Krita on Arch which works muuuuuuuuch faster than on FreeBSD. 
BNTW I use FreeBSD for the desktop computer.


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## gore (Jul 23, 2010)

lumiwa said:
			
		

> You like Debian, you like Slackware...Debian has this, Slackware has this and FreeBSD is as is. If you like it keep it if not install something different. I was Linux user from...I forgot...but on my computer is just FreeBSD which I use almost all the time. Yes, I have Arch on my wifes because I like K3b which is not yet on FreeBSD and I use Krita on Arch which works muuuuuuuuch faster than on FreeBSD.
> BNTW I use FreeBSD for the desktop computer.



Umm, OK, here is the problem with posts like yours, and opinions like your opinion in that:

It's EXACTLY like those people who say "Well if you don't like something a lot of people use, then don't use it"... It fixes nothing.

I really don't think you realize how much Open OSs share with each other. FreeBSD uses GCC just like Linux. It's not like they don't share back and forth, as they should (When BSD and GPL / Linux people all share ideas, we end up with a better system).

I've been using FreeBSD on and off since 4.0, and I don't really care if someone is going to come on here and tell me that if I want it to update easy, I should just use something else. No. I will continue using FreeBSD, I will continue using Linux, and I will ...Sort of use Windows. (Wintendo). And I'll also continue stating my opinion, and eventually, someone will add to FreeBSD the things that make Linux more easier to update / patch / upgrade, and then, FreeBSD, will not be the "unknown" giant. Period.

I spend A LOT of my time doing IT / Tech stuff, for free, and one of the things I do, is install OSs for people, write HOWTOs on how to do it, and I even once spent literally 8 hours, with someone who had never used SUSE Linux before, basically spending all that time helping them get it installed, and then configuring it how they wanted, and so on. I didn't get paid for that, I did it because I wanted to help.

And every time someone asks me for help getting Linux installed, I almost always point out there is BSD. Why? Because I like BSD. I REALLY like it. That's why I've sent almost 5,000.00 to them. I want it to be better. I don't have a job right now and I still do the free tech stuff, because I'm not a greedy jerk. And I'm not the only person who wants things to work easier.

I doubt that if you had the CHOICE to use FreeBSD, and update it just as easy as Debian was, you'd decline. Who would seriously do that? I don't even get why anyone would be so rude they would actually post JUST to tell someone "If you don't like it use something else"...That's incredibly rude, doesn't fix anything, and, basically, wasted space.

I've been using this stuff for 10 years, and rarely do the Linux users I help out, ever want to use BSD. Well, let me rephrase that; They WANT to use BSD, and they'd LOVE to try FreeBSD out since it's the one I recommend, but at the same time, when security is brought up, they get all excited and Happy about the features FreeBSD has, until they see the section online about how you do updates. They think freebsd-update is fine, but once they see how Ports work, and how you update those... It's a deal closer.

This is the second time I've taken crap from someone who for some reason thinks it's totally perfect. I don't get that. No software is perfect, and the SECOND someone thinks it is, they stop trying to make it better. That's a problem. If you don't agree, that's fine, and that's your opinion, but being so rude as to say not only is it fine the way it is but if you don't like it hit the road... That's a bad attitude.

Eventually, some time, someone who works on BSD, will see that these updates, and how they work, IS slowing adoption of it, and they'll make a tool that updates the whole system, and then, FreeBSD will be able to compete with Linux on more than just servers. 

It's not like I'm saying the way Ports work now should be taken out. I'm not like that, I don't think my opinion is so better than anyone else's that they should only do it my way (like you seem to think) I'm saying that the way it works now, could use another option.

I don't understand why someone would think that FreeBSD would work any different if another option was made. That makes no sense. The Ports could work just like they do now, it would just be nice if there was the OPTION to do it like Debian, or Slackware.

Wouldn't you love it if you could upgrade only the ones that have security patches? And not have to take the whole thing down for a week to do them ALL ?


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## DutchDaemon (Jul 23, 2010)

Guys, get off the Linux vs FreeBSD wagon. This thread is not about that.


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## dbi (Jul 24, 2010)

Depends on the purpose and the circumstances. 
If I have a choice I'd use the following money-free OSes in this order:

For a SOHO router I'd use Slackware ot Gentoo, because like FreeBSD they both give the option to install a base OS only and I have experience with them. I believe Arch Linux follows the same BSD-like installation method - "base system + everything else", but I've never tried it.
I'd use a BSD too, but only for very simple cases. While a little slower, Linux firewall and routing provide more features.

For a server I'd prefer FreeBSD. Then Gentoo, then CentOS or Slackware. servers don't need as many packages as desktops do. Compiling from source allows removing unneeded options and packages which brings better speed and security. The other approach is "install a base system and compile by hand". Then one should update by hand also which I'd prefer not to do.
Where does CentOS come in this mix? Well, CentOS uses the RHEL sources. This means one has the security provided by Red Hat and yes, I do believe that security-wise it is a good thing to have a company behind the distro because this means legal obligation to provide security fixes ASAP.

For a desktop I'd use Fedora - balance between easy installation and use on one hand and it works relatively fast and doesn't get in my way too much on the other. Gentoo remains my favourite but I don't like wasting so much time on compiling.

The bottom line is that I should try Arch Linux and it is in my to-do list.


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## drp (Jul 24, 2010)

Ubuntu/Kubuntu is very good for simple, quick, and has-everything. Constant updates, up-to-date versions, tons of packages in the repository. Apt-get and interfaces to it. It's the simplest, most kept-up Linux. Aside from the lack of big repositories and fast package management for everything, I liked Slackware a lot... not that it has everything up-to-date and in a repository, but what you do get is very nice. I was thinking about trying Arch, but I'm really done with Linux. FreeBSD is much better (as far as I know, and to me personally) in a lot of ways, and definitely what I want to stick with for the long-term. If I have just one operating system on my computer, it will definitely be FreeBSD... and I'm tired of Linux.
I haven't used Windows for around a year and a half, except for a few days a couple of times. I played Civilization III on it a little. I got rid of it less than a month ago, I think, and now I have nothing but FreeBSD.
OS X is nice, but Apple is too expensive to me.


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## gore (Jul 24, 2010)

Slackware is VERY BSD like in how it operates. I don't just mean the BSD style rc stuff, but if you buy the Slackware Essentials book, it actually has a BSD logo on the back. "BSDI" is on the back of it just like some FreeBSD books. Also, the CD sets from Slackware, are almost exactly like FreeBSD. For example, I have the FreeBSD 6.0 4 CD set, and the Slackware 10.0 and 10.2 4 CD sets, and the cases are almost identical. The only difference in the logos and what they actually say, the look and style of the case, is the same, and so is the type of info you get. I thought it was kind of weird until someone from the FreeBSD Mall told me one day that yes they were involved with it. Made me Happy to see that not every BSD or Linux distro was at each other's throat and got along 

I need to find Pat's Cell phone number and ask him when he's going to add a SlackPort's to Slackware or something. It's a neat idea, and would be something I think he'd like. And of course, you know, SlackBSD, which would be cool, to put a BSD Kernel on Slackware. Debian has does that already, as has Gentoo.


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## avkhatri (Jul 25, 2010)

For my favorite Linux Distro it's a tie between Debian, and Fedora. Both are stable and have great features.


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## nestux (Jul 26, 2010)

I use Slackware and Debian ]=)


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## bigearsbilly (Jul 26, 2010)

I used SuSe first off when it was either that or redhat. all those years ago.
no broadband just a modem so I used to buy it! (remember?) suse came in a box with a book and 5CDs and loads of apps to play with. great fun exploring a real system compared
to DOS.
Back in the days when linux distros installed a C compiler and man pages.
sadly gone.

slackware was good too I used that for a while. got bored with
finding dependencies though.
Tried ubuntu, pclinux, debian. Solaris 10 I used for a year or so.
Now I use puppy linux in a virtualbox for youtube and suchlike.
debian to keep my hand in, because I've never worked anywhere that use BSD.


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## pkubaj (Jul 30, 2010)

I like Debian and Arch. I also have Ubuntu on my laptop, but it's because almost no other distro has working GMA500 driver (only Mandriva, which I don't like and Fedora but 12 at best). As Ubuntu is Debian-based, I chose to use it. Though I'm planning to try Arch on it, there is supposedly poulsbo driver working. BTW is there any chance of porting poulsbo driver to FreeBSD? I'd like to try it on my laptop, but vesa has just too little performance.


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## Stringer (Aug 6, 2010)

I may not be an linux distro expert but Archlinux and gentoo is the way to go if you ask me. Since gentoo aint really for beginners in linux it suits sort of with BSD, while archlinux is more of a choose if i wanted to quickly get an computer with it's purpose of being an educational, programming desktop pc.


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## Blackbird (Aug 6, 2010)

If I had to choose a linux distro for my desktop, I think I would choose Ubuntu. Whenever there is the possibility of flexibility in the setting up of some linux distro, e.g. Gentoo, I can't stop comparing it with FreeBSD's flexibility and get depressive. :e

So I would choose Ubuntu, which I have nearly no possibility to change something by command line, so I'd use the GUI tools and could become happy.
But of course, I would hardly miss the flexibility of everything.


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## fronclynne (Aug 7, 2010)

Blackbird said:
			
		

> If I had to choose a linux distro for my desktop, I think I would choose Ubuntu. Whenever there is the possibility of flexibility in the setting up of some linux distro, e.g. Gentoo, I can't stop comparing it with FreeBSD's flexibility and get depressive. :e
> 
> So I would choose Ubuntu, which I have nearly no possibility to change something by command line, so I'd use the GUI tools and could become happy.
> But of course, I would hardly miss the flexibility of everything.



Oh dear, no.  I can confirm that aptitude, apt-get, dpkg all work perfectly on Unbunutuwutu.  As does an angry "rm -rf /" whist you shriek imprecations at the accursed thing.


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## Blackbird (Aug 7, 2010)

Ok, I know. I've used Ubuntu before as well.
But if I think about it, I think I would become depressive with these command line tools, and manpages, just more.


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## Vener (Aug 7, 2010)

I still use debian on some servers, buts it's only for virtualization using xen and kvm. 
I use ubuntu on my desktop at work. It works well, it's easy and really fast to install. I don't have a lot of time to waste at work and it's enough for me.


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## fx4 (Aug 9, 2010)

Fedora.  yum is a superior package management system to anything else I've tried on Linux.  The system itself is very flexible.  Plus, RedHat gives a lot back to the community.  My only beef is that SELinux is enabled by default, but it is easy to remove.  Maybe not the prettiest distro out of the box, but certainly each release gives a working preview of what other distributions will soon be leeching.

Arch Linux is nice, very minimal if you stick to the packages + AUR.  However, ABS is no replacement for the ports system and I wish they would stop branding it as such.  I would probably be running Arch on my laptop if recent kernel changes didn't break thinkpad_acpi when using OSS for sound.  KDEmod is the superior KDE4 implementation on the market.


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## Crabb (Aug 15, 2010)

linux base f10


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## mauser1891 (Aug 16, 2010)

Hello Folks,

For a older hardware and simple graphical user interface I install Peppermint @ http://perppermintos.com/
My regular linux installs I use sidux @ http://sidux.com/
My first distro was Slackware back in 1998.


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## gore (Aug 18, 2010)

I still use OpenSUSE and SUSE Linux. What can I say, I'm a German American  We make good stuff!

I still don't like Fedora Core, but that's just me. I mean if it works for someone and they like it, my opinion shouldn't matter anyway. I also still like Slackware and Debian, which is the other stuff I use.


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## Yampress (Aug 18, 2010)

debian


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## ath0 (Aug 18, 2010)

Hey @all

i only use ubuntu or kubuntu for test stuff since i changed to FreeBSD.
soon i will have a look at Debian because my last experience a years ago.


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## mauser1891 (Aug 20, 2010)

Hello Folks,


I suggest trying out sidux, which uses Debian sid as it's core with some fixes.
Any rate you can read about more about it @ sidux

I used *buntu for awhile, but had better support for my BCM 4311 rev 1 wireless in my old Compaq C551NR laptop.
I never went back.  I use the  toram  "switch" to increase my install rate.
The installer is extremely simple.  My friend installed Debian as his first distro had a hard time since the installer was to simple...  lol
I still use sidux.


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## elimite (Aug 22, 2010)

i'm using arch on my low end toshiba laptop. great distro if you're not afraid to get your hands a little dirty - and a nice payoff in terms of performance, responsiveness, and customization.

Got the family desktop running Linux Mint on a 10 yr old machine. Very responsive, nice software selection, and easy for the tech-challenged to use.


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## ChickenWing88 (Aug 30, 2010)

MY personal preference is Debian .
Here is my lap top specs 

Lenovo N500 

Debian 5.0.5 Lenny With xfce and Openoffice 3.2.1 from Debian backots

/dev/sda
 500GB Aftermaaket
Display: 15.4'' TFT
RAm: 3072MB
Intel Hraphics Media Accelerator


----------



## hrsetrdr (Sep 20, 2010)

Weinter said:
			
		

> OK OK I know ALL of us LOVE BSD
> But I am sure you all played with Linux before conversion?
> So which is your favourite?



1.Debian
2.Arch


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## davidgurvich (Sep 21, 2010)

My preferences are for ease of use, speed, and stability.  

Linux Mint is very good and the fluxbox edition is very fast, comparable to Arch.  The appearance is quite good.  The fluxbox edition requires some configuration but not as much as Arch.

PCLinuxOS is the fastest KDE4 distribution I've ever tried.  The hardware support is excellent.  I don't like the appearance as much as opensuse but would suggest that for anyone having issues with speed on opensuse they try PCLinuxOS.

Debian is fast and requires almost as much configuration as Arch.  I haven't seen the Linux Mint Debian version yet but that may be one of the better combinations that I've heard of.

Fedora is interesting but the rapid changes frequently cause problems and the distribution is not very friendly for individual desktop users.  Too often some esoteric command line magic is needed to make various things work.  That does not include installing drivers from source because the included drivers have too may bugs.


----------



## tty3 (Sep 21, 2010)

emulators/linux_base-f10, *love* *bsd systems, not change for nothing, is minimal, simply, fast and recognized all hardware


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## nekoexmachina (Sep 21, 2010)

>emulators/linux_base-f10
+1 lol
Also i've come to hate ubuntu after trying to upgrade my fathers laptop from 8.04 to 10.04. After about a day of jumping around with timbrel in my hand, i've just reinstalled it.
While on his desk everything went smooth and cool.


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## zspider (Sep 21, 2010)

nekoexmachina said:
			
		

> >emulators/linux_base-f10
> +1 lol
> Also i've come to hate ubuntu after trying to upgrade my fathers laptop from 8.04 to 10.04. After about a day of jumping around with timbrel in my hand, i've just reinstalled it.
> While on his desk everything went smooth and cool.




Me too Linux Emulation does almost everything and well too, the family computer is Ubuntu and it works for the most part, but sometimes it can be a real PITA to work with.x( like the time I removed network manager to use the interfaces file to setup networks which broke it and I had to manually fetch packages and their dependencies from another computer to fix it.


----------



## captobvious (Oct 29, 2010)

Been using Slackware for the past 2 years, just switched over to FreeBSD a month ago. Just my 2 cents, I feel like the newer linux distros are trying to migrate in more mainstream users by emulating the Mac OS (yes I know it's technically a BSD) desktop environment. Prime examples: Ubuntu and any distro the defaults a GNOME or KDE desktop.

I'm not a computer guru, I'm a biologist by background; the switch to linux from windows XP was prompted by the annoyance of learning a new microsoft OS every 3-5 years - no thank you. I really want a stable system that once I learn how things work, it will for the most part stay the same.

So FreeBSD here I am  

But Slackware was a very nice distro and a good bridge distro to migrate from linux -> BSD


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## Deleted member 9563 (Oct 29, 2010)

Although I'm just an amateur, I have been playing with computers since the 70's, yet I have never had the guts to run MS-Windows so I managed with DOS. When a GUI became mandatory, my only realistic choice was Linux. I've been running *Kubuntu* for some years now. Linux is trying to be popular by emulating everything about Macs and MS. I'm finding it just not stable enough any more. So yes, I'm with you *captobvious*:


> I really want a stable system that once I learn how things work, it will for the most part stay the same.


Linux is good, and FOSS is the only way to go in my mind. However BSD is the logical next step.


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## gore (Oct 29, 2010)

It's been a while since I posted on here last, but with all the talk on here, I figured I'd pop in to give my personal opinion on some of the things said. Of course, I'll point out clearly, that this is ALL my personal Opinion, and so there isn't much in the way of technical reason for MY choices anyway 

My start in Computers is much less than most around here. I didn't own one until VERY late 1999. That was when I got my very first computer ever. I'd always been fascinated with them, because whenever I saw one, I looked at the screen, and thought "Wow, this thing does SO much! It's nothing like what I've used, and I want one!".

Basically, all of two of my family members owned a Computer at that time, and the only other time I saw one was in school. These were Macs at school, and I didn't know a thing about them either. Well, I ended up being kicked out of high school for grades (They can do that, or at least they could then) because even though I'd been diagnosed with ADD, they couldn't get a medication to actually work. My teachers thought I was stupid, my family thought I was lazy, and it took years to find out that really, I had a very above average IQ (I have an IQ of 146, which when I read the results and the chart I got, is around Genius level) and so of course this was a shock and a half....

The teachers I had to deal with assumed I was stupid and that THAT was the reason I did poorly. My Family figured I was lazy and didn't pay attention, and it wasn't until some testing that the cause was found to be it wasn't that I was stupid, but in fact a Genius level IQ person, who oddly enough, will end up a lot like Bart Simpson....

Heh, if you guys ever watched The Simpsons, remember the episode where Bart is taking the IQ test in school, and switches his paper for Martin's? And the school finds out when the guy comes in and says "The reason BArt acts out and does so poorly is that he finds no challenge in his school work" and so on?

Well it was kind of like that. I ended up going to an adult learning center, and after about one semester, I learned that these classes were HALF credits... So it would take longer. I decided to try for a GED, because I wanted to have a diploma.

The State of Michigan at that time, was starting to change how those worked, and I had basically a month to start preparing myself for the tests, and pass them all, because the next month, they were changing how it all worked, and I'd have to start over again.

Well, I ended up going in when they had an opening, and to make it through, I'd do two tests each day. Not only did I pass, but I got such high marks that I got an equivalence instead of the standard GED.

A while later, I went to college, made the Honor's List, and became good friends with the Professor's in the Computer Science labs. I was part of the gifted group in the Computer Science department. All this within 4 years of turning on my first computer.

I think those of us with ADD for some reason learn through Computers better than other methods. But anyway, I'm rambling, sorry lol.

I personally don't like Ubuntu... But, at the same time, I have no issue with a Distro of Linux trying to be more like Windows. I don't care about that at all.

I've had very food experiences with certain versions of Mandrake / Mandriva Linux, and then some versions, were basically crap.

I haven't ever really liked Red Hat, or Fedora Core... But again, that's personal preference. I HATE Gentoo however.... I'm glad the people who like it found something they REALLY like and all, but I personally refuse to use it. I can't stand it Honestly.

The following, are the Distros I personally use and love:

SUSE / OpenSUSE
Slackware
Debian
NetSecL / The Security Enhanced Slackware
Mandrake / Mandriva (Depending on version of course...Some are just terrible)
A few smaller distros I've used, which I can't recall the names of... Mostly the Slackware based ones.

And of course FreeBSD, PC-BSD and all of them based on FreeBSD. I don't mind NetBSD, but I personally am more of a FreeBSD guy. OpenBSD... I don't like it, and I don't like the guy who makes it. I have no issue with his gigantic Ego, it's his personality and "We won't use ANYTHING that isn't open, even if it means being behind or our users suffering for it"... THAT bugs me.

As for Windows, and DOS, and all that... I do like Windows 2000, but don't use it anymore, and I do like Windows 7, which has a PowerShell which is a step in the right direction FINALLY. (Who here was EVER actually Happy Hacking in a DOS prompt? Heh).

Anyway, that's just my opinion, and I don't push my opinions on others, so you won't see me telling anyone here they're wrong in any way shape or form, unless they ask me what I think. That's one of the things people seem to like about me heh.


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## fronclynne (Oct 29, 2010)

*Frankly, my dear, the Simpsons sucks the big one.*



			
				gore said:
			
		

> Heh, if you guys ever watched The Simpsons, remember the episode where Bart is taking the IQ test in school, and switches his paper for Martin's? And the school finds out when the guy comes in and says "The reason BArt acts out and does so poorly is that he finds no challenge in his school work" and so on?



That was a Dennis the Menace television episode from 1961, except that instead of switching tests it's a grading error from the "Do Not Fold, Spindle, or Mutilate" problem.


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## UNIXgod (Oct 30, 2010)

Just started playing with funtoo. Might be one to check out. It's f0rkable =)

http://funtoo.org


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## Deleted member 9563 (Oct 30, 2010)

gore said:
			
		

> . . . (Who here was EVER actually Happy Hacking in a DOS prompt? Heh). . . .



Me.

Hehe. Not to take this too far astray - but I couldn't leave that alone.  It is noteworthy in this context that DOS is completely run by user written configuration files in such a way that every computer is highly personalized and extremely efficient to the user who set it up - much like a shell only *nix system. It is also noteworthy that it is trivial to do e-mail on a system with a single 360K floppy and no other storage beyond a flyspec of RAM. Yes, this is seriously fun "hacking". Try it!

I do all my writing and text file management on a pure DOS machine. I even use it for a fair amount of network stuff. I can't imagine any OS coming even close for text management. Yes, personal opinion of course, but my point is that I *do* use DOS in a serious manner and the files fly back and forth effortlessly from there to my *nix boxes. No, I don't use any of the original distribution files - just my own collection of utilities - which is the only way to do it in that world. So, yeah, I'm actually "Happy Hacking in a DOS prompt".


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## da1 (Oct 30, 2010)

Favorite ? Maybe Debian.
Using ? RedHAT/Fedora.
Reason ? employer & $$$.


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## sk8harddiefast (Oct 30, 2010)

Funtoo? Based.... on Gentoo?


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## UNIXgod (Oct 30, 2010)

sk8harddiefast said:
			
		

> Funtoo? Based.... on Gentoo?



Basically it's Gentoo with openrc and git backend for syncing. DR is also back in the picture with it. It's considered a derivative vs fork. Maybe because of this: http://blog.funtoo.org/2007/07/so-can-i-have-gentoo-back.html


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## zspider (Oct 31, 2010)

captobvious said:
			
		

> Been using Slackware for the past 2 years, just switched over to FreeBSD a month ago. Just my 2 cents, I feel like the newer linux distros are trying to migrate in more mainstream users by emulating the Mac OS (yes I know it's technically a BSD) desktop environment. Prime examples: Ubuntu and any distro the defaults a GNOME or KDE desktop.
> 
> I'm not a computer guru, I'm a biologist by background; the switch to linux from windows XP was prompted by the annoyance of learning a new microsoft OS every 3-5 years - no thank you. I really want a stable system that once I learn how things work, it will for the most part stay the same.
> 
> ...



I agree, Linux was a good stepping stone, but I had to graduate sooner or later, happier here on FreeBSD which has worked far better than I ever imagined it would, Ubuntu is definitely changing to a desktop for non-computer people especially with the whole unity thing and that is one of the reasons I refused to use Ubuntu beyond learning the basics, you could say that I saw the writing on the wall.


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## kenorb (Nov 1, 2010)

Pld


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## swa (Nov 6, 2010)

Desktop: openSUSE. Used Ubuntu before but once I tried openSUSE I never looked back.
For a server, if it really has to be linux for whatever reason, I would probably choose Debian.


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## sk8harddiefast (Nov 7, 2010)

> Pld


Pld?


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## davetrotteruk (Nov 7, 2010)

sk8harddiefast said:
			
		

> Pld?



It used to stand for polish Linux distribution, but now its just PLD. Its an idependant distro that uses rpm packages.
That's my knowledge exhausted.


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## captobvious (Nov 7, 2010)

Just a thought, would it be possible to repost this thread as a poll? Let's say with the top 15-20 linux distros from distrowatch.com ? I'm actually curious to knowing how many BSD users favor slackware.


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## ahavatar (Nov 10, 2010)

Ubuntu because I can make my hands dirty with FreeBSD


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## Thorny (Nov 10, 2010)

I started with Mandrake/Mandriva-Linux. At some of my Desk/Laptops i'm still using it. Installing/Upgrading software is very easy (compared to yast ) and it just works.


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## dulemars (Nov 10, 2010)

Regarding Slackware, it was my first "admin" Linux experience ever (i didn't count in playing with Ubuntu and Debian desktops). First servers I ever built in my life were on FreeBSD, and I learned it substantially before I tried any Linux deployment. I was very happy learning that FreeBSD and "hardcore" Slackware are very similar


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## oliverh (Nov 10, 2010)

dulemars said:
			
		

> Regarding Slackware, it was my first "admin" Linux experience ever (i didn't count in playing with Ubuntu and Debian desktops). First servers I ever built in my life were on FreeBSD, and I learned it substantially before I tried any Linux deployment. I was very happy learning that FreeBSD and "hardcore" Slackware are very similar



Well, back in the good old times, Slackware counted as entry-level distro. Nowadays it's quiet different, but that's not the fault of Slackware or FreeBSD. So "hardcore" is somewhat wrong in my opinion.


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## rghq (Nov 12, 2010)

Hmm - Slackware - pkgsrc runs quite fine on it. Problem may be some packages Slackware needs & ships cause problems with pkgsrc ones.
Still meanwhile, Arch is a nice one. Still not for use on Servers but that's not their focus anyways.


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## El_Barto (Dec 2, 2010)

It is hard to say. I started just for fun doing multiboot because it was to hard for me to choose ...
As I was and still am new to all of this stuff and I did not had to much time for doing a study on Grub(2). Lilo was no obtion for me (that is why I did not liked Slackware) because it only supports limited partitions (because at a certain moment I was running up till 38 distro's).
So I tried almost all (commercial) bootmanager on the market because I am still not into programming and that kind of stuff.

I tried most out of Distrowatch. Really liked Hymera (Italian and Debian based but no longer active I believe), the standard Interface was not much but it had also a a very beautiful one included which could be activated in the extra options. Did not understood why it was not their general Desktop Environment, one of the most beautiful on the Linux market. Gos (Ubuntu based) was (was because I do not think it is still active) a OSX look a like. 

I did not like Sidux because some updates messed up some other partitions, especially the grub part. That reminds me of another distro of which I do not remember the name anymore. It had a special updating system, I believe it was called Conakry or something like that. It tried to update all other Linux kernels if found too on the other partitions with the result I could start all over again...

I liked SuperOS and Ultimate Edition because all the stuff it had included from the start. Vector Linux, Black Panther, OpenGeu, Chakra and PC/OS nice to try and had each their own special blend. DreamLinux is still on the to do list, what ever I do I am unable to install this one because of some bug towards my hardware. Trisquel is a stripped version of Ubuntu, I like it because it really demonstrates how good a Linux Distro is capable of watching flash movies without the flashplugin of Adobe without any problems although this plugin still has to be installed after the installation.

On the end I had a few distros left of which I was unable to choose from ...
- Sabayon and MoonOS (Very beautiful Desktop Environment)
- Linux Mint (Beautiful and out of the box experience)
- PcLinuxOs, Deephin, and especially Zorin OS and YLMF OS are very Windows Look a like as Desktop Environment (not everything of Windows is bad)
- Pardus was also very nice to have, although sometimes buggy
- Ubuntu Netbook I liked too to have as desktop.
- OpenSuse : what can I say about this one, is there anything left to be improved? I doubt it. Also the fact that it downloading the updates and installing them at the same time whilst working without any delay on the system was very impressive. 1.5 gb within 20 minutes was amazing.

My final observation was that 60% of Linux distros used is Ubuntu based. Ubuntu is actually a polished and user friendly version of Debian. So actually it is Debian which is running the show.


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## El_Barto (Dec 3, 2010)

It seems I am unable to edit my own posts.

The package manager I was referring to and which tried to update all other Linux kernels it found on the other partitions is not Conakry but Conary from rPath. There is another ditro based on rPath I tried too, Foresight. Foresight is completely closed as I remember, you have to give the admin password for every breath you take. Terrible to use if you know nothing about it. Even Arch Linux with their manual for noobs was easier to use.


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## DutchDaemon (Dec 4, 2010)

El_Barto said:
			
		

> It seems I am unable to edit my own posts.



Maybe you're able to read your signup email, or the Sticky posts in the General forum


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## LeopoldP (Dec 21, 2010)

my favorite is red hat


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## fat64 (Dec 21, 2010)

Scientific Linux.

"Scientific Linux is a recompiled Red Hat Enterprise Linux, co-developed by Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory and the European Organization for Nuclear Research (CERN)." --DistroWatch


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## sizemj (Dec 22, 2010)

I would also be put on the Slackware list. I have played with a lot of Linuxes, but loved Slackware and how simple it was. Slackware is what got me interested in FreeBSD. Slackware's handbook tells you to look in the FreeBSD handbook for more answers : )


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## graudeejs (Dec 22, 2010)

sizemj said:
			
		

> I would also be put on the Slackware list. I have played with a lot of Linuxes, but loved Slackware and how simple it was. Slackware is what got me interested in FreeBSD. Slackware's handbook tells you to look in the FreeBSD handbook for more answers : )



Really?


----------



## sk8harddiefast (Dec 23, 2010)

Ok! Now I am sure 100%! I use the most perfect OS!


----------



## YZMSQ (Dec 23, 2010)

fat64 said:
			
		

> Scientific Linux.
> 
> "Scientific Linux is a recompiled Red Hat Enterprise Linux, co-developed by Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory and the European Organization for Nuclear Research (CERN)." --DistroWatch


Reminds me of CentOS,also derived from RHEL.:f


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## ChickenWing88 (Dec 26, 2010)

*Favorite Linux*

For desktops : RHEL
Laptops; xubuntu


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## gore (Jan 3, 2011)

killasmurf86 said:
			
		

> Really?



Yes it does. Pat actually tells people all the time to basically not even bother with Linux web sites, and that if you want answers for things, most Linux pages are PR based crap, and to look into BSD as you'll get actual technical information.

Also, if you order from the Slackware Store, and BSD Mall, you get your stuff in the same box. I had an order for FreeBSD books, software, shirts, and so on, and the same day, an order for Slackware software, shirt, books, and so on, and the next day they were on my porch in the same box.

Also, the Slackware official CD and the FreeBSD ones, look almost identical. I'm pretty sure they're made a few feet away from each other lol. I've also been told my people at the FreeBSDMall they like Slackware. And Pat seems to really love BSD. I've talked to him a few times, good guy.


----------



## troberts (Jan 5, 2011)

I do not have a favorite Linux distro but last year I wiped FreeBSD, which I had been using since 6.0 was released, and installed Gentoo. I never had a problem with FreeBSD but something about the Gentoo 'g' icon kept calling my name. The one advantage to using Gentoo instead of FreeBSD is Flash support. On FreeBSD, nspluginwrapper would hang or there would be one instance per tab that was open in Firefox. The IMDb.com web site was where I had the most problems with viewing its content with Flash enabled. I do not blame FreeBSD in any way, shape, or form, but seeing how much nicer Flash runs with Gentoo I will be staying here a bit longer, although I do prefer FreeBSD as a whole. Gnash was hit-or-miss with a lot of miss.

P.S. Any word on when Adobe will offer a native version of Flash for FreeBSD?


----------



## DutchDaemon (Jan 5, 2011)

Flash has been working fine on 32-bit and 64-bit FreeBSD for ages now. If it doesn't: PEBKAC, I'm afraid.


----------



## oliverh (Jan 7, 2011)

@DutchDaemon well, most of the time. There are websites with Flash that fail on FreeBSD and I'm not talking of Youtube or watching movies. For the latter I use clive.


----------



## DutchDaemon (Jan 8, 2011)

Can you give examples of those? Can't remember seeing that.


----------



## gour (Jan 25, 2011)

Hiya,

After seeing that OS2 is going nowhere, I had installed SuSE in '99. Soon, found out about rpm deps hell and switched to Gentoo and fighting with it on ~amd64 for more than 5yrs...then switched to my current distro -Archlinux.

Now, I'm evaluating PCBSD-9 (under vbox) and soon plan to shrink my lvm2+raid-1 ext4 array in order to test with real hardware...hopefully making full switch by the time of 9.0 (maybe even sooner if everything will be ok). 

All in all, I believe that F/PCBSD is upgrade from the current OS and I'm going to put it on the desktop of several people believing I'll have less problems servicing and maintaing their machines.


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## gore (Jan 25, 2011)

Dependency problems on SUSE back then? I've been using SUSE since 8.1 Professional, and it wasn't really until around 10 that I ever ran into those. I'd go as far as saying that SUSE Linux 8.1 and 8.2 Professional were two of my favorite OSs ever. I've got a lot of them, and to this day I wonder if they'll ever make another as good as those two were. Literally everything worked out of the box on every machine I was using.


----------



## nakal (Jan 25, 2011)

I like Gentoo Linux best, but I already managed to break the portage system in a way, where no upgrade was possible anymore already 2 times. Which brought me back to FreeBSD again, because in all the years, I never had problems with ports (of course I don't mean single ports that occasionally don't work correctly, I mean the whole tree). And before anyone mentions it, yeah, I know there is revdep-rebuild on Gentoo (but it did not work!).

FreeBSD Ports Team is the best! I love you guys. Keep the good work!


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## UNIXgod (Jan 25, 2011)

nakal said:
			
		

> I like Gentoo Linux best, but I already managed to break the portage system in a way, where no upgrade was possible anymore already 2 times. Which brought me back to FreeBSD again, because in all the years, I never had problems with ports (of course I don't mean single ports that occasionally don't work correctly, I mean the whole tree). And before anyone mentions it, yeah, I know there is revdep-rebuild on Gentoo (but it did not work!).
> 
> FreeBSD Ports Team is the best! I love you guys. Keep the good work!



Nothing beats FreeBSD stability. You gentoo guys should have a look at Funtoo. It's really what gentoo was before the mess.

Breakage is less frequent and fixable. No BS like "drop untested into stable and hope someone with some time on their hands comes along to deal with it.


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## gore (Jan 25, 2011)

I personally haven't ever used Gentoo. I've used a distro or two that is based on it, but I haven't ever installed Gentoo on any of my machines. When I first read about it, I was like "WTF is this? They took BSD and slapped a Linux Kernel on top?" And of course that's not accurate, but it was my first thought.

A friend of mine started using it, and then became "The" Gentoo guy, because he loved it. Then he got annoying talking about how his Terminal Window opened up .3 seconds quicker or something. He wouldn't use anything else. After a while he seemed to calm down, and started using Slackware and FreeBSD along side Gentoo.

I've been contemplating downloading a CD ISO of it to give it a whack, but I'm still iffy. Don't get me wrong though; That "G" Logo is really pretty lol.


----------



## gour (Jan 26, 2011)

gore said:
			
		

> Dependency problems on SUSE back then?



Iirc, although it was long ago, I started with SuSE around 4.1 and/or before 5.0 and left, I believe, after 7.2.


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## gour (Jan 26, 2011)

UNIXgod said:
			
		

> Nothing beats FreeBSD stability.



Heh, that's what my ears like to hear. 



> You gentoo guys should have a look at Funtoo. It's really what gentoo was before the mess.



Wel, drobbins is the key word here...and actually that guy which pushes 'alternative' to portage, was the main reason why I finally left Gentoo. :e


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## gore (Jan 26, 2011)

It was probably 4.2, since there was never a SUSE before that. There wasn't a 1.0 or 2, or 2, as it started at 4.2 Mostly because "42" is, of course, the answer


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## kpedersen (Jan 26, 2011)

I now have a pet hate of Linux distros that have a "tweaked" kernel.

Tried to recompile a vanilla kernel on RedHat Enterprise 5 to get a newly supported wireless device working and... The new kernel just doesn't work lol (even though the kernel .config is the same as the original default kernel). Nothing would mount at bootup and then a kernel panic occurred. (ext2 and ext3 were compiled in (not as modules).

So I assume it has something to do with the whole system is set up to require the tweaked kernel. (Perhaps intentional vendor lock in?)

Moral of the story, linux is generally unusable


----------



## xibo (Jan 26, 2011)

I found I can have fun with gentoo, somehow live with suse, and i decided to not touch ubuntu again unless being paid for it.
Of cause gentoo fun is mostly about having to modify the ebuilds and microtweaking the kernel config&makefile and of cause every-gentoo-user's-favourite CFLAGS.

Recently I'm often using Interix ( Microsoft's POSIX ), which here also uses GNU userland. Does that also count as linux?


----------



## gore (Jan 27, 2011)

Software und System Entwicklung  I know a lot of people who think SUSE is bloated, but I don't care, it's a great distro. I REALLY miss the old ones I was mentioning before; 8.1 and 8.2, I STILL love them. If my older box was up and running I'd probably install them on that. They just worked SO good out of the box.

Now you try and get a Linux distro working that good and it's like "Ach du scheisse! What is this thing doing?!?" because they have totally crazy stuff out of the box. I've heard that Red Hat even shipped a product once, that out of the box, couldn't use certain features....Like, broken by default.... Then again, they DID say they wanted to be like Microsoft.


----------



## gour (Jan 27, 2011)

gore said:
			
		

> It was probably 4.2, since there was never a SUSE before that. There wasn't a 1.0 or 2, or 2, as it started at 4.2 Mostly because "42" is, of course, the answer



Right...now I remember it was just close before 5.0 release...


----------



## gore (Jan 27, 2011)

Yea, apparently they are huge fans of Douglas Adams.


----------



## laikexpert (Feb 16, 2011)

Puppy Linux
is extraordinarily small, yet quite full-featured.


----------



## Akill (Feb 16, 2011)

Arch ...simple, lightweight, nice wiki, rolling release, bsd init script...


----------



## v8skittles (Feb 21, 2011)

Fedora/Ubuntu/Debian/Arch/Mint(I liked the colors)/Slackware/Slax/Puppy/Centos/OpenSUSE. I got really bored after a while..


----------



## mauser1891 (Feb 22, 2011)

*Which is your Favourite Linux?  Debian GNU/Linux*

Various release stages and package selection has been the determining factor in my choice for Debian GNU/Linux. Everybody has their choice on what they want to use, so I will not get into the "mine is better than yours"... 

I do have to be thankful of DistroWatch for providing me an introductory article and link to FreeBSD. 

So I usually have a triple-bootable system with WinXP Pro (SP3), Debian GNU/Linux, and FreeBSD.


----------



## GreenMeanie (Mar 16, 2011)

debian


----------



## alie (Mar 17, 2011)

Arch


----------



## Zare (Mar 17, 2011)

Debian on "homebrew" servers, RHEL on brand servers that require support, and Arch on desktop.

Every now and then, I google some Linuxism, and when I see the answer, I have a huge WTF?! Sign over my head. Some mechanisms and some solutions in general GNU/Linux environment are damn ugly.


----------



## zennybsd (Mar 17, 2011)

Slack/debian/salix/arch/ubuntu for desktop (minimal with i3-wm and without and DM).

Crunchbang/archbang/ubuntu for laptop.

Debian/centos for servers (with tmux/screen).


----------



## x-com (Mar 31, 2011)

Only Debian touches my harddisk :e


----------



## homemade (Apr 1, 2011)

homemade said:
			
		

> Debian for servers and Ubuntu for Desktops.
> 
> Ever since FreeBSD 8.0, I might be forced to leave FBSD for a more secure future; but I love FBSD.



It has been a 1 year and 3 months since I switch from FreeBSD to Debian. The best decision I have ever made as far as server OS.  If you plan to use production servers for hosting different applications for yourself and others, then go to Debian.  You shouldn't kill yourself maintaining servers.  Don't become a code troll. HaHa.

My first distro was Unix at my local college during the early 2000's.  And since then, it feels like I had tried every OS available.  I must say try debian as one of your first Os's.


----------



## UNIXgod (Apr 1, 2011)

homemade said:
			
		

> If you plan to use production servers for hosting different applications for yourself and others, then go to Debian.  You shouldn't kill yourself maintaining servers.  Don't become a code troll. HaHa.



Did you just tell people on a FreeBSD user forum to not use FreeBSD for production servers and shell scripting is a form of trolling? or are you putting down programmers?

How come I have a feeling your just a linux-bigot and not a real admin?


----------



## roddierod (Apr 1, 2011)

homemade said:
			
		

> My first distro was Unix at my local college during the early 2000's.



I take it computer science wasn't your major.


----------



## DutchDaemon (Apr 2, 2011)

Trolls should go hungry, folks, especially on April 1st.


----------



## nestux (Apr 2, 2011)

nestux said:
			
		

> I use Slackware and Debian ]=)



Still like them but...now my favorite linux distribution is emulators/linux_base-f10/ :e


----------



## Prezadent (Apr 7, 2011)

If I was forced to use Linux, I would try CentOS first.

But really asking me what is my favorite Linux is like asking who is my favorite male stripper.


----------



## timotheosh (Jun 8, 2011)

I have been using Linux for fifteen years (Systems Administration, and programming web platforms). Started with Slackware version 2. Switched to Debian. Dabbled in Redhat and SuSE. Always returned to Debian.

Redhat committed unforgivable crimes distributing broken gcc and perl packages on RedHat 5,6 and 8 (before RHEL and Fedora releases). That, and  broken X distro on version 5.2 has caused me to be leery of any thing labeled "RedHat". I'll even endorse CentOS over RedHat because it does not carry the tainted name. (Yes, irrational behavior on my part!)

I have been happily playing with BSD (the big four - NetBSD, OpenBSD, FreeBSD, DragonflyBSD) for a year now. I like BSD more than Solaris 7,8, or 9 (forget 10, its not even UNIX anymore!)

For Linux, Ubuntu for the desktop (if you stick with LTS releases only, it is almost Debian), Debian or CentOS for server.


----------



## gore (Jun 8, 2011)

I have a few questions for you about some of your post :



			
				timotheosh said:
			
		

> Redhat committed unforgivable crimes distributing broken gcc and perl packages on RedHat 5,6 and 8 (before RHEL and Fedora releases). That, and  broken X distro on version 5.2 has caused me to be leery of any thing labeled "RedHat". I'll even endorse CentOS over RedHat because it does not carry the tainted name. (Yes, irrational behavior on my part!)



I've heard about this before but I don't know much about it. I remember reading about it. I was reading something or other online one day, and I'm not a fan of RedHat at all, and I was looking up something and found this article that talked about Red Hat shipping with broken products.

They didn't really go into much detail about it so I don't know much about what happened, and since I'm no fan of theirs anyway, I don't have a clue what happened. I wasn't using RedHat other than to try it out once or twice before deciding I didn't like it. 

Do you have any details? I'm wondering more or less what happened, and WTF they were thinking. I mean if a Company like RedHat made a screw up that's one thing, but shipping an Operating System where the Compiler AND Perl are both broken, that's pretty high up there. I mean this isn't a simple mistake where they shipped and forgot to add something or they maybe had a last minute change that broke ONE application, this is like REALLY bad because then you can't compile, and Perl, as far as I know, you need that for certain other things to work in Red Hat, so that's a HUGE screw up.

Do you have any details on this? Like what happened or how they fixed it?



> I like BSD more than Solaris 7,8, or 9 (forget 10, its not even UNIX anymore!)



What do you mean by 10 isn't Unix? Again, I don't really have much experience in Solaris, so I don't know much on that aspect. I've only got PC hardware, and I only have really the Solaris for X86 that was shipped out a few years ago.


----------



## timotheosh (Jun 9, 2011)

Hi gore,

I don't remember all the details now. I can tell you that RedHat released a forked version of gcc (it was forked during version 2.95) and called it gcc 2.96. If you go to the gnu archives, you'll see, there is no version 2.96 of gcc. gcc 3.0 came after 2.95, a significant rewrite. I don't remember the version of Redhat that shipped with this broken gcc.

Perl was most definitely broken in RedHat 8. The fix, was to go and download the sources yourself and recompile.

I used to have a workstation at work with Redhat 5.2 installed on it. Every night, I would log out of that system, to the xdm screen, and go home. The next morning the system would be completely locked up, and I would have to reboot.

Every Redhat system I installed back then, including Redhat 5, 6, 7, and 8, I would have to tweak after the install to get everything running properly. If I installed Debian stable or Debian testing, everything would just work, with no issues.

Now to be fair, Redhat has matured into a fine product. But I still occasionally run into some nuance they added that they thought would add value to their product, and would more often than not, just be in the way.

Later, RedHat's mistakes were being done on Fedora, and even that is far more stable than it used to be. Debian has just always been very consistent. There are worse distributions, than RedHat, today.

CentOS is a carbon copy of Redhat Enterprise Server, but you get it free. People use it, so they can transfer to Redhat to get support. I say why bother. Centos has commercial support, and it will cost less and be of equal or higher quality than Redhat.

Technically, Solaris 10 (and 11) is still UNIX. But, they have done away with some POSIX standards on the system. They have totally revamped the init system (done away with inittab). I presume, much of these changes were in line with Sun's goal of making Solaris the ultimate Java platform.

I worked with Solaris 2.6, 7, 8, and 9, and have grown very fond of Solaris. My first impressions of Solaris 10 were all bad. Mainly because they had switched around enough stuff in the shell to where I no longer recognized the system.

If you need the iron, Solaris is still solid. However, with Oracle being anal about patches, it is a total waste on intel/AMD platforms. If you are not going to buy the Sparc servers, stick with Linux or BSD.

Something I have been doing recently with Debian, is use the NetBSD pkgsrc system on it. When Debian stable is only getting released once every two years, it is an effective way to keep up with the jones'


----------



## gore (Jun 9, 2011)

Hey,

First off, thank you for taking the time to reply to all that stuff I asked about, I was trying to remember exactly what happened because, well, I'd read about it, once, but it was a really long time ago, so I couldn't for the life of me remember what had happened. So thanks very much for replying to everything:



			
				timotheosh said:
			
		

> Hi gore,
> 
> I don't remember all the details now. I can tell you that RedHat released a forked version of gcc (it was forked during version 2.95) and called it gcc 2.96. If you go to the gnu archives, you'll see, there is no version 2.96 of gcc. gcc 3.0 came after 2.95, a significant rewrite. I don't remember the version of Redhat that shipped with this broken gcc.



Wow.... That's actually incredibly shoddy of them to say the least. Lol I can't Believe they actually did that!



> Perl was most definitely broken in RedHat 8. The fix, was to go and download the sources yourself and recompile.



OK now this is just priceless! I remember a while back I was reading an online article about Red Hat, and they were getting some crap from people because a very high ranking person in the company (Might have been the CEO actually) had said that red Hat wanted to be like Microsoft, and they were basically trying to down play it into "Well Microsoft is very successful and we'd like to be that successful! That's what it meant!" or something to that line.

Shipping a totally broken Perl.... And the fix being "Well download it yourself and fix it yourself" I think they've hit their goal of being like Microsoft lol!

I remember when I took Linux+ in college, the book you had to buy for the coarse, was one that came with two CDs of Red Hat 7.x something. I think 7.2 but I'm not sure since I didn't ever use it. But I do remember that this was literally less than 8 years ago, and even THEN that was out dated as crap.

Thankfully the teacher who did the class, was a good guy and actually knew what he was doing, and he allowed everyone to use something else. Like he even took the time to burn CDs for people who wanted to try something else but didn't have access to a high speed net connection. So he'd let everyone pick what distro they wanted, and then, he would let them download it at school, and then got a portable CD Burner to make the Discs for everyone. 

I thought that was cool of him to say the least. At the time I took that class, I was using SUSE 8.2 I think... Anyway, I used SUSE on my Laptop, and then at home, I had a decent selection of stuff; I had SUSE Linux on a desktop, and then I had another with Slackware and FreeBSD, and then I had Ubuntu I tried ONCE.

I'm a little bit picky when it comes to Operating Systems, but, in my defense, I'll actually try them out before I bash them. I mean, I don't like Red Hat at all, but I did try it out first. In fact, when I bought "Linux for Dummies" I got Red Hat 6.1 or something with it, and I did try installing it even though it didn't work on my hardware very well at all, and actually failed during the MBR writing. Which was BAD lol.

But I then tried out Red Hat again for 9. I didn't have THAT many complaints with Red Hat 9, because for the most part, using it as a VERY minimal Desktop, it was kind of OK. I mean I didn't set up any services on it, but just using it very carefully for some basic desktop stuff, it was OK for that.

I mean, basically, I'd install KDE and Gnome, and generally use KDE, and then have Gaim (Which is now Pidgin) installed, and XMMS to listen to music, and some text editors and a web browser, and that was OK. 

I didn't ever really keep it long though. I mean after 2 months I just said the heck with it and formatted the drive. 

I don't like Gentoo either. Not sure why, I mean, I like the overall look of it, but the whole "Hey why not install EVERYTHING from sources in a manner that makes you wonder why you didn't just pick BSD which does this 10,000 times better and faster?" all that usually annoyed me lol. I mean I know they now have better versions, and you don't need to use the early stage ones, but I just personally don't like the installer. 

Now, to be fair, being a Mod for AntiOnline.com, I do get a LOT of questions when it comes to the Operating System forum there, and when people ask, I generally won't talk about Gentoo, or Red Hat, or any other distro I flat out don't like.

I don't talk about them because I don't think it's right for me to make my opinion a decision for someone else. I mean, what if me saying it's crap means they don't use it, and then, they don't find one they truly like? So I just won't talk about the ones I don't like.

The few times I HAVE talked about those, I generally will say at the very least "Hey, I don't like this one, but that doesn't mean you won't. Distros work for different people for different reasons, and if you have a certain personality, you may well be a perfect match for this one" so that way I'm at least not trying to throw my opinion down someone's throat and force it on them.

I do the same with BSD too. I don't like OpenBSD, and I just don't talk about it. I haven't ever liked OpenBSD really. Theo is a doo doo head and annoying, and the OS isn't anything special, and I've always liked FreeBSD the most. That's why I'm here lol. FreeBSD has been my top BSD pick since... Well, since I got into Unix. Even wayyyyyy back when I got my very first PC; I'd never used a Computer much, and knew nothing about them, and when I got into it more, I started learning about different OSs, like Linux, and BSD, and I bought the "BSD PowerPak" which came with FreeBSD 4.0, and The Complete FreeBSD third edition, and I liked it a lot! I stick with FreeBSD, even though I do have NetBSD somewhere on CD, I just don't use it, like ever.

And I have PC-BSD, DesktopBSD, Freesbie, and the one from UnixPunx, which I liked a lot.




> I used to have a workstation at work with Redhat 5.2 installed on it. Every night, I would log out of that system, to the xdm screen, and go home. The next morning the system would be completely locked up, and I would have to reboot.



Yea RedHat is weird like that. I mean, you'd think that any given Linux distro would work close to the same, considering the Kernel and all the applications are basically the same except for some versions using different versions and customized apps, but Red Hat seems weird in that it doesn't seem to be as stable as just about anything. 

I remember once a few years ago, well, actually a number of years ago.... Anyway, a guy was doing some testing, and reporting his findings on one of the SUSE Mailing Lists, and, his test was taking two machines that were exactly the same; The Hardware was identical, and everything was the same. He then installed Red Hat on one, and SUSE on the other. Then he set up a little web Server, and then used more machines to give them load balancing and all that, and he then started generating Traffic on them.

He said that it was strange, because the SUSE machine almost never used the load Balancing machines at all, and out performed Red Hat by almost double. I always liked that because it made Red Hat look bad and SUSE look good lol.



> Every Redhat system I installed back then, including Redhat 5, 6, 7, and 8, I would have to tweak after the install to get everything running properly. If I installed Debian stable or Debian testing, everything would just work, with no issues.



I've had similar happen; Debian works very well for me too. I've liked it quite a bit actually. One of my machines that I used quite often, was a PC with two hard drives in it, and it dual booted FreeBSD and Debian. I totally loved that machine, and as soon as I get the Power Supply replaced in it, I'll probably go back to Debian and BSD on it.



> Now to be fair, Redhat has matured into a fine product. But I still occasionally run into some nuance they added that they thought would add value to their product, and would more often than not, just be in the way.



I personally haven't used Red Hat since 9. And Fedora... I did download Fedora Core 1, and I think I stopped not long after that for a long time. I grabbed a new release of it like a year or two ago, but I don't actually remember which version it was, and I didn't install it on anything. I wasn't really a fan of it.



> Later, RedHat's mistakes were being done on Fedora, and even that is far more stable than it used to be. Debian has just always been very consistent. There are worse distributions, than RedHat, today.



Yea, I know of a few that I wouldn't use either way. I mean Red Hat isn't great, but there is worse out there.



> Technically, Solaris 10 (and 11) is still UNIX. But, they have done away with some POSIX standards on the system. They have totally revamped the init system (done away with inittab). I presume, much of these changes were in line with Sun's goal of making Solaris the ultimate Java platform.



I didn't know about this at all! That just seems weird to me. I didn't like when Ubuntu did away with the usual Root Account, and so changes like this, are something I don't think is cool at all. I mean I don't pretend my opinion matters that much, but I for sure don't like that.



> If you need the iron, Solaris is still solid. However, with Oracle being anal about patches, it is a total waste on intel/AMD platforms. If you are not going to buy the Sparc servers, stick with Linux or BSD.



I'm very partial to SGI. They make my dream machines. If I had like, no worries about budget or cost, I'd go with SGI everything heh.


----------



## sossego (Jun 9, 2011)

timotheosh said:
			
		

> If you are not going to buy the Sparc servers, stick with Linux or BSD.


 OpenBSD and FreeBSD run quite well on SPARC64 systems.


----------



## gore (Jun 9, 2011)

I think he meant that the non Sun Hardware isn't the best option for running Solaris.


----------



## timotheosh (Jun 9, 2011)

gore said:
			
		

> I think he meant that the non Sun Hardware isn't the best option for running Solaris.



Yes, that is what I meant. But after spending hundreds of thousands of dollars on new Sun equipment, I am not going to blow it away to install another OS.

However, if I were to buy a Sparc pizza box off Ebay, BSD is going on it.

Ubuntu did not get rid of the root account.
`$ sudo passwd root`
is all you need to activate root. A minor inconvenience, for better desktop security. The way Ubuntu handles root, is one of the reasons I highly recommend it to the "un-initiated".
I use `$ sudo su -` on every *nix system I work on anyways. The way Ubuntu does things does not interrupt my flow at all.

Gentoo made a lot of sense back in the day when intel had released their Pentium MMX. There were mighty good performance reasons for recompiling all your i386 binaries to take advantage of the expanded instruction set. Now that almost every distro comes with pre-compiled i686 binaries, there are not many good reasons to do that any more. In spite of this, I tried a Gentoo install from scratch four years ago. Could not get it to stage3 over a single weekend, and then abandoned the project. That was the end of that experiment, and I never have been interested enough to go back.

What year did you take Linux+ in college? I taught that certification class six years ago. But not at a college, I did it for Avaya. We used Fedora Core 2 CD's which worked well enough at the time.


----------



## UNIXgod (Jun 9, 2011)

timotheosh said:
			
		

> Gentoo made a lot of sense back in the day when intel had released their Pentium MMX. There were mighty good performance reasons for recompiling all your i386 binaries to take advantage of the expanded instruction set. Now that almost every distro comes with pre-compiled i686 binaries, there are not many good reasons to do that any more. In spite of this, I tried a Gentoo install from scratch four years ago. Could not get it to stage3 over a single weekend, and then abandoned the project. That was the end of that experiment, and I never have been interested enough to go back.



If you ever felt the need to reevaluate Gentoo again look into Funtoo. It's DRobbin's effort to take back his own project. Also for the most part everything seems to work. I, like yourself, had issues with Gentoo years ago.


----------



## sossego (Jun 10, 2011)

timotheosh said:
			
		

> Yes, that is what I meant. But after spending hundreds of thousands of dollars on new Sun equipment, I am not going to blow it away to install another OS.
> 
> However, if I were to buy a Sparc pizza box off Ebay, BSD is going on it.



I bought two Sun Blade 1000 workstations off of ebay used. One had 512M RAM, two UltraSPARC III CPUs. The other came with 8G RAM and a single UltraSPARC III CPU. I had to buy the drives separately. Both have a Mach64 video card, no Sun type.

I don't have a "pizza box" nor can I afford any new sparc64 system.

Oh, FreeBSD/SPARC64 will not work on the SPARC (32) systems. OpenBSD and NetBSD have support for those systems.


----------



## knk (Jun 11, 2011)

From my limited experience, Ubuntu is such a nightmare in a server environment. Anyone who used Ubuntu (or Debian, there isn't really a big difference, is there) probably knows what I mean. Outdated packages. With Ubuntu you end up with "importing" one or the other "ppa" from launchpad (most probably several).

I don't know how up to date SuSE packages are; and I'm afraid to look (rpm based distributions are offlimits at my work place ...). But if they were, I would use SuSE in a heart beat. Their security team is quite amazing, judging from CVE's that can be attributed to them.

Plus there was this whole OpenSSL fiasco. I'm not sure if Ubuntu was affected. But Debian isn't an option anymore. Not ever. Even now, how would you sell that to your boss? You can't ... (and yet, Ubuntu is "the way to go" at my job ... drives my crazy).

But for use at home, Ubuntu is quiet nice. Boots fast, works out of the box. Whats not to like - except that it's not FreeBSD, of course.


----------



## pkubaj (Jun 11, 2011)

timotheosh said:
			
		

> Hi gore,
> 
> I don't remember all the details now. I can tell you that RedHat released a forked version of gcc (it was forked during version 2.95) and called it gcc 2.96. If you go to the gnu archives, you'll see, there is no version 2.96 of gcc. gcc 3.0 came after 2.95, a significant rewrite. I don't remember the version of Redhat that shipped with this broken gcc.
> 
> ...



I think you're wrong regarding the GCC part. I've searched for it and found this: http://gcc.gnu.org/gcc-2.96.html So it seems 2.96 is a development snapshot of GCC 3.0, incompatible with GCC 2.95 and 3.0. It's not a fork.

Anyway my I favorite distro for desktop is Arch - very much like *BSD and cutting-edge (which I want). On my notebook I use Fedora. It's also a cutting edge distro, but one I don't have to tweak for a couple of hours to make it work according to my needs. And rolling-release model is great for a desktop, but not really for a notebook. That's why I love the FreeBSD ports system, it lets me have a rock-stable OS with the newest software.


----------



## rusty (Jun 11, 2011)

Can someone clarify what similarities Arch and FreeBSD share?


----------



## gore (Jun 11, 2011)

Hey all,

Wow, got a lot of replies to answer huh?

OK, I'll start by quoting what I'm talking about, so that way you guys can actually see what I'm responding too, because I'd like to bring up a few things on like at least 3 of the posts made, so I'll quote first to make it more readable 



> Yes, that is what I meant. But after spending hundreds of thousands of dollars on new Sun equipment, I am not going to blow it away to install another OS.



Yea O figured that was what you meant  I can't blame you heh, if I'd spent THAT much money on ALL that stuff.... I'd be hard pressed to just format the drives to put basically anything else on there.

Don't get me wrong; I use FreeBSD and Linux on almost every machine I have... We currently have 11 Computers here, and that's mostly because both my Wife and I are Computer Science Majors, and, in terms of what we like, we both like very similar things; My Wife has more experience in Programming than I do, and She's also stronger in Hardware, where as I'm stronger in Operating Systems in general (I can go into lots of boring crap about more of them) and I also have a stronger BSD skill set, and I'm stronger in Security. Other than that, we have very similar skills. So our skill set compliments each other's skills very well I think.

We both don't like Ubuntu for multiple reasons, and we both like Slackware.  My Wife also has watched "20 Years of Berkeley Unix" on DVD with me a hundred times or so, and we're both huge fans of M Kirk McKusick. 

We both have a Laptop, and mine currently runs FreeBSD 8.2-RELEASE, and my Wife's Laptop currently has Windows XP I think, because my Mom's Compute had died a while back, so, we installed Windows XP on my Wife's Laptop so my Mom could use it for work while Her new machine was being sent.

Then, there is the VERY first Computer I ever bought. It came with 128 MBs of RAM and a 43 GB HD. I upgraded the RAM to 384 MBs, and added a second HD in it so it has close to 200 GBs of Disk in it now, and since the Video card in it has been dying on me for a long time, I haven't run a GUI on that thing in a long time. I ended up installing Slackware 12.0 on it, and setting up VSFTPd, and then, I decided instead of tossing the machine, I could just use it as my FTP Server. 

I have another Desktop machine too, which is a Compaq Presario 6000 with an ADM Athlon XP 2600+ (A small Frying Pan with a Heat sink if you ask me) and that is running FreeBSD 8.2-RELEASE as well. 

So that box has Slackware Linux and is basically an FTP Server. We use it to back up files to it, and then from there, I have a USB External HD that is 80 GBs I can put the most important stuff on, and also a Thumb Drive, and a ZIP Drive I hook up and put more stuff on ZIP Disks. 

It's the last time I had to reboot, which was a hardware issue, the Video Card finally went on me, but it still runs, so I just log in over SSH to do Admin tasks. Then there is this machine, which was my Christmas Present the year before last; It's got 4 GBs of RAM, an ATI video card, and an Intel Duo Core 2 Processor. It dual boots Slackware and Windows 7. I use it mainly for games that I actually play, like League of Legends, and FPS games from id Software, and Unreal Tournament (all of them) and the Unreal Series, and a few other things. Basically, Wintendo with Opera for Browsing and SOME Email. I rarely use Windows for Email because I'm picky.

My Mom's old Gateway Essentials recently died on me, but that was running FreeBSD 8.0 and Slackware. It's a POS Celeron Processor @ 433 MHz, and 192 MBs of RAM. My Medion PC also died on me recently which had two HDs, and had Debian Linux and FreeBSD on it too.

My Wife's main Desktop has Windows 7 on it, and then the other two desktops She has are Linux and Windows.

If I had $100,000.00 to blow on a machine, I'd buy an SGI. I'd probably have to buy an old one though, since I'd want IRIX on it. I've never gotten to use it before, and the other option seems to be Linux. I can run Linux on PC hardware, so I'd rather buy a slightly older SGI and get to use IRIX. I do admit that after getting some SGI Workstations and Servers I WOULD buy an Alpha Workstation too. I've had a chance to look at those a little, and though I've never gotten to use one, they look amazing. I'd prefer one of those running Tru64 Unix.

Wow, sorry about that wall of text!



> However, if I were to buy a Sparc pizza box off Ebay, BSD is going on it.



My Wife LOVES Sun. It's a shame Oracle seems intent on destroying what Bill Joy has done to make great machines. I remember reading about Oracle buying out Sun, and then seeing what they've been doing. All I can say when I think of that, si that basically; "The Sun has Set".



> Ubuntu did not get rid of the root account.
> $ sudo passwd root
> is all you need to activate root. A minor inconvenience, for better desktop security. The way Ubuntu handles root, is one of the reasons I highly recommend it to the "un-initiated".
> I use $ sudo su -
> on every *nix system I work on anyways. The way Ubuntu does things does not interrupt my flow at all.



Yea, I know that, I should have clarified what I meant about that a little better, but the last few weeks have been REALLY long for me, and I haven't been sleeping as much, so basically, I know that Ubuntu does have a root account, and that it's set up that way for a reason, I just meant that I don't like the way they did it, that was all.



> What year did you take Linux+ in college? I taught that certification class six years ago. But not at a college, I did it for Avaya. We used Fedora Core 2 CD's which worked well enough at the time.



Honestly, I don't remember the exact year I took the class, but I know it was probably 7 years ago. I want to say it was around 2004, but I could be off. I rarely had any issues with the class other than the fact that I was kind of shocked to see so many people who didn't know a thing about it being in there. I mean to be Honest, I was sort of waiting for two of the people in the class to ask where the Start Menu was. There were two people in my class who just seemed totally lost, and my teacher had to spend a LOT of time with them, so normally, if anyone else had an issue they needed help with, I normally would step in and take care of it.

My Teacher for that class was the guy who was in charge of all the IT / tech related courses, and he was and is, a really good guy. We still talk to this day, and see each other now and then at a gaming store. He likes to use me in examples when he does the Security + class. I consider us friends. He actually gave me more than 100% in the class because not only did I do all the work and get straight "As", I also got extra credit a lot for helping him out in class. 

He more or less gave me the extra credit when I was helping him out. I mean, I did a lot of student help in the class as I was saying, where I'd help out everyone who had their hand up while he was stuck working with the two people who knew nothing, and he saw me helping out a lot. So basically, yea, he enjoyed having me in class lol.




> I don't know how up to date SuSE packages are; and I'm afraid to look (rpm based distributions are offlimits at my work place ...). But if they were, I would use SuSE in a heart beat. Their security team is quite amazing, judging from CVE's that can be attributed to them.



SUSE is very up to date. I'm one of the biggest SUSE fan boys you'll probably ever meet. I can say quite a lot of good about them. I DO miss the old SuSE Linux 8.1 and 8.2 Professional Distributions, as they were incredibly well done, well thought out and they just worked so well, and when I heard Novell was buying them, I was pretty worried considering it was my favorite all purpose OS. 

SUSE has very well updated software, and Marcus Meissner, the head of SUSE Security (Or at least he was the last time I checked anyway) is an awesome guy. I remember one time, I had SUSE Linux running on my main desktop, and the Nvidia Video Card I was using in that machine, was supported by the Nvidia Driver, so I had actual 3D and all that, and, well, one day, I did a Kernel Upgrade because there was a new Security Patch.

After doing the upgrade, I knew I had to drop down to run level 3 (Just Text, no GUI) to re-install the Driver, and there was some weird issue. I happened to know Marcus was on IRC at the time, and I sent him a PM on IRC asking him a few questions, and telling him what happened. He basically asked me what hardware I had in the machine, which Video Card it was, and which drive I was using from Nvidia, and then said in the Room he was in on IRC that he was leaving for work a little early to fix something. He sent me a message saying he would take care of it, and a few hours later, I saw a brand new patch for the Kernel to "Address an issue with certain video cards" and him telling me he fixed it.

The guy literally left for work early, and fixed MY HARDWARE ISSUE for me, and had it done within a few hours. I got the new driver, and everything worked fine again. So yea, needless to say, I was impressed.


----------



## timotheosh (Jun 12, 2011)

pkubaj said:
			
		

> I think you're wrong regarding the GCC part. I've searched for it and found this: http://gcc.gnu.org/gcc-2.96.html So it seems 2.96 is a development snapshot of GCC 3.0, incompatible with GCC 2.95 and 3.0. It's not a fork.



Yes, I remember, now. There was a "branched" version of GCC, called egcs. This was being used in the "2.96". It was forked for the c++ portion, mainly for greater ISO compliance. The gcc team made this a seperate project, and released this compiler as the egcs compiler (http://gcc.gnu.org/egcs-1.1/), so technically was a fork, until it was merged back in in gcc 3.0.

Other distros packaged this as the egcs compiler, only RedHat packaged it as the gcc-2.96 compiler, which was very misleading.



			
				gore said:
			
		

> My Wife LOVES Sun. It's a shame Oracle seems intent on destroying what Bill Joy has done to make great machines. I remember reading about Oracle buying out Sun, and then seeing what they've been doing. All I can say when I think of that, si that basically; "The Sun has Set".



The "Sun was setting" as Linux took more and more of the market share in the server room. Sun hardware was like a lot of the classic cars. Built to outlast its owners. With the rate of replacing old hardware with new, Sun's sales model was not fitting the market. Cheaper hardware, and cheaper software replaced steady and stalwart.

I had begun using SuSE for the Desktop back when 6.4 was released and loved it. I never had to tweak anything to get it running. I even bought the boxed editions of every release until 8.2. I found it cumbersome to use as a server over time. SuSE for the desktop, but using it as a server is like trying to use Fedora as a server (by contrast, though, at least SuSE provides security backports for two years after an OpenSuSE release).


----------



## freesbies (Jun 20, 2011)

I use Debian 6.0.1 on old computer that has 128 MB RAM and runs smoothly with Openbox and Opera. I'm running on it right now. Debian is really stable and light.


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## gore (Jul 1, 2011)

I personally stayed with SUSE longer, as I always loved it, though I do miss the older ones. They just seemed to be the best product.

I also miss SUSE's firewall, and the other stuff they made back then. Novell REALLY should have kept that stuff going. It's a shame they didn't. I still have my catalog somewhere here where it shows the other products they made back then.


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## dj (Aug 10, 2011)

Slackware


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## d_mon (Aug 10, 2011)

freesbies said:
			
		

> Debian is really light



more than slitaz i do not think so!



> Which is your Favourite Linux?



Gentoo...far from 'others' unix/linux


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## fonz (Aug 10, 2011)

d_mon said:
			
		

> more than slitaz i do not think so!


He said it was light, not necessarily the light*est*. I remember having told you before that not everything in life is a competition.



			
				d_mon said:
			
		

> Gentoo...far from 'others' unix/linux


As far as I can tell Slackware, Gentoo and ArchLinux appear to be the most popular (or tolerable, as the case may be) among BSD people. However, I do remember that when I first got started with Linux in the mid '90s, I found RedHat very friendly for beginners.

Fonz (just for what it's worth)


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## Bellum (Aug 27, 2011)

Couldn't run FreeBSD on my laptop, so I installed Arch. I love it. It's very solid. There are a few annoyances, though. On FreeBSD, /home is by default a link to /usr/home and all my software is installed on the /usr partition. This method shall be henceforth known as "the common sense solution". /usr is its own partition and everything is right with the world. With the Arch setup, software is installed on the / partition. Which I suppose makes sense considering what's haphazardly tossed there. Also, I'm swimming in a sea of GNU and it's a very scary place.

Still, perhaps not quite as scary as FreeBSD's package manager/ports tree. That's one big thing I wont miss.


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## d_mon (Aug 28, 2011)

Bellum said:
			
		

> Arch



Arch rocks man!


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## ramonovski (Aug 28, 2011)

> Which is your Favourite Linux?



Binary-based: Archlinux
Source-based: Gentoo


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## LateNiteTV (Aug 29, 2011)

Bellum said:
			
		

> Couldn't run FreeBSD on my laptop, so I installed Arch. I love it. It's very solid. There are a few annoyances, though. On FreeBSD, /home is by default a link to /usr/home and all my software is installed on the /usr partition. This method shall be henceforth known as "the common sense solution". /usr is its own partition and everything is right with the world. With the Arch setup, software is installed on the / partition. Which I suppose makes sense considering what's haphazardly tossed there. Also, I'm swimming in a sea of GNU and it's a very scary place.
> 
> *Still, perhaps not quite as scary as FreeBSD's package manager/ports tree. That's one big thing I wont miss*.



What do you dislike about it?


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## Bellum (Aug 30, 2011)

Well, to get up-to-date software (for instance, Firefox 6), I had to go through ports. Actually, I installed quite a bit of software through ports, and upgrading ports is a complicated, error prone process. I remember following the UPDATING instructions to the letter, failing, and ultimately having to delete everything and start fresh. 

Not to mention, I never quite knew what options to take during compilation. :/


----------



## jb_fvwm2 (Aug 30, 2011)

You'd probably be served with the command, 
	
	



```
#example... 
portmaster -d -B -P -i (category/port) [FILE]sysutils/tmux [/FILE][FILE]x11-servers/xorg-server[/FILE]
```
 etc etc, as it has seemed to streamline most every upgrade except those mentioned in UPDATING. As far as options during compilation, usually the defaults, give or take a few, if they compile, suffice for the usage of the port (exceptions of course. )


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## from_mars (Aug 31, 2011)

I like Arch Linux, but there is no portsnap and it scared to updates.


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## b7j0c (Aug 31, 2011)

although i use arch where i have to use linux, it isn't a good choice for environments that demand stability. its the only linux i have used in the last few years that will periodically explode after a package update...although its getting better. 

i doubt many freebsd users would recommend ubuntu, but i think it has its place


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## da1 (Aug 31, 2011)

b7j0c said:
			
		

> i doubt many freebsd users would recommend ubuntu, but i think it has its place



I consider Ubuntu to be ok for non-technical-orientated people (like my boss for instance) but like you said, I wouldn't recommend it. Centos is my weapon of choice if I must use Linux (although I do have a mental problem using yum and rpm).


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## d_mon (Aug 31, 2011)

from_mars said:
			
		

> there is no portsnap and it scared to updates.



You are TOTALLY absolutly wrong my friend!

and for "flash" reasons i'm going to quit bsd world[installed gnash and never could it see anything] it is annoying that matter of flash!

while they do not see that point[flash] u people of BSD will remain at idle on OS's world!

bye return to arch(downloading 57%)...


----------



## fonz (Aug 31, 2011)

d_mon said:
			
		

> for "flash" reasons i'm going to quit bsd world[installed gnash and never could it see anything] it is annoying that matter of flash!



You are totally, absolutely wrong. Flash works perfectly fine on recent versions of FreeBSD.

Fonz


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## Maredelamer (Aug 31, 2011)

**blinks confused* People like flash?*

*blinks confused* People like flash?

But as for the topic, erm, I've only used RH5 then two iterations of Mandrake (7.1 being the last as I recall) in that order before I ended up with FreeBSD 5 and I've yet to have any desire for any other OS. So, my _favourite_ linux would have to be a BSD I am afraid.


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## sT4k3 (Aug 31, 2011)

At work I use RHEL and Debian Linux and some servers work under FreeBSD


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## Oxyd (Aug 31, 2011)

d_mon said:
			
		

> while they do not see that point[flash] u people of BSD will remain at idle on OS's world!



Flash is a pain to install right, but once you get it working, it works about as well as Flash ever worked.

Anyway -- another +1 for Arch from me.


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## UNIXgod (Aug 31, 2011)

Maredelamer said:
			
		

> *blinks confused* People like flash?



Some people enjoy surfing the internet. Flash is a byproduct of that need.


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## expl (Aug 31, 2011)

UNIXgod said:
			
		

> Some people enjoy surfing the internet. Flash is a byproduct of that need.



With advances in javascript engines (performance, multithreading, canvas, high performance/cross browser frameworks) and incorporation of HTML5&CSS3, most serious design companies are cleverly shifting away from Flash and similar technologies that are suffering from many design flaws and at same time cost a lot in licenses. In next couple of years (when most people have modern browsers) I do not see any big web projects still relying on flash or anything else based on binary plug-ins (which is terrible invention of the 90s).


----------



## fonz (Aug 31, 2011)

expl said:
			
		

> With advances in javascript engines _[snip]_ and incorporation of HTML5&CSS3, most serious design companies are cleverly shifting away from Flash and similar technologies


True, but this is a gradual process. I've never liked Flash but I still see it a whole lot. The problem with JavaScript btw is that many people have it disabled.

Fonz


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## fonz (Aug 31, 2011)

Oxyd said:
			
		

> Flash is a pain to install right


For what it's worth: maybe it's just me but although installing Flash used to be a royal pita indeed, especially with something other than Netscape/Firefox, I think there has been significant improvement lately.

Fonz


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## d_mon (Aug 31, 2011)

from_mars said:
			
		

> I like Arch



You like *Arch*...I "adore" *Arch*! ï¿½e


----------



## DutchDaemon (Sep 1, 2011)

I thought you 'quit the BSD world'?


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## dndlnx (Sep 4, 2011)

fonz said:
			
		

> You are totally, absolutely wrong. Flash works perfectly fine on recent versions of FreeBSD.



But you install separate X libs and GTK...it's like double versions for FreeBSD and the Linuxulator. Then there's the whole darn Fedora base, and all the other F10 stuff. Seems like a real buzzkill for 'minimalism'. Can I install the whole Linux kernel too? I got rid of it all, and turned off the Linux support. It seemed super silly. I can live without it. At least until there's a native one (probably never). 

I considered going to Arch, but why? Learn a whole new system for a plugin? I'm too comfortable with FreeBSD now. Everything else on my laptop works perfect.  Flash drains my battery super fast, and I get most distracted by YouTube videos anyway.


----------



## JuniperSprouts (Sep 4, 2011)

BackTrack

Honorable mention:
Tiny Core Linux
Slackware
Puppy OS


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## jb_fvwm2 (Sep 4, 2011)

One can use flash without the linux layer... (seamonkey and some other port... my other post somewhere should mention it. Principally just for youtube though).
Also  multimedia/gxine, multimedia/xine  for local flv avi etc.


----------



## vermaden (Sep 5, 2011)

About *Arch* ... they made several really bad decisions and are losing their users now a lot:
http://www.reddit.com/r/archlinux/comments/jy2l0/how_i_learned_to_stop_worrying_and_love_the_gentoo/


----------



## Maredelamer (Sep 5, 2011)

Just to mention this as another data point, multimedia/vlc will play (local) flv files as well.


----------



## vermaden (Sep 5, 2011)

Maredelamer said:
			
		

> Just to mention this as another data point, multimedia/vlc will play (local) flv files as well.



Same as *mplayer* (and many other players), FLV is just a codec, what Your point?


----------



## drhowarddrfine (Sep 5, 2011)

d_mon said:
			
		

> while they do not see that point[flash] u people of BSD will remain at idle on OS's world!



Um. Flash is a web/browser thing, not an operating system thing. It's also an Adobe thing. It's not BSD's fault if Adobe won't cooperate with it.


----------



## Maredelamer (Sep 5, 2011)

vermaden said:
			
		

> Same as *mplayer* (and many other players), FLV is just a codec, what Your point?



Yupper, I was just expounding on the two mentioned by jb_fvwm2.


----------



## hitest (Oct 8, 2011)

Updated reply.
I run FreeBSD 9.0 Beta 3.  My favourite version of Linux is Slackware.  Arch is nice, but, it is too unstable for day to day use ( I run Arch in a VM).


----------



## kpedersen (Oct 8, 2011)

All Linux OSes completely tie the user down to the distro's package server, which is probably due to large company influences such as RedHat who want to "be in control" of their users and customers. For this reason, Linux pisses me off.

Having said that, my favorite Linux is Fedora Core 3&4... because it had a nice background.
The RedHat EL5 theme looks pretty nifty and so does the beta version of RHEL6, but unfortunately the release version of RHEL6 looks crap with it's wannabe Vista black theme.


----------



## hitest (Oct 8, 2011)

kpedersen said:
			
		

> All Linux OSes completely tie the user down to the distro's package server, which is probably due to large company influences such as RedHat who want to "be in control" of their users and customers. For this reason, Linux pisses me off.



That is true up to a point.  The Slackware package managers pkgtool and slackpkg offer a high degree of control for the user.  All configuration steps done on a Slackware station are done with a text editor.  Slackware is very Unix-like in set-up and use.  You can set-up a Slackware box exactly the way you want it.


----------



## kpedersen (Oct 8, 2011)

Both those package managers still rely on the central server (either 3rd party or official) to work.

"Real" ports systems (such as FreeBSD ports) obtain the source files directly from the upstream vendor so you don't need to rely on a distro vendor to not screw up.

"Fake" ports systems (such as Arch pkgbuild) can just about make a package, but still need to get the dependencies from Arch's servers (which is pretty half-assed and useless IMO lol).

Since upstream vendors rarely provide binaries for *nix, a ports collection is the next best thing to the standalone packages for Windows and MacOSX.

Edit:
Being tied to an external server (online activation server) is the reason I left Windows in the first place... So you could say that I have a bit of a hangup


----------



## hitest (Oct 8, 2011)

kpedersen said:
			
		

> "Real" ports systems (such as FreeBSD ports) obtain the source files directly from the upstream vendor so you don't need to rely on a distro vendor to not screw up.



Slackware does not modify the upstream source from the vender, the source is provided as is (the source is put into the Slackware package format...that is the only modification). Slackware provides vanilla source code.


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## Carpetsmoker (Oct 8, 2011)

FreeBSD. Sometimes OpenBSD


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## kpedersen (Oct 8, 2011)

hitest said:
			
		

> Slackware does not modify the upstream source from the vender, the source is provided as is (the source is put into the Slackware package format...that is the only modification). Slackware provides vanilla source code.



This isn't quite what I meant.

Basically, when you add new software using Slackware's native package system, where does it download software from? It doesn't download it from upstream, it fetches it from slackware, one of it's mirrors or a third party site. If all of these go down (i.e in 5 years) then you are pretty much stuffed.
Afterall, I don't even think the Apple appstore will be around in 5 years.. It will have evolved into the next biggest gimmick.


----------



## Bellum (Oct 9, 2011)

You aren't forced to use the package managers, but I'm not sure why you _wouldn't_. At least, not for a desktop computer. I can see how something like Arch Linux would not be ideal for a server. 

As for sites going down, yeah it happens. It's only an issue if Arch Linux itself no longer exists and there is nobody maintaining the repositories. Which could happen, in which case you'll be stuck doing everything manually or switching distributions.


----------



## hitest (Oct 9, 2011)

kpedersen said:
			
		

> This isn't quite what I meant.
> 
> Basically, when you add new software using Slackware's native package system, where does it download software from? It doesn't download it from upstream, it fetches it from slackware, one of it's mirrors or a third party site. If all of these go down (i.e in 5 years) then you are pretty much stuffed.



Granted.  But any distro can go belly up and you will be pretty much hosed if the mirrors go south.  There are many mirrors for Slackware.


----------



## gore (Oct 12, 2011)

I'm gonna go ahead and chime in here real quick. I already said my favorite Linux distros, but this Package Manager stuff is something I have an interest in, so with the last page or so being almost all that, I read through them.

First, Slackware and BSD are actually pretty similar. In fact, if you pay for the actual FreeBSD and Slackware CD or DVD sets, the packaging is even almost identical. 

Years ago when 6.0 was the newest RELEASE, I had been in college for Computer Science, and I had gotten my check from the school I was going to, to help pay for things I needed. Well, that particular year, I'd been on Honor Roll, and I got a pretty good sized check, and I decided I'd use a good chunk of it, to catch up on my BSD stuff, so I started looking around for what I wanted. I went to the FreeBSD Mall, and the Slackware store. 

I ordered basically everything from the FreeBSD Mall; When I got a phone call for a Confirmation on some info, I remember the girl asking exactly what I ordered, and when I finished telling her, she was pretty shocked at how much money I'd spent. I basically ordered one of everything I could.

I got EVERY book they sold except for The Complete FreeBSD 3rd Edition because I already owned that one, and instead got the O'Reilly version, and then The FreeBSD Handbook, both the second Edition, and both books from third, "Teach Yourself FreeBSD in 24 hours", a FreeBSD 6.0 CD set, which I ended up getting two of those because a book came with the first disc of it as well, so I kept both of the CDs, and then I also got the FreeBSD Mouse pad, which, even though this was a while ago, is what I'm using right now, and the Stickers I got a bunch of, and the Case plates, and the Tee Shirt I'd wanted, and Boxers, everything. And of course; "20 Years of Berkeley Unix" on DVD!!!! (I HIGHLY HIGHLY HIGHLY Recommend ANYONE here, to order this. It's a talk by Marshall Kirk McKusick, who to me, is a Legend, and incredibly funny too. I have watched this thing probably 400 times or more, and I still love it, order it !! You can get it from his web site, but back then I saw it on the BSD Mall site).

That's not all I ordered, but it gives you an idea of how big of an order it was lol. I even spent the extra to over night it. Then, I went to the Slackware store, got the second Edition of Slackware Essentials, the 4 CD set of.... I can't remember if that was 10 or 10.2, but one of them; And then I got the Slackware basic tee shirt, Mouse Pad, a couple of the Case Plates, and, a few other things.

I couldn't over night this one, so I got second day shipping.

Now, about 12 hours or so later, I noticed a package on the Porch. I could see it was from the "FreeBSD Mall" so I grabbed it and brought it in, and it was HUGE. I knew I'd ordered a lot, but I didn't know it was THAT much.

Then I opened it up and it made sense; Inside was all the stuff I'd ordered from the FreeBSD Mall, AND everything from the Slackware store! All in the same box. Then it hit me; I'd already realized that the Official CD-ROM Sets from FreeBSD and Slackware looked A LOT alike, but then I checked my first edition of Slackware Essentials; Sure enough, there was a BSDi logo on the back of the book.

So, long story short, if you order stuff from both stores, you're probably going to get it at the same time, in the same box. I was told by someone who works for the FreeBSD Mall that they actually do in fact do the Slackware store, as they like Pat, and Slackware. 

I also got Free Sticker from BSDMall once because another order was having problems and got VERY delayed. I was NOT rude to them about it, I was understanding, but DID tell them that I wasn't exactly happy about it, and because I made my point in a more laid back not freaked out way I ended up with like a BUNCH of FreeBSD and generic "BSD" stickers which literally cover my Laptop.

Actually, BSDMall, MAY be where I got the DVD of Kirk. Either way it's great so buy that!

And also, if you don't know since I'm on the topic; If you go to Kirk's Web site, and check out the stuff you can buy, not only can you get the DVD, but, you can get the CSRG CD set! THAT is what I'm currently aiming at. I REALLY want it. I mean the Historical aspect alone is cool.

Anyway, Slackware and BSD seem pretty close for the most part, and again, because Slackware doesn't do their mods like a lot of other distros do, you really aren't screwed as on person said, if Slackware went under. I mean you could just as easily build the Packages yourself, and do it all yourself, as they aren't modified anyway.

Personally I've used quite a few Package Managers, and the ones I liked best for all around installation, and removing, were FreeBSD's, SuSE Linux (Using Yast, or YAst2 if you have X loaded) and Debian of course.


----------



## kpedersen (Oct 12, 2011)

Bellum said:
			
		

> You aren't forced to use the package managers, but I'm not sure why you _wouldn't_.



In most linux based distros you pretty much *are* forced to use a package manager. For all but the most simple of applications you do not want to be spending days learning how to compile the software. Also, if you look at all the patches in the Arch AUR, the FreeBSD ports or in the RHEL5 SRPM system, you really don't want to be compiling from source because without these patches you may leave the software open to things like memory leaks or build issues.

The reason not to use package managers is just one big one. What happens when the package server goes down?

The distfile system that FreeBSD (ports) uses ensures that no central package server is used. Meaning that nothing could ever go down.

Microsoft Windows users don't need to download every bit of software they use from Microsoft's servers so why should linux users be any different. It is hardly freedom.


----------



## Carpetsmoker (Oct 12, 2011)

The biggest problem with Linux packaging is that there's usually a lot of patching and prodding done by the package people.

For example, CentOS ships with OpenSSH 4.3p2 (From 2005, IIRC). It backports some fixes and even some features. It's not entirely clear *which* features it exactly backports or if they are done correctly. The end result is that you've got some sort of woefully outdated FrankenSSH.
In any case, it seems like a whole lot of wasted effort to me. It also makes stuff damn inconsistent across distributions and OS's.


----------



## gore (Oct 12, 2011)

Just for sake of argument (As no one is really playing bad guy it seems) since you DO have the source anyway, in theory, you could keep it going yourself if you really wanted. I mean if McDonald's goes out of Business, which has about the same chance and Novell going down, I could still make a Big Mac for myself if I had the Ingredients, and Source Code is nothing more than an Ingredient list for Software much like "This type of dough, made this way at this temp" and "this meat seasoned this way and cooked this way at this temp" would let me keep making or even selling Big Macs if McDonald's ever went down.

I mean, I DO agree that quite a few ways you deal with installation and management of software on a lot of Linux distros is outright stupid, but, not all are like that. And, of course, there's also ease of admin work like how when you do upgrades and patches on Linux VS BSD, it's REALLY different. I don't always love the BSD way with Ports, as I'm more of a Packages kind of person (I don't want to Compile anything if I don't have to, and would like Packages more which is why I use them).

Just a thought.


----------



## geodni (Oct 13, 2011)

Hi,

I do not have Favorite Linux, just the habit of using Debian, Red Hat and VMware at work.
When I install a new Red Hat server at a client office, I use graphical interface but selects none of the options and verify to deselect all preselected ones. I prefer add myself what is needed after first reboot. Deployment is easy using Red Hat kickstart and pretty configurable (pre and post scripts). PXE is also available for most Unices.
Sometimes a new package I want to install needs more than 20 dependent packages, and I have to check it by hand and old systems, but that's not too hard to do, just annoying.
I don't like install any server with X11, I prefer install minimal requirements to run remote graphical applications through SSH, such as Red Hat cluster interface (XML configuration becomes a bit hard to manipulate with vi).
About VMware based on Red Hat, I use command line for advanced configuration tasks for network (like remapping ethernet card to reorder themwhen you make an upgrade) or SAN.
Both Debian and Red Hat made improvements to manage packages, but when you want to had recent and/or custom services, it's often made by compilation tasks.

For personnal use, it's FreeBSD on my desktop, a sandbox server and a hosted server. It was FreeBSD on my laptop Thinkpad T60 but for several reasons (like flash port not working well and proprietary VPN client runing only on windows), I tried MAC OS X for a while and failed back to Windows, version 7. Perhaps I'll give another try with FreeBSD.


----------



## mobleyc (Oct 14, 2011)

I guess my favorite would have to be red hat.  I am partly biased because I was part of the conceptualizing team who build a good base for that release.  Though Fedora is also a good contender for that crown.

I think each one has their own favorite but they all generally work good.


----------



## Carpetsmoker (Oct 14, 2011)

> Red Hat - has unacceptable technical support which lets tickets languish for months or even years with no resolution.



This is also my experience. I submitted a ticket once, granted, it was without patch, but I described the problem clearly and described what should be done to resolve it.
No reply what-so-ever. Not even a confirmation or mark as "invalid".


----------



## rusty (Oct 14, 2011)

Scientific Linux does what I need on the Linux front.


----------



## Slurp (Oct 14, 2011)

kpedersen said:
			
		

> All Linux OSes completely tie the user down to the distro's package server, which is probably due to large company influences such as RedHat who want to "be in control" of their users and customers. For this reason, Linux pisses me off.



I don't like it either, but I don't see FreeBSD as something considerably better. As far as I know, it still uses a centralized server maintained by distro-related people to fetch ports from. 
I've been thinking about writing a truly decentralized package system that would store software in a decentralized database (i.e. Kademlia for files + DHT for metadata), where anybody could just add anything w/no formalities and anybody, not only a distro, could act as an authority signing packages they consider trustworthy.


----------



## hitest (Oct 15, 2011)

Carpetsmoker said:
			
		

> The biggest problem with Linux packaging is that there's usually a lot of patching and prodding done by the package people.



Slackware does a very good job of delivering unmodified vanilla packages to users.  Slackware is and always will be my favourite version of Linux.


----------



## drhowarddrfine (Oct 15, 2011)

Slurp said:
			
		

> where anybody could just add anything w/no formalities and anybody, not only a distro, could act as an authority signing packages they consider trustworthy.


I'm sure that would go over well. :\


----------



## tingo (Oct 15, 2011)

gpatrick said:
			
		

> Linux is really nothing more than a bad joke perpetuated upon the IT world, given steam by clueless senior management who believe that "it's less expensive" bullsh!t.  It's cheap, not less expensive.
> 
> Give me an entire operating system any day, whether it is BSD, Solaris, AIX, HP-UX, because then you don't have to deal with the inconsistencies of something bolted together piecemeal and expecting it to work even remotely well.



gpatrick, it sounds like you or the company you work for is doing it wrong, in all possible ways.

Keeping a system up and going has more to do with planning, education, testing and change control than the actual technical parts chosen (operating system and so on).

The company I work for uses Red Hat, CentOS, AIX, Solaris, HP-UX, Windows and a few other platforms. We manage to keep them all running, with the occasional service disruption now and then. Granted, various platforms require different amounts of "attending time", but all are serviceable as production platforms. The company I work for is a large IT company in Norway, so I guess it is what Americans would call "small and medium business".

And why do you continue to buy crap hardware? You're only hurting yourself.


----------



## drhowarddrfine (Oct 15, 2011)

Doesn't Linux have their own forums? Why is this thread going on for so long?


----------



## hitest (Oct 15, 2011)

drhowarddrfine said:
			
		

> Doesn't Linux have their own forums? Why is this thread going on for so long?



Yes.  This thread is rather extensive.  However, this forum is the Off-Topic Forum where it is perfectly proper to discuss non-FreeBSD topics of interest.


----------



## fonz (Oct 15, 2011)

drhowarddrfine said:
			
		

> Doesn't Linux have their own forums?*[sic]*


There is of course LinuxQuestions. And most distributions seem to have their own forums, too. The quality varies considerably, as far as I can see.

The biggest problem with LinuxQuestions in my opinion is that, no matter how clearly you state that you're using distribution A, people still feel compelled to post answers that only apply to distribution B - very annoying.



			
				drhowarddrfine said:
			
		

> Why is this thread going on for so long?



Because people keep contributing to it. Does it bother you and, if so, dare I inquire why?

Fonz


----------



## drhowarddrfine (Oct 16, 2011)

fonz said:
			
		

> Does it bother you and, if so, dare I inquire why?


Three reasons. 1)


			
				fonz said:
			
		

> most distributions seem to have their own forums


2) I see this exact same question on virtually very forum I go to.
3) What purpose does it serve to answer the same question for now three years but to repeat the same answer over and over without going off topic which it does at times?


----------



## fonz (Oct 16, 2011)

drhowarddrfine said:
			
		

> What purpose does it serve to answer the same question for now three years but to repeat the same answer over and over without going off topic which it does at times?


I see your point. This thread has probably long outlived its purpose. But having said that, it's just one thread in the off-topic forum. If you don't care for it, isn't it easier to just ignore it?

Fonz


----------



## drhowarddrfine (Oct 16, 2011)

It's the principle of the thing.


----------



## DutchDaemon (Oct 17, 2011)

It's a nice magnet that keeps pointless Linux talk out of all the other threads, really.


----------



## Carpetsmoker (Oct 17, 2011)

Sometimes frustrations need to be vented


----------



## fluca1978 (Oct 17, 2011)

I use (K)ubuntu at work, and I've got FreeBSD and Ubuntu on the servers. Not to say that BSD is the most stable, but for the end medium-skilled end user ubuntu is probably the best and the package management is awesome. Anyway, I would suggest also pcbsd for non-technical users. Ubuntu is right for me because I try to keep it under control, and if you avoid some unneeded updates, your system will run fine.


----------



## DutchDaemon (Oct 28, 2011)

*Why Iâ€™ve finally had it with my Linux server and Iâ€™m moving back to Windows*

Great rant, and it does sum up many FreeBSD users' frustrations with Lunix as well.



			
				David Gewirtz said:
			
		

> *New motto: For all of us who have lives, thereâ€™s Windows.*
> 
> This is a rant. But Iâ€™m so angry and frustrated right now that youâ€™re just going to have to live with the rant. And, for you Linux people, you who know it all and look down upon the people who donâ€™t spend day and night breathing in the insane arcana of all the little fiddly bits that make up modern distros, I have this to say: I donâ€™t have your kind of time.
> 
> ...



Rest of rant: http://www.zdnet.com/blog/diy-it/wh...inux-server-and-im-moving-back-to-windows/245


----------



## Crivens (Oct 28, 2011)

"... disorganized, unsupervised, chaotic craptasm ...", epic!
Thank you for sharing it.


----------



## nighttime (Oct 28, 2011)

I like to try to keep some of everything running so i have breadth of knowledge (though i fear i may not know much about anything sometimes, just a little about many things). 

I run a Win7 desktop at home, i have a OSX laptop (that i really should use more), a Ubuntu netbook, Backtrack on a 32G USB, FreeBSD on my work box, and a Ubuntu Server at home (that i may rebuild as Debian). I used to also work at a couple labs at school, one being 20 Fedora machines, the other a mix of Ubuntu, Debian, and FreeBSD. 

Depending on what I'm working on, each has it's own little set of advantages.


----------



## Bellum (Oct 29, 2011)

DutchDaemon said:
			
		

> Great rant, and it does sum up many FreeBSD users' frustrations with Lunix as well.
> 
> 
> 
> Rest of rant: http://www.zdnet.com/blog/diy-it/wh...inux-server-and-im-moving-back-to-windows/245



Call it a hunch; I don't think this guy would be happy with FreeBSD.


----------



## frijsdijk (Oct 29, 2011)

Servers: Debian/Ubuntu
Desktop: Mint

Btw, a pitty actually why most can not just give a straight answer without bashing Linux. Of course most here will prefer BSD, but if BSD would have such a wide support for hardware and software as Linux did, there would be no Linux would there. Unfortunately we need Linux now and then, and if used the proper way, I think it runs good enough!


----------



## UNIXgod (Oct 29, 2011)

frijsdijk said:
			
		

> Servers: Debian/Ubuntu
> Desktop: Mint
> 
> Btw, a pitty actually why most can not just give a straight answer without bashing Linux. Of course most here will prefer BSD, but if BSD would have such a wide support for hardware and software as Linux did, there would be no Linux would there. Unfortunately we need Linux now and then, and if used the proper way, I think it runs good enough!



GNU/Linux historically had the pr momentum due to the BSD lawsuit. But what hardware are you speaking of. BSD supports pretty much everything new and old.


----------



## Bellum (Oct 30, 2011)

Linux does have the upper hand for PC hardware anyway. FreeBSD, for instance, will not install on my laptop at all. Also, the Arch Linux i686 build seems boot and run _significantly_ faster on the old desktop than i386 FreeBSD.

Otherwise, I'd probably be using it, because, got to say, even for a "casual"* user, I could tell that FreeBSD was the better put together OS in a lot of ways. 

*(In that I don't have the expertise to run a server.)


----------



## calande (Oct 30, 2011)

Ubuntu even though I have been disappointed by the 11.x series...


----------



## TroN-0074 (Dec 19, 2011)

Hey, I love Linux, I have used Ubuntu and OpenSuSE and I love them both. I would like to try more distros but there are so many and they all offer different stuff for each user.
Now I just installed FreeBSD and I am finding some difficulties however I am very positive about this experience and hopefully I will feel like home here too.
I am very thankful for the Open Source community and I show my respect to them by not making negative comments about their work.
With that said I wish you all happy holidays.


----------



## shepper (Dec 20, 2011)

As a desktop user the criteria I use are stability, security and simple to understand administration guidelines.  Stability wise, I have had the best luck building the desktop I want, multimedia codecs, libdvdcss, flash (can't rationalize linux emulators and need flash for cme lectures) with Debian followed by Slackware.  My Debian Squeeze system is over a year old without a hiccup.  Security and bug updates are a breeze in Debian and not too bad in Slackware. 

Out of interest I will periodically try out a new feature in Arch Linux - the rolling release model tends to work very well for being bleeding edge and the documentation is up to date. Arch can give one an idea where development is heading, why KernelModeSetting has yet to find its way into any BSD, and what the all the heated discussion about the Gnome3 shell is about.


----------



## Simba7 (Dec 20, 2011)

Servers - FreeBSD 9
Workstation - Windows 7 Ultimate
Laptop - Windows 7 Ultimate with Gentoo, FreeBSD, and Ubuntu in VMs (Hey, it's an Asus G53SX with 24GB of RAM and 1.5TB of disk space)

I moved back from Gentoo to FreeBSD last month. I basically got sick of the mentality of "Why do you need that?". If I didn't need it, I WOULDN'T BE ASKING FOR IT. The ZFS filesystem was basically the final nail in the coffin and I returned to the FreeBSD world.

I actually started on FreeBSD back in 1998 while I was active duty Navy. My friend, in 2005, exposed me to Gentoo and caught my interest almost immediately. Unfortunately, the reason that turned me off Linux in the past (freakin' script kiddies and "I'm so 1337" BS) started to enter into the Gentoo community. So, I'm back in FreeBSD and staying put.


----------



## fluca1978 (Dec 20, 2011)

Simba7 said:
			
		

> Laptop - Windows 7 Ultimate with Gentoo, FreeBSD, and Ubuntu in VMs (Hey, it's an Asus G53SX with 24GB of RAM and 1.5TB of disk space)



What a laptop! I would rather do a Linux/FreeBSD running Windows as virtual machine, eh eh.


----------



## asapilu (Dec 20, 2011)

I like debian more than other linux but not using that for about 1.5 year since i reduce my desktops/home server from 3 to 2 
but currently i use Android with root and terminal emulator and i like it. It is use a linux kernel after all.


----------



## hitest (Dec 20, 2011)

Slackware 13.37 and Slackware-current.


----------



## fonz (Dec 20, 2011)

Simba7 said:
			
		

> If I didn't need it, I WOULDN'T BE ASKING FOR IT.


Fair enough *if* you know what you're talking about, but you'd be surprised to see how many people are asking for things they don't need due to not knowing what they're doing (not understanding the problem rarely leads to a correct solution).



			
				fluca1978 said:
			
		

> What a laptop! I would rather do a Linux/FreeBSD running Windows as virtual machine, eh eh.


+1 on that :h

Fonz


----------



## nuxthrou (Dec 21, 2011)

...I would love the Debian based - is my #1. Redhat is my #2 and Freebsd FreeBSD is #3.
...Debian, because, the arrangement of the files and the structures are easy to determine and understand.
...Redhat would be the second because, they are fairly stable, regardless of the file structure.
...Freebsd FreeBSD because the file structures are uniquely challenging, and fairly tough when it comes with SMTP-relay Server role or smarthost role, DNS role, firewall role, and router role. though, this can be also configured on some other disto but freebbsd is really unique.


----------



## gore (Dec 21, 2011)

Red Hat and Stable in the same Sentence? Wow.... And on a FreeBSD Unix Forum???? Wow!


----------



## jake (Dec 21, 2011)

calande said:
			
		

> Ubuntu even though I have been disappointed by the 11.x series...



What were they thinking with Unity, I really liked Ubuntu 10 and it's been ruined. Still using it now for desktop, but as soon as PC-BSD works out of the box like Ubuntu I'm moving.


----------



## Crivens (Dec 21, 2011)

gore said:
			
		

> Red Hat and Stable in the same Sentence? Wow.... And on a FreeBSD Unix Forum???? Wow!



Why not? Stabillity is what you make of it


----------



## asapilu (Dec 21, 2011)

nuxthrou said:
			
		

> ...I would love the Debian based - is my #1. Redhat is my #2 and Freebsd is #3.
> ...Debian, because, the arrangement of the files and the structures are easy to determine and understand.
> ...Redhat would be the second because, they are fairly stable, regardless of the file structure.
> ...Freebsd because the file structures are uniquely challenging, and fairly tough when it comes with SMTP-relay Server role or smarthost role, DNS role, firewall role, and router role. though, this can be also configured on some other disto but freebbsd is really unique.



FreeBSD is not linux  
FreeBSD is FreeBSD :stud and always #1 :e


----------



## gore (Dec 22, 2011)

Crivens said:
			
		

> Why not? Stabillity is what you make of it



Well, yes, to an extent; But I've never seen someone use Windows ME as a Server for what I'm assuming, is that reason  Heh. That and Oracle is on my crap list right now.


----------



## Crivens (Dec 22, 2011)

gore said:
			
		

> Well, yes, to an extent; But I've never seen someone use Windows ME as a Server for what I'm assuming, is that reason  Heh. That and Oracle is on my crap list right now.



You did follow the link, did you? :e

And I know of a company which used '98 for the server because there were not so many problems for the PHBs when they wanted to manage the files - like "permission denied" and stuff.


----------



## gore (Dec 22, 2011)

Hahaha, I can't imagine Windows 98 as a Server, I mean, really, WTF would they be thinking? Windows 98 can barely stay up long enough to play a game.... Windows Servers need Viagra and a Wiener Pump to stay up at all.


----------



## Crivens (Dec 23, 2011)

gore said:
			
		

> Hahaha, I can't imagine Windows 98 as a Server, I mean, really, WTF would they be thinking? Windows 98 can barely stay up long enough to play a game.... Windows Servers need Viagra and a Wiener Pump to stay up at all.



Now that is a bit harsh  Windows can be like an erection, true. It can stay up some time when you do not screw around with it and it needs loving care to stay up just a bit longer.

And what that company was thinking was that administration was so much easier without all these safety features against messing up the projects. What they are thinking now I do not know, but it would not surprise me to learn about them joining the belly-up brigade. You know, when you mention the B* word and look into a sea of dumb faces. Then you just know.

Returning to the topic of this thread, my favorite Linux is currently debian. It used to be Ubuntu, but they went a pretty insane direction IMHO which I refused to follow. So I picked the distro with a good deal of similarity and less nanny ambitions. I know I can not sort out the working of the system like I can with FreeBSD, so the Linux with the least friction is nice.

*: B word, noun: Backup.
           verb: to backup, performing the steps necessary to create a backup


----------



## gore (Dec 25, 2011)

Heh, I enjoy poking fun at Windows now and then. Windows 7 isn't bad or anything, it just isn't great. They're still not ripping off the right AREA of Unix. 

My Personal choice for Linux is very simple; SUSE, Slackware, Debian, and sometimes Mandriva. Depends a lot on what they did to any given version. I don't have a current installation of Mandriva on anything, and Debian isn't installed on anything currently because all my machine are in use right now, but Slackware has been running my FTP Server since.... Well, when Slackware 12.0 came out, I installed a new HD in the machine, and installed Slackware 12.0 Fresh, and it's been up and running ever since. It's fully patched too.

OpenSUSE is running on my Laptop with PC-BSD making it's appearance now and then and FreeBSD too. I like Slackware, and always have. It reminds me of BSD basically. And if you order something from the Slackware store, try this:

Order a bunch of stuff from the FreeBSDMall, then, choose next day for shipping.

Go to The Slackware store, and order stuff. Choose Second Day Air for Shipping.

In about 12 to 15 hours, look outside. You'll see a huge box. It's both orders. 

I asked about this, and one of the people from FreeBSD mall Confirmed for me that they do in fact run the Slackware store's orders. I kind of had a feeling about that already considering that both my 10.0 and 10.2 Slackware 4 CD-ROM sets looked like the 6.0 CD ROM sets from FreeBSD, AND of course, the Slackware book has a BSDi logo on the back of it.

When I did that, my order was over a grand. I basically had a lot of money given to me finally from my college, and, instead of blowing it, I went to the FreeBSD Mall, and the Slackware Store. I ordered EVERY book, software, and more, from the FreeBSD Mall. My order was about 800 dollars. Then I go just about one of everything from Slackware. Then, because of the excitement, couldn't wait, and overnighted it.

I'm sitting here right now in my brand new FreeBSD tee shirt I got for Christmas. My Mom agreed to let me pick some stuff and She'd order it for me for Christmas; I got the Classic oldschool FreeBSD tee shirt (The Power to Serve one) and, the Black Pull Over Hoody, some stickers, the CD Case, two issues of BSD Magazine, and a few other things. 

If anyone here has ever thought about ordering from the FreeBSD Mall, but wasn't sure, I can vouch for them; I've not ONCE had a problem, and Believe me, I've sunk some pretty large sums of money into orders. I've got basically every FreeBSD book you can get except "The best of" one they have now. And I have the PowerPak, and I have both version of "The Complete FreeBSD" and... I've got the FreeBSD Mouse Pad, Boxers, and more. I've had excellent service, and my orders are always on time, and I can't say enough good about them. 

If you ever need ANYTHING that has to do with FreeBSD, check the FreeBSD Mall out; They have excellent stuff, excellent staff (I spoke to a girl who worked there who called simply to ask about my order and if I was Happy with it and so on, and she was pretty shocked at how much money I spent heh) and to me; Being called PURELY to make sure I was Happy with my Order, was great. Oh and the stickers, are AWESOME. The Tee shirts.... I LITERALLY wore my first FreeBSD tee shirt so much, that in 4 or 5 years, it had holes in it. I wore it like every chance I had. It was always being washed. I wore it so much that I had to wash it 4 times a week. I wore it all the time. I LOVED that shirt. And now, I finally have another one  And yea I put it right on lol. 

For whatever else it might be worth; The FreeBSD Pull Over Hoody, the Black one which costs 35 dollars.... Believe me, I'd tell you if I didn't like it, but I LOVE it. I had Hoodies I've spent hundreds on, and I've got Hoodies and Jackets that costed more than 200 dollars, and this one is just as nice. The material, and the way it's made... I'd pay double what it costs and STILL think it was a deal. BUY ONE OF THOSE THINGS! The Black Pull Over. VERY Comfortable, VERY nice, and my Aunt, who knows nothing of Computers, Unix, or BSD, even she wanted one. They're THAT nice.

Shameless plug, yes. But that's OK. You know why? I don't work for FreeBSD, I don't work for FreeBSD Mall, I'm just someone who loves FreeBSD, and likes to tell people when I've seen a company go the extra mile to make me Happy. So buy something!


----------



## mlinuxgada (Jun 10, 2012)

Funtoo and Arch Linux!


----------



## hitest (Jun 10, 2012)

Several years ago I was using Debian at work, but, we got a new IT manager and now we are a windows only shop; I run Vista Enterprise at work.  
At home I run FreeBSD, OpenBSD, and Slackware.


----------



## gore (Jun 15, 2012)

Vista? Wow man, that sucks. I like the Home Set up you have though; I personally have this current setup:

Main Desktop / Workstation; Windows 7 dual booting OpenSUSE 12.1
FTP Server; Slackware 12.0
Laptop; PC-BSD 9
Desktop; FreeBSD 9.0
Compaq Desktop; FreeBSD 9.0

I tend to be picky about OSs, and I also collect them, so I have a lot. I still have my copy of BeOS Pro 5 in the box actually. I'd install it on something but I don't have any more machines available, and the one or two machine it might work on, currently need new hardware to boot, so I can't run it right now. I LOVED BeOS. I don't know why, but it just looked neat and worked well for me.

For Linux I almost always use this list as a go-to guide for when I either have a new computer to install on, or, I get bored with an OS and want to try something else:

OpenSUSE / SUSE
Slackware
Debian
Mandriva

There are a few smaller distros I mess with from time to time, but that's my main list.

FreeBSD and PC-BSD are used a lot too, because I love them.


----------



## expl (Jun 18, 2012)

I recently switched our vmware 'workers' to RHEL 6 as it seems to be 'factory pre-tuned' and works best for our virtual environment, it also came with recommendations from our datacenter. Only problem is that update downstream and base package repositories are not free unless you use Fedora ones.


----------



## gore (Jun 18, 2012)

expl said:
			
		

> I recently switched our vmware 'workers' to RHEL 6 as it seems to be 'factory pre-tuned' and works best for our virtual environment, it also came with recommendations from our datacenter. Only problem is that update downstream and base package repositories are not free unless you use Fedora ones.



First of all, I LOVE your Signature! I've seen it before but it still makes me laugh 

And as for Red Hat; WOW... I didn't know that. I haven't used Red Hat since about... Well, I had Red Hat 6.x back in the day when I got RedHat for Dummies, which I thought had some good funny stuff in it, and then I downloaded red Hat 8 and 9, and then they made Fedora, which I just don't like personally, but as for making you do that, I think that's kind of odd. Red Hat seems to be set on actually being Microsoft as one of their guys once said heh.

I just can't Believe they aren't free though that's pretty shady. I've had a Love hate relationship with Red Hat for a while though. I mean part of me liked SOME of what they were doing, and part of me would hear Horror stories of Red Hat shipping with stuff Broken out of the box which is just shameful.

My Wife actually DOES like Red Hat / Fedora though, so, I do usually see what they are up too. We both generally use Slackware, and for the "easier" to set up stuff, I've ALWAYS liked SUSE for that. YaST and YaST2, seems to be one of the very best tools ever made for it's purpose.

My opinion of it anyway.


----------



## Deleted member 30996 (Jun 20, 2012)

Mandrake was the first Linux distro I used. Debian isn't bad but I don't care for Linux at all.


----------



## gore (Jun 20, 2012)

The first one I ever used was Caldera Open Linux, which came with "Teach yourself Linux in 24 hours" and it was actually a good one considering what happened to that company lol. The second one I got was Mandrake Linux 7.1, which I bought at Best Buy. 

Around the same time, I also got something else there; BSD PowerPak, with FreeBSD 4.0 heh.


----------



## throAU (Jun 20, 2012)

Weinter said:
			
		

> OK OK I know ALL of us LOVE BSD
> But I am sure you all played with Linux before conversion?
> So which is your favourite?



For me, either slackware or Debian.

I started out with slackware and it seems to be the most "bsd-ish" to me.

I spent about 5 years (1996-2001 ish) setting up and maintaining debian systems as ISP / small office servers though (was working for an ISP that set up/maintained mail/firewall/shared internet environments for business customers - we used Debian for it)


----------



## AndyUKG (Jun 20, 2012)

Have been using Ubuntu as a server OS recently and was pleased to find it offers freebsd-update-like upgrades between major versions, which AFAIK the likes of CentOS etc do not, which was nice 

I also find apt-get pretty ok, prefereable to RPMs and yum for me.

cheers Andy.


----------



## gore (Jun 20, 2012)

APT is actually a LOT like the BSD way. The first time I used Ubuntu, I didn't like it. I played DooM, and after one game, started messing around, didn't like it, and formatted the machine lol. I just could NOT stand how the Root account worked out of the box. 

Anyway, I still don' like Ubuntu, and I also don't like Gentoo, though I'm starting to see they are making an effort on a few things I cared about that made me turn away the first time.

To me, part of it was the fact that whenever I'd be on a general Unix / Linux / BSD Security Mailing List, it seemed as though Gentoo had at least two security patches a night. I didn't like that. And the whole Ebuild thing.... I got that going on Slackware one day, and it's OK, it's not that it's terrible, it just isn't for me.

A friend of mine swears by Gentoo, I swear AT Gentoo. Though I could very easily see me giving it another chance. The installation, which, again, this was something I thought to be stupid for all but the rarest of times... A Stage 3, OK, maybe not so bad, but didn't anyone ever really want a Stage 1?

Anyway, Gentoo is starting to do something, but I haven't given it another shot yet. Ubuntu, I use those CDs the same way I did my Windows NT installation CD; Coffee Cup Coaster.

Debian I DO like though. Ubuntu is a pretty, more updated, more shiny version of Debian, and I've liked Debian for a long time. It's simple, and I LOVE APT.


----------



## fluca1978 (Jun 21, 2012)

RedHat 5.2 was my first installation at home. Then I used Mandrake 6 for a while, but get back to redhat from 6 to 9, when I switched to suse. I tried gentoo, but did not like it, then I switched to Debian and Ubuntu. then I met FreeBSD....


----------



## throAU (Jun 21, 2012)

gore said:
			
		

> APT is actually a LOT like the BSD way.



Somewhat.

But I was more referring to the BSD style init, encouraging use of /usr/local for add-on software, etc.


----------



## gore (Jun 22, 2012)

Oh, OK. That was something that actually did cause me a little confusion when I first started using stuff other than Windows. I mean, at first, all I had was Windows 95. Back then I didn't know there was anything else, because I had just gotten my very first Computer, so I knew nothing about them. 

Then, finally, I started to learn things. I didn't have any manuals, so I had to just screw around, and eventually, I learned there was different versions of Windows, which didn't take long to learn obviously, and eventually, I heard about this thing called "Linux" which I looked up, and saw it was like something called "Unix" and so on, and that was when I started learning about this stuff. 

After a while, I knew a lot about OSs, and then, one day, I was reading about some Hacker who was in the news for writing something (I don't remember what the web site was, but I think it had to do with DeCSS) And they said this guy preferred FreeBSD, and so I looked up that, and I was blown away.

That's kinda how I got started; Just reading about Computer stuff, and reading about Operating Systems. After I got into the idea that you can use more than just what the Computer comes with, I started trying out everything. 

I still have my copy of BeOS Pro 5, and I did like it, but I just wanted to try out as many different OSs as I could, to see what I liked more. I've tried so many OSs now I can't count, but I do remember reading about FreeBSD for the first time, thinking "I REALLY need to try this out! This one seems awesome!" And eventually, I did. And I've been using it ever since.


----------



## zodias (Jun 26, 2012)

I liked MS - Windows for gaming nd still use it for the same reason 
Back in 2001 tried Red Hat and reformatted the HDD during install. Asked a friend for help. He gave me a CD with FreeBSD and said "If you want something stable, use FreeBSD, if you want troubles use Linux". Started to learn FreeBSD. Tried all of the most famous Linux distros since then and never had a preferred distro. Used Ubuntu for a while until I realized that the console is gone from it. I mean you write 
	
	



```
#ifconfig eth1 down
```
 and after 2-3 seconds the interface is up again. That was the very moment I erased it and never look back for a desktop different from FreeBSD. Tried Debian for a virtualization server and discovered that the kernel and the GNU tools are built with different versions of GCC which prevents VMWare from compiling. And if you install manually some pkg you are in trouble when have to update. This was the very moment I replaced Linux with FreeBSD and VMWare with VirtualBox.


----------



## gore (Jun 26, 2012)

I hated Red Hat personally for a long time. The first version I had was Red Hat 6.1 which came with Red Hat Linux for Dummies, which was the second book I bought on Linux (The first one was Teaching Yourself Linux in 24 hours, and it came with Caldera Open Linux 2.2, it was when I first got a computer and first got started) I always had a thing for Unix.

I mean yeah, I had to use Windows because I had dial-up, didn't own a REAL modem, and so on, and needed REAL Hardware, but eventually, I started figuring this stuff out, and really, when I bought that very first BSD PowerPak, I'd only owned a computer for a few months. So I sort of started out with FreeBSD and Linux around the same time.


----------



## throAU (Jun 27, 2012)

zodias said:
			
		

> I mean you write
> 
> 
> 
> ...



You know what they say about assumptions...

The command you should have used is [cmd=]ifdown eth1[/cmd]

Blaming an OS because you don't RTFM and expect it to work like something else isn't the operating system's fault.


----------



## zodias (Jun 28, 2012)

throAU said:
			
		

> Blaming an OS because you don't RTFM and expect it to work like something else isn't the operating system's fault.



Yes, you are right. Accept my apologies. I expected Ubuntu to behave like FreeBSD does. And also was very surprised that Ubuntu did not honor /etc/rc.local as FreeBSD and Debian GNU/Linux. Maybe Ubuntu is good after all, but not for me.


----------



## michaelrmgreen (Jun 28, 2012)

throAU said:
			
		

> You know what they say about assumptions...
> 
> The command you should have used is [cmd=]ifdown eth1[/cmd]
> 
> Blaming an OS because you don't RTFM and expect it to work like something else isn't the operating system's fault.



Ubuntu has a manual? Stone me, that's an improvement.


----------



## gore (Jun 28, 2012)

Everything taken from Unix has SOME form of Manual... "man man" 

Ubuntu is just African for "I'm too sissy to use Slackware" and got ripped off of Debian, and just shows that a billionaire really CAN take whatever they want and make it work.


----------



## hitest (Jun 28, 2012)

gore said:
			
		

> Ubuntu is just African for "I'm to sissy to use Slackware" and got ripped off of Debian, and just shows that a Billionaire really CAN take whatever they want and make it work.



I run FreeBSD 9.0 on this work station, but, I also like and use Slackware and OpenBSD.  I say live and let live.  I am happy when people use some type of free OS that is not proprietary.  It is all good.


----------



## michaelrmgreen (Jun 28, 2012)

@Gore. I'm so old I remember when all software came with one or many HUGE manuals and three ring binders to hold them. The manuals that came with SCO Xenix added up to six or seven hundred pages. All the answers were there, if you read them. 

Then came a time when there was one 'perfect bound' manual, not as good, they didn't lie flat for one thing, but still adequate.

Then it was "Oh, there's a manual on the disk, it's in PDF format, just look in that." A poor substitute but better than nothing.

Then came the time of "Just look in the help files", useless.

Now it's <sound f/x - blowing wind> and "Work it out for yourselves, we're off to our private islands."

Handbook is one of many things that makes FreeBSD stand out from all the Linux 'distros'. If some entrepreneur got a proper manual written and created a distro to match we might well have a 'year of linux on the desktop'.

I'm not holding my breath.


----------



## kr651129 (Jun 28, 2012)

Redhat was good for a while IMHO, I played with TurboLinux for a bit, I tried slackware and didn't care for it to much, Suse was alright.  The look and feel of Suse made me really want to get into Linux full time.  Then I found Ubuntu, I don't think it's the best but I have a soft spot in my heart for it because once I found Ubuntu I left Microsoft behind but kept XP on as a multiboot option (games, flash, specific programs).  When Ubuntu started to hit the 10th release it started to get bulky and I wanted something better.  I tried the BSD's way back in the day but I didn't know enough and it confused me and I got turned off by it, after all that playing with Linux I finally made the switch to FreeBSD and now I shake my head thinking "Why did I waste all of that time with Linux?!?!"


----------



## fmc000 (Jun 29, 2012)

I always ran Linux on my home PCs / laptops. It started in 1996 with Slackware, then I tried more ore less every distribution I could fetch: RedHat/CentOS, Mandrake, Debian, OpenSuSE, Fedora, Arch, Ubuntu, etc.

Then three days ago I installed FreeBSD on my eeePC. Basically it was because of ZFS as I use it massively at work on my Solaris High-End servers. Well, I must say that I'm amazed. It just works, every task feels snappier than ever, the documentation is easy and well written. But it's everything you already know, I'm sure.

So, my favorite Linux is the one that's not installed on my machine.


----------



## jdhore (Jun 30, 2012)

gpatrick said:
			
		

> To put the bloated piece of sh!tware known as Red Hat into perspective by looking at the US-CERT NVD database:
> 
> ```
> 3-months      3-years     All
> ...



I'm sorry, but this argument is total crap. 

For FreeBSD and Windows, it only counts the "core" components of the OS (the kernel, OpenSSL, FBSD *[*]* FreeBSD libc, tcsh, etc).

For Red Hat on the other hand, it counts all ~3,000 packages in the repositories (and that's just for RHEL, not even counting Fedora which has ~22,000 packages in the repositories. Although maybe the wikipedia numbers are incorrect). 

That's a lot more software than the FreeBSD base system to have security issues (that includes a bunch of HTTPd's, a bunch of SQL engines, a bunch of programming languages aside from C (Ruby, Python, Perl, etc)


----------



## Simba7 (Jul 1, 2012)

gpatrick said:
			
		

> inferior architecture of i386


..and what exactly is wrong with the i386 architecture? I've been using it for decades without issues. I still operate a set of i386 (well, i686) boxes along with a set of 5 SunFire V100s and they all are rock solid with FreeBSD and Gentoo Linux.


----------



## SR_Ind (Jul 1, 2012)

Simba7 said:
			
		

> ..and what exactly is wrong with the i386 architecture? I've been using it for decades without issues. I still operate a set of i386 (well, i686) boxes along with a set of 5 SunFire V100s and they all are rock solid with FreeBSD and Gentoo Linux.



This argument flows out of the old RISC vs CISC debate. In university we were always told RISC is superior (hence i386 is crap). Reality has turned out to be otherwise. In the desktop world the fate was decided long ago (sealed the day Apple joined the camp).

On the server side RISC is fast losing out, in fact old UNIXes running on RISC processors are getting kicked out of the market. For example look at HP-UX's market share for last few years, also try to find  sales figures for Solaris on SPARC vs x86.

I don't know how many people here do commercial software development, but last month one of our customer*s*, a large (maybe the largest?) European telecom equipment maker told us that on the managed networks they manage for operators worldwide are only allowing x86 hardware. Critical OSS/BSS application on older servers are gradually migrated. Only non-essential applications shall remain on non-x86 platforms. 

Weird, but they have better insights into the market and technological trends.

[*] [*]


----------



## gore (Jul 1, 2012)

SR_Ind said:
			
		

> This argument flows out of old RISC vs CISC debate. In university we were always told RISC is superior (hence i386 is crap).
> 
> Reality has turned out to be otherwise. In desktop world the fate was decided long ago (sealed the day Apple joined the camp).
> 
> ...



OK, now I HAVE to pop in here for this one; It wasn't easy to understand exactly what you meant, but that's OK, I think I got it.

I personally don't know how ALL of YOU feel about this, but even with the way things are going right now, where regular PC Hardware is becoming the norm, if I were in charge of some huge company, and I was told to set up our "Mission Critical" section, I probably wouldn't be choosing regular off the shelf stuff...

Call me crazy, but an SGI Server, and SGI Workstations, are better than PCs. Even though SGI is going to a Linux only World, which sucks because IRIX is Beautiful, I'd still want that. Sun, The Sun has Set, and they might as well be renamed "Moon" and change SunOS to MoonOS (Which in a twist of humor is a version of Linux! LOL) but the reason is Oracle is ruining Sun. 

If you've ever seen "25 years of Berkeley Unix" where Marshal Kirk McKusick is talking about how he saw /dev/kidney and they were using Unix for Kidney Dialysis, and he says "I sure Hope I don't ever need that" I agreed with him. If I had to pick something where crashing could kill me, I'd want either the SGI stuff I just brought up, or FreeBSD.

I'd sleep better at night knowing I had some nice HP Servers that didn't know what Windows was lol.


----------



## throAU (Jul 1, 2012)

RISC vs CISC is a bit blurred these days.


CPUs are complex enough now that the intel stuff is all RISC internally with a decoder for CISC instructions.  

So you get the benefits of CISC style code density but the code is broken up and run as RISC internally.  Also, the RISC CPUs got more complex and added streaming instructions like altivec...


I ask why is an SGI or SPARC cpu so inherently superior to x64 these days?  Sure in the past they had the memory bandwidth, etc - but intel has the best fabs in the world, and individual x64 nodes are now fast enough to blow basically anything else out of the water in terms of instructions per dollar with cheap clustering solutions.  The intel gear has virtualization support, redundant hot swap hardware, etc.  The old advantages simply either are not there, or are way more dollars than they are worth, and can be worked around  by just throwing money at x64.


But it will come full circle.  Eventually just like intel ate the server market from the bottom up, ARM is going to eat intel's market from the bottom up as well.


----------



## kpa (Jul 1, 2012)

I386 and amd64 survive only because of compatibility requirements and the fact that it's infinitely much easier to find working development tools for them than some obscure RISC architecture. From a completely technical point of view i386/amd64 stink to high heaven.


----------



## throAU (Jul 1, 2012)

kpa said:
			
		

> I386 and amd64 survive only because of compatibility requirements and the fact that it's infinitely much easier to find working development tools for them than some obscure RISC architecture. From a completely technical point of view i386/amd64 stink to high heaven.



Be that as it may, they have the horsepower.  At the end of the day, 99.99% of developers are not dealing in x86 assembly language any more.  So the "crap" architecture doesn't actually matter.


----------



## SR_Ind (Jul 1, 2012)

throAU said:
			
		

> Be that as it may, they have the horsepower.  At the end of the day, 99.99% of developers are not dealing in x86 assembly language any more.  So the "crap" architecture doesn't actually matter.


x86 rules the world of personal computers (almost complete domination) which translates to it being the software development platform as well. That means it is easier (and for hobbyists only possible platform) to target x86 for software products. 

The second factor is the availability of the non-x86 platform. Non-x86 platforms are neither cheap nor commonly available as personal devices. So how does one write software for them? Hobbyists and FOSS developers are ruled out, small (in developing countries even mid size) companies are ruled out. All of these folks are a big mass of software developers that have contributed enormously towards x86's current position.

There is also the question of ROI for consumers. We have half a dozen SunFire servers (circa 2005). In our country this is a lot of money. And guess what, they are lying in stores because there's no modern OS available for them. And the IT will not allow them to operate without security patches and there are no security patches for them from Oracle. And no developer will take up the responsibility of applying a unofficial patch from sources.

And the result? Business line heads will fire anyone asking for non-x86 hardware, unless some customer pays for it.


----------



## mwatkins (Jul 1, 2012)

I used to work for what was a company in the big systems Unix market. The company doesn't exist any more.

Ironically, they predicted their own demise quite accurately. Despite having roots in RISC, the company made a strategic shift to Intel because, and I quote a founder, "commodity economics always win".

Tom West was right about that but Data General made the transition too late and had too little market share at the time to come out on top (ed: let alone being one of the survivors). EMC bought them, primarily for their storage products.


----------



## Simba7 (Jul 6, 2012)

SR_Ind said:
			
		

> There is also the question of ROI for consumers. We have half a dozen SunFire servers (circa 2005). In our country this is a lot of money. And guess what, they are lying in stores because there's no modern OS available for them. And the IT will not allow them to operate without security patches and there are no security patches for them from Oracle. And no developer will take up the responsibility of applying a unofficial patch from sources.
> 
> And the result? Business line heads will fire anyone asking for non-x86 hardware, unless some customer pays for it.


Why not just stick a modern OS on it? FreeBSD runs great on my old SunFire V100s. Sure, there's that stinkin' 128GB limitation, but you throw a pair of 120GB drives in there with ZFS and RAID0 (or 1) and it runs rather decent.

That's what I ended up doing to mine. I picked up 5 of these for cheap (under $100 shipped) and turned one into a ports server, one into a mail server, and one into a syslog server. I'll eventually find a use for the other 2.

..and if you want to go the Linux route, there's Gentoo. I've tried it on a spare V100 and it runs rather decent. There's still a few bugs in the toolchain, but they're weeding them out.


----------



## maxum (Jul 6, 2012)

Ms-dos


----------



## SR_Ind (Jul 6, 2012)

^^

Simba7,

Dumb IT policies. They'd only allow RHEL and Solaris if there is an official version available for that CPU. 
Why just Gentoo? If we have the liberty we'd try FreeBSD itself. But doing so, IT will wash its hands off any responsibilities with respect to those boxes. Which means managing patches, backups and downtime all out of scarce developer resources.


----------



## rajl (Jul 6, 2012)

Just my two cents on preferred linux distributions.

I tried RedHat back in the 7.2 days circa 2001 or 2002.  I could never get anything done in it and it drove me nuts.

I found Gentoo in Fall of 2002 and loved it.  First, building your system from Stage 1 (several times) really taught me the fundamentals of how the internal system worked.  And Gentoo had a rather vanilla implementation, which carried over well to other distros.

I used Gentoo as a primary OS with a backup Windows partition for games and such.  I stuck with Gentoo until Ubuntu came out, and switched in May 2005.  The things I loved about Ubuntu was out of the box hardware support for almost any hardware you threw at it, as well as the fact that it was essentially Debian, but without associated software being two years behind the times as Debian was back then.  Put succintly, Ubuntu was perfect as a desktop Linux for me.

I'm not sure exactly when it happened, but eventually I drifted over to Windows as my primary OS.  I don't remember any exact trigger, save that I enjoyed having all my games play on Windows and had no pressing need to use any free oss.

I only recently picked up using FOSS again personally.  I first started using FreeBSD for a home file-server.  I was afraid to take the plunge, but needed the killer app of ZFS.  Turns out that FreeBSD has all the things I love about the Unix family of operating systems, but with none of the things I hate.

I also recently put Linux on my laptop.  I moved the Windows license I had on it to an HTPC I built for my wife, and being too cheap to buy another copy of Windows, I decided to see how well Linux worked.  At first, I tried Fedora with Gnome Shell to see what all the hoopla about Gnome 3.0 was.  I vetoed that choice because even though I was ok with Gnome Shell, I couldn't connect to a wireless network.  I then tried Fedora with KDE and had a similar experience.  I then decided to go with Ubuntu since I generally have the best results with it and hardware.  Their new Unity interface is alright, although it has a few minor behaviors that annoy me to no end.  However, installing KDE solved all my usability problems (I guess I really am a KDE guy).

My current vote: Ubuntu.  Everything just works as far as hardware goes.  If you don't like Unity, installing something else is a breeze.  Gentoo is good if you like FreeBSD's ports, although there are some notable differences between portage and ports.  If you want rock-solid stable, CentOS and Debian are both good choices although you may lag behind the latest releases of software.


----------



## Crivens (Jul 7, 2012)

throAU said:
			
		

> RISC vs CISC is a bit blurred these days.
> 
> 
> CPUs are complex enough now that the intel stuff is all RISC internally with a decoder for CISC instructions.
> ...


And that is one of the problems. The code translation which is being performed eats die area and also power, and it makes the core much more complicated, read, buggy.



			
				throAU said:
			
		

> I ask why is an SGI or SPARC cpu so inherently superior to x64 these days?  Sure in the past they had the memory bandwidth,


Memory bandwidth still is a problem, but it hits them all. And here is one of the benefits which come from CISC, the denser code. It requires fewer memory accesses. On the other hand, the instruction set severely limits the freedom of expression when it comes to planning memory accesses longer ahead so the cache or memory access is not stalling the ALUs. Pipeline length also is a thing not to be ignored.



			
				throAU said:
			
		

> But it will come full circle.  Eventually just like intel ate the server market from the bottom up, ARM is going to eat intel's market from the bottom up as well.



Some time ago I had high hopes in ARM, but not any more.
My next HW will most likely be based on MIPS or some PPC core, but that will be decided when it needs to be.


----------



## throAU (Jul 8, 2012)

Crivens said:
			
		

> Some time ago I had high hopes in ARM, but not any more.
> My next HW will most likely be based on MIPS or some PPC core, but that will be decided when it needs to be.



Eventually ARM will win, imho.

It may take 1 year, it may take 10 years - but the x86 market is eventually going to hit the wall in terms of performance that people actually need in a single die, and ARM is much cheaper, and trailing only a few years now in terms of performance.

Low end servers will start using ARM for better power consumption (and incompatibility with x86 malware), and they will trickle upwards as performance proves to be "good enough" for more of the market.

Same way x86 killed Itanium (PPC, everything else) from the desktop upwards, ARM will kill x86, from the phone/tablet upwards.


----------



## drhowarddrfine (Jul 8, 2012)

throAU said:
			
		

> I ask why is an SGI or SPARC cpu so inherently superior to x64 these days?  Sure in the past they had the memory bandwidth, etc



Funny you should ask. I was just getting ready to do some painting and that's the only time I wear this shirt anymore (from about 1992 when I worked there).


----------



## gore (Jul 8, 2012)

I can say why SGI is better with one line:

PC - "Let's make it as cheap and as powerful as possible"

SGI - "F*ck their budget let's make it the best it CAN be, and make sure the Hardware can stand up to being abused worse than Blow...Actually let's make the price about the same as blow!"

PC Hardware seems to fail a LOT more than this stuff ever does. It might cost less for almost the same performance, but it WILL fail faster in my experience. An SGI on the other hand?

Look up their 1600 line Monitors from the mid 90s; They're STILL being sold because they are THAT good.


----------



## Simba7 (Jul 8, 2012)

gore said:
			
		

> Look up their 1600 line Monitors from the mid 90s; They're STILL being sold because they are THAT good.


Um.. They didn't make those monitors. Sony did with their Trinitron line.


----------



## throAU (Jul 9, 2012)

gore said:
			
		

> PC Hardware seems to fail a LOT more than this stuff ever does. It might cost less for almost the same performance, but it WILL fail faster in my experience. An SGI on the other hand?



Depends if you buy cheap crappy PC hardware.  If you buy proper server quality hardware with redundant PSUs, disks, fans, etc. it is generally fine.  I've got PC servers in appalling conditions in the field (stuck in a rack next to a heater in a transportable building on a remote mine site office in Kazakhstan for example - where the temp range outside is -40c to +40c - so the heater gets cranked way up, too) and see a much lower failure rather than "normal" PC hardware.  That particular box for example has been in use since 2004 without issue.  We have a replacement box on the way right now because it needs upgrading and eventually the disks will no doubt fail.

I've had multiple other PC servers last WAY beyond their intended service life.  However, given most busineses depreciate their servers over 4-5 years, lasting much longer than that is somewhat pointless most of the time - it will be outdated and decommissioned by that point anyway.


I'm not saying Sun/SGI have no market.  Simply that it will continue to shrink as cheaper-to-purchase x86/x64 boxes become powerful enough for more of the niche higher-end tasks, at far lower cost.

Sure, if your SGI/Sun lasts for 10-15 years it might be worth paying the extra (it might need to last that much longer to pay itself off!), but for most people they want the higher performance that the next generation of hardware offers by that point.  If you're a very large company with minimal growth in terms of compute it will probably make sense too.  If you're a younger/smaller company with high growth rate, you'll be throwing old hardware out and upgrading anyway.

The cheaper price also means you can more cheaply cluster, keep spares on hand, etc.


----------



## Crivens (Jul 9, 2012)

throAU said:
			
		

> Eventually ARM will win, imho.
> 
> It may take 1 year, it may take 10 years - but the x86 market is eventually going to hit the wall in terms of performance that people actually need in a single die, and ARM is much cheaper, and trailing only a few years now in terms of performance.


There are other options which are still cheaper and consume still less power.
IMHO, power efficiency will be the driving force for the time comming.
Given the fact that MIPS cores these days cover half the die area an ARM core does, the possibility that ARM is going to win out is anything but sure to me.



			
				throAU said:
			
		

> Same way x86 killed Itanium (PPC, everything else) from the desktop upwards, ARM will kill x86, from the phone/tablet upwards.



The x86 did not kill anything, people who bought them did, by not buying other things. The question would be why they did so, and superior architectual conceps would not be the reason. The driving force was available software, and that argument is comming to an end, too, as software is available for several architectures these days. Most software, that is.
This is the result of open source like *BSD and Linux, and the switch in CPU architecture which was done by Apple two times showed everybody that it was possible and that there was no real reason to stick to some special architecture.

When I started to use computers, I had no special need like that "MS flight simulator needs to be available" or some office suite. I would have used a SUN, but they were noisy and above all not available in my budget. Same for SGI, but still I did not go the intel road.



			
				drhowarddrfine said:
			
		

> Funny you should ask. I was just getting ready to do some painting and that's the only time I wear this shirt anymore (from about 1992 when I worked there).



That, Sir, can be considered sacrilege  I still keep my motorola C'Bit gear in good order to remind me of some good time.

And to contribute something to the original thread, the Linux I favor most on my machines is the Linux that is silently sitting on some boot CD and is not installed or running. It was an option as long as they did not try to make it into some fisher price product and as long as they were not under the impression that any file may fit in any directory. But after that, I prefer even Haiku over it (provided it has the SW in need, nothing against Haiku).


----------



## gore (Jul 10, 2012)

Simba7 said:
			
		

> Um.. They didn't make those monitors. Sony did with their Trinitron line.



http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SGI_1600SW

That one.

Also, for the other reply about PC Hardware, I think it may have been taken a little wrong, since I do personally use PCs as Servers too, and one in particular has been like amazing!

The very first Computer I ever bought myself, which is an HP Pavilion I bought preinstalled with Windows 98, and that was in like 2000, so that PC, has literally been formatted, partitioned, and repartitioned, and reformatted again, like 200 times, and the little 43 GB HD it came with which I thought was huge at the time, is still going. I also thought 43 GBs was odd. Windows 98 with a Fat File System, would say 42.9 GBs, and Unix based stuff would give it all to me based on File System.

So yea I do get PCs as servers, I mean, heh, it's a FreeBSD forum, which when started, was mainly a PC OS, and LOTS of people used it on Servers.

I always thought that was funny heh; Yahoo! was a huge thing on FreeBSD and it was made mainly for PC Hardware.

Now, one reason I am so into those "REAL Workstations" is the Unix tradition of so much hardware and all of it actually being able to run just one OS. I mean Unix was invented on a machine from DEC, then went to everything. It's amazing if you think about it; This happened at a time when each company made their own OSs and nothing else worked really unless a "real" Hacker wrote another one for it, and yet AT&T was lucky enough to have hired to Legends. True Legends, who changed history forever. That's saying something heh.


----------



## Simba7 (Jul 11, 2012)

gore said:
			
		

> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SGI_1600SW
> 
> That one.


Ahh.. I stand corrected. That's a rather nice monitor, but it uses an OpenLDI interface. That might make it difficult for it to adapt to recent workstations.

..now if they still made an OpenLDI to DVI (or HDMI) adapter that wouldn't cost an ARM.


----------



## gore (Jul 11, 2012)

Simba7 said:
			
		

> Ahh.. I stand corrected. That's a rather nice monitor, but it uses an OpenLDI interface. That might make it difficult for it to adapt to recent workstations.
> 
> ..now if they still made an OpenLDI to DVI (or HDMI) adapter that wouldn't cost an ARM.



Heh, yea. Those Adapters seem to range quite a bit. But yea that Monitor, is just amazing. I've always Loved SGI stuff though. The first time I saw an SGI Computer, I was like "OMG! They make something other than a white or gray box!" Because it was like Neon Purple or something. I've just always Loved the whole case design thing they went with.

Once I've finished paying off everything I've got going right now, I do plan on buying an SGI Workstation and everything. I know they're dated and all, but I Love them, and I think they truly are works of art. So it doesn't hurt if I get myself a Workstation running IRIX, and play Quake2 on it


----------



## roddierod (Jul 11, 2012)

gore said:
			
		

> Once I've finished paying off everything I've got going right now, I do plan on buying an SGI Workstation and everything. I know they're dated and all, but I Love them, and I think they truly are works of art. So it doesn't hurt if I get myself a Workstation running IRIX, and play Quake2 on it



You should keep an eye on Craiglists, local FreeCycle groups or even local LUG mailing lists. I just got 2 SGI O2s, a SGI Fuel, 3 copies of IRIX, 3 21" SGI CRTs and other misc stuff for free by answering a posting on one of these.


----------



## drhowarddrfine (Jul 11, 2012)

roddierod said:
			
		

> I just got 2 SGI O2s, a SGI Fuel, 3 copies of IRIX, 3 21" SGI CRTs and other misc stuff for free by answering a posting on one of these.


When I first went to work at SGI, I called my boss to ask what kind of system he was getting me. I was hoping for a 4-processor system. "Four?!", he said. "I was putting you down for a 16-processor system."

I was the only one working out of the St. Louis office. I was in heaven.


----------



## gore (Jul 11, 2012)

Oh I do check that, heh, sometimes you can get lucky and either find something really cheap, or free if you're willing to come get it (Isn't that how Debian say they work? lol) But yea I look on there  as well. Good score by the way!

And drhowarddrfine; Sooooo hate you right now lol. Not only getting to work for them but... 16???? God that's the age of consent here and considering what you got I think there was a yes from someone lol.


----------



## roddierod (Jul 12, 2012)

drhowarddrfine said:
			
		

> When I first went to work at SGI, I called my boss to ask what kind of system he was getting me. I was hoping for a 4-processor system. "Four?!", he said. "I was putting you down for a 16-processor system."
> 
> I was the only one working out of the St. Louis office. I was in heaven.



DANG!! What was that, the desk side Crays they used to make  

Some kind of Cray is on my want list...no idea what I even do with one but you never know when you might need one.


----------



## Crivens (Jul 12, 2012)

roddierod said:
			
		

> DANG!! What was that, the desk side Crays they used to make
> 
> Some kind of Cray is on my want list...no idea what I even do with one but you never know when you might need one.



You could try thishere to have your own cray  And I would wager it does not run Linux out of the box.


----------



## Grell (Jul 12, 2012)

My favorite Linux would have to be Debian.  APT just makes life so simple.


----------



## Michael (Jul 13, 2012)

RedHat Enterprise Linux


----------



## drhowarddrfine (Jul 13, 2012)

And now this thread is recycling. Time to close it.


----------



## TiberiusDuval (Jul 16, 2012)

As simple desktop user I say Ubuntu 10.04&Kubuntu 12.04 It simply works most of time, only times I got any problems with Ubuntu were when I tried to make something in not proper way, like installing newer major kernel version for 10.04.

Yes it is bloated, and maybe does not give as much controll as you may want, but for desktop use it simply works, you can browse web, write, view videos etc. without problems. Even some gaming is possible by using wine, though for serious gaming I use Windows.


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## gore (Jul 17, 2012)

For gaming, I think the easiest experience I've had was SUSE 8.2, with an Nvidia Video Card, because I grabbed the .sh installer, shut X down, installed it, and then, when I brought it up, it showed the Nvidia screen, and I could play anything. That's the best experience I've had period.


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## olav (Jul 23, 2012)

I need some help and suggestions here. I'm going to reinstall my desktop system at work, it is currently running Ubuntu 11.04 and is outdated. I'm mainly a Python and Java developer. I need stability, and minimum noise. I've been using Ubuntu since 2004 and been very happy almost all the time (installed Kubuntu on my laptop last year as Unity and Gnome are too noisy for my taste). Currently KDE is my preferred desktop environment. I really like Kubuntu, but it is slightly more buggy than the latest Gnome2 on Ubuntu 11.04.

I really like the FreeBSD ports system. Mostly because I get quick and easy access to new software releases, especially apache, nginx, varnish, uwsgi, python, postgresql and so on. However FreeBSD's Java support is a bit rough and noisy. I prefer to download and install directly from java.oracle.com which works fine for Linux. Jails is also a plus. Is PCBSD a good desktop environment, is it possible to live with openjdk7 as a java developer?

So far I have found a few Linux options like Chakra and Sabayon. How do these two compare to Kubuntu? Or should I just stay with Kubuntu, it works fairly well though


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## mwatkins (Jul 23, 2012)

I can't speak to Java as I only use Java as a desktop user, but I've been developing web applications using Python and hosting them for clients on FreeBSD for many years. Having embraced jails I wouldn't want to do without them now.

The road has been quite smooth but the odd bump or two along the way shouldn't be a surprise. Over the last decade I think I've run into just a couple of edge case differences between Linux and FreeBSD that required the development of minor patches to be incorporated into one or two third party Python packages. PyPy wouldn't compile on my machine for quite some time but does happily now. I don't use PyPy for work but do like to keep up with what's going on in Python land.

Occasionally for the WSGI ecosystem some new web server that doesn't support kqueue will show up; maybe I might not get to play with that code for a while. Again this I've not found to be a problem. Those are the only sorts of roadblocks I've run into over the years and none of them have affected what I do. YMMV.

Edit: Re-reading your post, recently I was in much the same place as you are today. Despite having used a FreeBSD based workstation for years to support my work I was toying with running Linux on my new desktop workstation, and on my laptop. I'd run Linux on laptops before but never for the life of a laptop; usually I end up on Windows as a primary OS dual boot with FreeBSD in case I need to do support work while travelling. 

Before migrating off my old machine I've been putting a number of OS's (including FreeBSD and PC-BSD) and different configurations through the testing mill on the new fast box. After a week I ripped out Linux (had been running Mint, Debian edition on both) and went back to FreeBSD on both. I'd given a few Linux distros a workout and decided to check Mint out. Hardware support was excellent. ACPI suspend/resume worked flawlessly on both machines. Mint / XFCE / Debian Edition was light enough I probably could stomach keeping it but not knowing it decently well under the covers I didn't want to commit to putting all my work on it when my true comfort zone is FreeBSD, so I decided to give FreeBSD 9 (actually the 9.1 beta) another shot to see if I could get ACPI suspend/resume working. Somehow, and I haven't figured out what the magic sauce is yet, suspend and resume is now working well on my desktop. Resume continues to frustrate me on my laptop I have hopes I'll figure it out.

So after humming and hawing over this decision for a while I decided to keep the OS I already know on my desktop and laptop development/productivity machines. Since I deploy on FreeBSD servers and virtual servers, going this route is definitely the path of least resistance for me. I know FreeBSD well enough to be self sufficient in my own support or can find answers; I never feel like I'm out there at the end of a limb with FreeBSD. Linux represents a learning curve I'm not willing to invest in. At some level I have always been attracted to the nature of FreeBSD as a complete OS. It just feels tighter, like the commercial Unix I came from, so I continue to stick with it.


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## gore (Jul 25, 2012)

olav said:
			
		

> I need some help and suggestions here. I'm going to reinstall my desktop system at work, it is currently running Ubuntu 11.04 and is outdated. I'm mainly a Python and Java developer. I need stability, and minimum noise. I've been using Ubuntu since 2004 and been very happy almost all the time (installed Kubuntu on my laptop last year as Unity and Gnome are too noisy for my taste). Currently KDE is my preferred desktop environment. I really like Kubuntu, but it is slightly more buggy than the latest Gnome2 on Ubuntu 11.04.
> 
> I really like the FreeBSD ports system. Mostly because I get quick and easy access to new software releases, especially apache, nginx, varnish, uwsgi, python, postgresql and so on. However FreeBSD's Java support is a bit rough and noisy. I prefer to download and install directly from java.oracle.com which works fine for Linux. Jails is also a plus. Is PCBSD a good desktop environment, is it possible to live with openjdk7 as a java developer?
> 
> So far I have found a few Linux options like Chakra and Sabayon. How do these two compare to Kubuntu? Or should I just stay with Kubuntu, it works fairly well though



This is just my opinion:

First off, PC-BSD is in my personal opinion, a GREAT Desktop OS; You basically have FreeBSD with a paint job, and some custom tools making the whole thing incredibly easy to use. I rarely EVER do this, but I'd go as far as saying that if PC-BSD stays on course, it WILL become a REAL contender to even Ubuntu. 

The first time I used PC-BSD it was a while ago, so I don't remember much, but then PC-BSD 8.X and 9.X came out, and I LOVED it; I'm using 9.0 on my Laptop right now, and it's just SO easy to set up and use. I kind of wish sometimes that FreeBSD would do similar; You have sound and everything else working right out of the box; No editing /etc/rc.conf or anything!

For Linux distros that I personally feel are good for production use, I can name the ones I've used without any issues:

SUSE / OpenSUSE Linux.
Slackware
Debian
.... That's the main ones, but I DO admit that the last time I used Mandriva and Magei Linux, I had a great experience with both. 

That's my opinion on it anyway. I mean, when it comes down to it, the main thing with ANY OS out there, is how YOU feel about it. I mean Linux has so many distros now it's hard to even keep up with half of it, and the BSD world, though not as "user friendly" at times, does have rewards you aren't gonna get in most Linux distros. 

So basically, to answer your question about this, I'd say just to try stuff out, and when you come to something you like, a lot of people just stop there and don't ever keep going, and I personally would say keep trying anyway. I have a BUNCH of open source OSs here, and even though I LOVE SUSE Linux, I didn't just stop trying, I kept going, and downloading new ones to toy with, and after a while, I had a list of like 3 or 4 Distros that I actually used all the time. 

I've been leaning more and more to BSD though, but I still use Linux as well. This machine dual boots Windows 7 and OpenSUSE, and works great, but then my Laptop, has PC-BSD on it, and then I have two Desktops running FreeBSD 9 on them, and then my FTP Server runs Slackware 12.0 on it.

So even though it's time consuming, I'd recommend looking at SUSE, OpenSUSE, (Either one really, though the Enterprise versions of SUSE ARE really sleek) And of course Debian is great, and Mandriva, though bloated at times, DOES have some very redeeming qualities in terms of how it's done. And Slackware of course is the old stand by it seems heh. 

So basically, I'd say to try out a bunch, and then, make yourself a list; One that lists all the OSs you personally liked, and list the pros and cons of each one, and then kind of keep looking until you're absolutely Happy with it. That's my opinion on it anyway.

And also; Don't forget that Linux and BSD aren't the only thing around.


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## olav (Jul 25, 2012)

I've tried PCBSD for a few days now. And I have to say it's been a surprisingly good experience.
Most things works great, even JAVA(openjdk7). I've noticed a few bugs with Java though, but nothing more serious than googling to find the workaround. Though I still have some problems with Eclipse. I managed to install Eclipse classic, but I can't get the marketplace plugin to work and neither the springsource toolsuite plugins.
Netbeans do work though, it really lacks a lot of what makes Eclipse a superior IDE in my opinion. But I can live with this. I'm using QuickSynergy to create a seamless desktop integration with my laptop running Kubuntu so I can still develop using Eclipse 






Two screens with PCBSD and the last one is mylatop with Kubuntu. All with one keyboard and mouse 

And Warden is some fantastic piece of work! When some of my CMS loving colleagues come back from holiday I need to show how easy it is to get a new CMS up and running with Warden!


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## oops (Jul 25, 2012)

olav said:
			
		

> However FreeBSD's Java support is a bit rough and noisy. I prefer to download and install directly from java.oracle.com which works fine for Linux. Jails is also a plus. Is PCBSD a good desktop environment, is it possible to live with openjdk7 as a java developer?


Have you tried to sidestep the issue by using java/linux-sun-jdk17?


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## olav (Jul 25, 2012)

Isn't that 32bit only?


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## drhowarddrfine (Jul 25, 2012)

mwatkins said:
			
		

> So after humming and hawing ...


It's hem and haw. Don't make me have to read all your posts and have to correct you all the time.





> Linux represents a learning curve I'm not willing to invest in. At some level I have always been attracted to the nature of FreeBSD as a complete OS. It just feels tighter, like the commercial Unix I came from, so I continue to stick with it.


This is my exact reasoning. When I have to mess with Linux, some things just don't feel right.


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## kalle97 (Jul 30, 2012)

I don't really have a Linux favorite, altough I really like the good old stable 2.6!  I have 3 GNU/Linux favorites though, Arch Linux, Debian GNU/Linux and Puppy Linux.


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## dalecosp (Aug 8, 2012)

When I arrived at my current position, I found we had one website on CentOS and about 10 on various Winservers.

Windows for HTTP just seems *wrong*.  And CentOS feels like a downgrade, but it's a tad closer to FreeBSD, so ... that's nice.

So, now, 1.5 years later, we have 3 sites on FreeBSD, two on CentOS, and few still hanging 'round on Windows.

But, it's *progress*, right?


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## dalecosp (Aug 8, 2012)

kalle97 said:
			
		

> I don't really have a Linux favorite, altough I really like the good old stable 2.6!  I have 3 GNU/Linux favorites though, Arch Linux, Debian GNU/Linux and Puppy Linux.


+1 for humorous pedanticism!!


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## CeReAl_KiLLeR_Du_77 (Aug 15, 2012)

1) Debian
2) Gentoo

FreeBSD (1) and OpenBSD (2) are my favourite for use server use.


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## zhoopin (Aug 15, 2012)

*Life is too short to drink Linux*

Currently, I haven't got enough skills to stay with CURRENT.
I declare myself guilty, who had to have both CURRENT and STABLE at the same time.
In the meantime... Life is too short to drink Linux.


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## gore (Aug 15, 2012)

For Servers, I've tried out a bunch of stuff. I have a copy of Windows Server 2003 Enterprise Edition which I got for free YEARS ago, and I did install it on a Desktop system once to give it a try, and even though it was a lot faster than I expected, I didn't even bother trying to use it as a Server. I saw Windows Media Player installed by default, and thought to myself "Who in the.... Why would ANY company put THIS in a SERVER Product?!?!?!? A Media player on a machine that is going to most likely sit headless in a closet somewhere, and not only that but a Media Player that needs Security Updates that require a reboot?!?!? Uptime loving or not; Trying to explain to someone they can't use the Server because a Media Player was installed and needs to be updated and patched and then needs a reboot is stupid..." And so I didn't bother.

For my Server use though, I've used everything from Debian to Slackware, Mandriva, Red Hat and Fedora Core, which I hated for the most part, and SUSE, and Open SUSE, and of course FreeBSD. 

My FTP Server currently has Slackware 12.0 on it, and has since 12.0 was still sort of new, so I haven't ever changed it, since there isn't a reason for me to. It works great, and I've gone through and taken out everything that I don't need to run the machine. It doesn't have X installed anymore since I didn't use that anyway, and I did leave a couple things on it like Compression tools, since this machine is used mainly for back ups, and I like to be able to use 7zip on it, and Bzip2, and log in over SSH and Compress things to save on space.


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## SR_Ind (Aug 17, 2012)

^^

IIRC on Windows server family Media Player is not installed by default. It is usually available on the add-on CD or via Service Packs.

Back to topic. I recently got my hands on CentOS. It's Red Hat EL minus the bloat. Great thing is there is something called minimal install. Good OS.


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## gore (Aug 19, 2012)

Well, it was a while ago, but I did a default install of it, and then saw updates for Media Player, which I looked though the Programs and found.


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## cpm@ (Aug 19, 2012)

I tested few linux distros, but I have my favourite one:

1. Debian GNU/Linux


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## SR_Ind (Aug 19, 2012)

Talking of Linux...today I tried to remove postfix from a RHEL server and the package manager was kind enough to advise me that such a move requires removal of cron.

Or if I remove ATI driver then the entire xorg video driver meta package needs a removal.

How do people work with this sorry excuse of an OS called Linux?


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## cpm@ (Aug 20, 2012)

SR_Ind said:
			
		

> Talking of Linux...today I tried to remove postfix from a RHEL server and the package manager was kind enough to advise me that such a move requires removal of cron.
> 
> Or if I remove ATI driver then the entire xorg video driver meta package needs a removal.
> 
> How do people work with this sorry excuse of an OS called Linux?



Read this interesting article: 

*"RPM hell: A Perfect Example of Good Software Crippled by Bad Design"*


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## swirling_vortex (Aug 20, 2012)

SR_Ind said:
			
		

> Talking of Linux...today I tried to remove postfix from a RHEL server and the package manager was kind enough to advise me that such a move requires removal of cron.
> 
> Or if I remove ATI driver then the entire xorg video driver meta package needs a removal.
> 
> How do people work with this sorry excuse of an OS called Linux?


I'd say it's the continuing symptom at being at the mercy of binary package management. When you use meta-packages, you're stuck with what the package maintainer felt should be included. Interestingly, the cron dependency seems to have been removed as of Fedora 13, so that won't come to RHEL until version 7.

http://bugs.centos.org/view.php?id=5491

That said, I do like Scientific Linux. I don't have much fondness for Debian ever since that ssl "bug" that the packager introduced.


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## john_rambo (Aug 28, 2012)

opensuse, Ubuntu, PCLINUXOS


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## GuillotinePartition (Sep 4, 2012)

Slackware for me, It seems closer to FreeBSD or unix-like in nature vs the other distros


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## numpad5 (Sep 11, 2012)

I started as Slackware, they are one of the leaner, but still more full featured ones that don't come with many services enabled to hog system resources on older hardware.  I also enjoyed using things like ZipSlack back when it was still sort of unique to have it, when livecds were hard to come by.

Nowadays I'm mostly a Fedora guy when I have to use linux, but that is usually when I want a virtualbox guest of it.

Still think BSD is cooler though


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## GuillotinePartition (Sep 19, 2012)

Ive heard that Fedora, Gentoo, Debian, and Arch are also pretty good to come by. To me it seems like the syntax sort of strays further away from Unix, which would be overwhelming for me because Im trying to learn Free and OpenBSD. In terms of system resource, xfce and flux are good regardless of what OS is being used lol.


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## drhowarddrfine (Sep 19, 2012)

I don't have a favorite. I hate all of them. Since I have FreeBSD I don't need them. And that's a good thing.


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## Grell (Sep 20, 2012)

Why do you hate them?  I think they've done open source a world of good.  Just because you like FreeBSD doesn't mean you have to put down Linux.


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## zer0sig (Sep 20, 2012)

I tried Slackware first, sticking with it for a couple of years, then Debian (favorite for general purpose use), have found RHEL to be very well-supported at work (Fortune 100 companies don't usually approve running Oracle clusters on FreeBSD for production machines, for example), but the one I like the most and am most likely to use is probably back|track. the live cd boots well on a great many machines and it has a wonderful set of tools for security audits and the like. I could (and to some degree do) load most of the same packages up in FreeBSD, but many of these packages are not known for working out of the box, and a quick boot off the disk gives me access to all of them in generally working order. Still prefer FreeBSD when possible, at least on PC type hardware.

For timeframes, I fist used both Solaris (back when it was still BSD-based) and Slackware in 1995, Debian in about 97 and FreeBSD in probably 1998. Have tried many different distributions and OSes since but above is still basically what I prefer.


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## drhowarddrfine (Sep 20, 2012)

Grell said:
			
		

> Why do you hate them?  I think they've done open source a world of good.  Just because you like FreeBSD doesn't mean you have to put down Linux.



Because I'm tired of coming to the FreeBSD forum and having to read about Linux.


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## UNIXgod (Sep 20, 2012)

drhowarddrfine said:
			
		

> Because I'm tired of coming to the FreeBSD forum and having to read about Linux.



This thread is here to defuse that.


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## drhowarddrfine (Sep 21, 2012)

I know but there have been a few splinter cells and it grates on me. I'm easily grated.


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## throAU (Sep 21, 2012)

Grell said:
			
		

> Why do you hate them?  I think they've done open source a world of good.  Just because you like FreeBSD doesn't mean you have to put down Linux.



Because they've re-invented a whole heap of stuff that was not originally a GPL project "just because" and done a pretty crappy job of much of it.


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## gore (Sep 21, 2012)

throAU said:
			
		

> Because they've re-invented a whole heap of stuff that was not originally a GPL project "just because" and done a pretty crappy job of much of it.



Though I'm a little more Biased towards the BSD License; I don't know I'd go as far as saying everything they did was bad or even not OK. I came from Windows 98 on my first ever PC, so just about anything I tossed on that box was an improvement in terms of Stability.... Windows 9X had Memory Leaks so bad you'd think the people who made the movie "Deep Blue Sea" would have been working ON it.


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## Crivens (Sep 21, 2012)

gore said:
			
		

> Windows 9X had Memory Leaks so bad you'd think the people who made the movie "Deep Blue Sea" would have been working ON it.



Wouldn't then "Memento" be a better analogy?

And as for hating Linux - if there was no Linux, one had to write one. And if there was no Vista, one had to write one. Simply because each scale of measurement needs a lowest end.


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## Edin (Sep 21, 2012)

I enjoyed using Debian for some time. Slackware was pretty cool. Gentoo was quite interesting, but I loved FreeBSD the most!


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## gore (Sep 21, 2012)

Crivens said:
			
		

> Wouldn't then "Memento" be a better analogy?
> 
> And as for hating Linux - if there was no Linux, one had to write one. And if there was no Vista, one had to write one. Simply because each scale of measurement needs a lowest end.



Maybe; I've slept about 12 hours in the last 8 Days.


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## UNIXgod (Sep 22, 2012)

GuillotinePartition said:
			
		

> Ive heard that Fedora, Gentoo, Debian, and Arch are also pretty good to come by. To me it seems like the syntax sort of strays further away from Unix, which would be overwhelming for me because Im trying to learn Free and OpenBSD. In terms of system resource, xfce and flux are good regardless of what OS is being used lol.



POSIX is portable knowledge. If you ever need to write a portable script you have two options:

1. Pick a language which you plan to be installed on every system (i.e. perl, python or ruby)

2. Use sh(1) and double check against the POSIX standard: http://rubyprogrammer.net/~stu/posix/


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## Crivens (Sep 22, 2012)

UNIXgod said:
			
		

> 1. Pick a language which you plan to *force every possible user to have it* be installed on every system (i.e. perl, python or ruby)


Or how it may be percived by others.


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## silicium (Sep 26, 2012)

Used RedHat on main desktop 10 years ago, then switched to FreeBSD for a while before staying with Windows for better hardware support.
Tried Debian on a Thinkpad X32 two years ago, but hated ugly binary packages dependencies  and eventually installed Windows 7 as a revenge. When upgrading main desktop system from 2ghz pentium M to a less outdated amd64 thing, will probably install Slackware for better multimedia and sensor hardware support, but keep most non-deskstop stuff running on a FreeBSD VM.


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## gore (Sep 26, 2012)

For Desktop use, I've used a lot of different OSs, and I still have most of them, but I've had pretty good results with PC-BSD. It's basically FreeBSD with a face lift, some paint and polish, and some custom apps to make use of it as a Desktop a LOT easier. 

Out of the box, with a normal installation, you have Ports, you have Sound, and if you have a supported Video Card, 3D.


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## jjthomas (Sep 29, 2012)

I cut my Linux teeth on RedHat.  I moved to Slackware.  Favorite is Slackware, but CentOS comes in a close 2nd.  I was an admin for a SCO server and I've work with Solaris.

-JJ


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## vadimkolchev (Sep 30, 2012)

After deciding to migrate from M$ products, I tried a great bunch of linux distros - first was Ubuntu, then they shipped free livecds, and I ordered one for myself. After digging into it a bit, I read about Debian and installed it - that improved the stability of my desktop. Later I tried Fedora, but at that time it was somewhat broken (the release was just out and it was not stable and missed something, though I can't remember now what exactly). After Fedora came OpenSuse, Mandriva, and then Slackware. First time I was compiling software. After Slackware I moved to Gentoo and compiled my first kernel and system successfully. Then I was advised to try Archlinux and I liked it very much. I stayed with it until moving to FreeBSD recently. The main reason to do this was that I like to learn everything new. 

So, to sum everything up, I'd like to point out several things, couple of words on each distro I used:
1. Ubuntu - too simple, a lot of not needed stuff
2. Debian - great distro, if not freebsd, maybe I could have it installed, secure and reliable
3. Fedora - didn't like rpm and yum, constant breakage of everything (at the time I used it, maybe it changed now)
4. OpenSuse - can't say everything real bad, moved from it because didn't want to do everything from GUI, and in OpenSUSE it is the most obvious way.
5. Mandriva - not bad distro, but again, too concentrated on GUI
6. Slackware - great one, stable and easy to configure once you begin to understand it
7. CentOS -good, though uses rpm and yum
8. Gentoo - best for learning
9. Archlinux - best for anything.

So, my three favorites are Archlinux, Debian, Slackware.


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## gore (Oct 6, 2012)

I personally LOVE SUSE Linux;  I've met most of the people who work on it, and they were really cool guys, and even did favors for me, who is, at the time, a total no one, like me saying to Marcus Meissner "Hey man, that Kernel update, I know I need to reinstall my Nvidia Driver, but it literally isn't working, and blah blah blah here is what I did, here was what happened, here is my hardware, any ideas?" And he actually went into work early to fix the Kernel update, and re-released it, and sent it to me and announced it a little afterwards and it worked. 

I was pretty amazed to say the least; Marcus Meissner is the head of SUSE security, or at least at the time, I haven't kept up to date on everything since I've been reading MAD Magazine, and BSD Magazine lately instead of web sites right now) But yea it was pretty nice to say the least.

I've also gotten Patrick Volkerding of Slackware to do a small favor for me because I'm lazy sometimes; I didn't want to have to actually compile Irssi for IRC, and it's my favorite IRC client, like ever. So I sent him an Email, or called his Cell, I don't remember all the details, but I basically told him "Hey man, I really love Irssi, and I don't want to have to compile it all the time, can you add it to Slackware? Come on man, you have *beep**beep**beep**beep**beep*X can you add it plleeeeeeease?  ) And what was in the Release notes for the very next release of Slackware? "Irssi IRC client added to Slackware".... SWEET!

I like how he and the SUSE guys were totally cool, and actually went out of their ways for me, who did not ever work for these people. I can also say the exact same thing about Marshal Kirk McKusick, who is totally amazingly funny, and REALLY nice.

I got to talk to him a few times, and I was worried about annoying him thinking "God how many people have Emailed this guy and bugged him with being a fan boi?? How many Emails must he get from nerds like me saying they think he's Brilliant and they LOVE the DVD?" And instead of being annoyed, he was Happy to talk to me, and thanked me a lot for the compliments, and it was great.


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## ericbsd (Oct 6, 2012)

None for the moment. I am satisfy with FreeBSD. My main box don't like Linux anyway.


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## Lorem-Ipsum (Oct 6, 2012)

I started using Linux in 2003 after using nothing but windows. I think it was Fedora Core 3 I started with, did a little work with Red Hat but quickly moved to Debian. When Ubuntu released 8.10 I installed it on my main box and ran Ubuntu for some time (until 10.04 I think) but I was never totally happy with it.

I currently run ArchLinux on my main desktop and have really liked it until recently. Now rc.conf is starting to be broken up I'm less interested. The only reason I'm sticking with it is for the rolling release, oh and maybe partially for pacman.

My laptop has transitioned over to FreeBSD, as has my server. When I next rebuild my desktop machine, which should be in the next year, I may well move to FreeBSD.


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## tiny (Oct 17, 2012)

I've been drueling over BSD for years and am excited to be joining the community. As for linux, I've tried many distro's over the years and I'd have to say my favorite has been Debian. I haven't tried #! but I would give it consideration if I hadn't stopped with Debian.


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