What is Linus Torvalds opinion about the Debian, Arch, Gentoo, Funtoo and Slackware?

[monsieurjoop]

What is Linus Torvalds opinion about the Debian, Arch, Gentoo, Funtoo and Slackware?

[wildmanne39]

Seems like a question only he can answer.

[1clue]

Also seems to be a question he gets regularly, and evades every bit as regularly.

My speculation on his answer would be all of them, and none of them.

All: I suspect he has either some spare hardware sitting around or a KVM box maybe, and periodically installs one of anything interesting to see what's going on with it.

None: I suspect his personal hardware is either his own distro, or LFS, or something like that. Slackware is an example of a distro which has been maintained by one person more or less, for a long time. So it's not an absurd notion.

A variation on this "none" theme would be that he and a few others collaborate on an unpublished distro or package manager or maybe just use an existing package manager which is good for their uses and they maintain their own repository.

[monsieurjoop]

Seems like a question only he can answer.

Linus Torvalds never talked about the Debian, Arch, Gentoo, Funtoo and Slackware?

[wildmanne39]

I personally have not spent time googling that topic, I am far to busy to worry about what people think about different operating systems, feel free to google and see what you turn up, the only thing that should really matter is how you like those distros when you try them. I never let someone else's opinion determine what I like or do not like, I think that is the best policy. I am going to watch with interest and see what people know on this subject.

[QIII]

Give me 20 minutes and I'll drive over and ask him.

[deadflowr]

Give me 20 minutes and I'll drive over and ask him.

are you there yet?

[QIII]

Eating dinner instead.

[thenailedone]

Eating dinner instead.

Disappointing :(

[QIII]

Not a good idea to drive down his street. The local cops say he only knows two throttle positions: on the floor and on the floor.

[#&thj^%]

I personally have not spent time googling that topic, I am far to busy to worry about what people think about different operating systems, feel free to google and see what you turn up, the only thing that should really matter is how you like those distros when you try them. I never let someone else's opinion determine what I like or do not like, I think that is the best policy. I am going to watch with interest and see what people know on this subject.
+1,000,000 ;)

Not a good idea to drive down his street. The local cops say he only knows two throttle positions: on the floor and on the floor.

Ha! :D I've also heard that>>>Diver Beware LT on the loose. :lolflag:

[QIII]

He lives about 20 - 30 minutes from me. He works about 10 minutes from me. It takes him 3.5 minutes to go from his house to work.

Or so I hear. :)

[1clue]

I personally have not spent time googling that topic, I am far to busy to worry about what people think about different operating systems, feel free to google and see what you turn up, the only thing that should really matter is how you like those distros when you try them. I never let someone else's opinion determine what I like or do not like, I think that is the best policy. I am going to watch with interest and see what people know on this subject.

Only it's not different operating systems, they're all Linux. Just variations of a common theme.

As I mentioned earlier, Torvalds seems to go out of his way to show no favoritism toward any particular distro. Why would he? They're all using his kernel. It's quite possible that he uses multiple distros for different purposes. I do.

[thenailedone]

Only it's not different operating systems, they're all Linux. Just variations of a common theme.

As I mentioned earlier, Torvalds seems to go out of his way to show no favoritism toward any particular distro. Why would he? They're all using his kernel. It's quite possible that he uses multiple distros for different purposes. I do.

The last official word on the subject I heard about was that he is now on Fedora after ditching openSUSE (was fed up that you need root privileges to change time/date, add printers etc.) - This was some time ago so I am not even going to try and find the links now.

Also it's pronounced GNU/Linux :cool:

[QIII]

Also it's pronounced GNU/Linux :cool:

Not according to Linus. He says calling it GNU/Linux is ridiculous. But he says the purveyors of Linux distros can call their product whatever they want.

[thenailedone]

Not according to Linus. He says calling it GNU/Linux is ridiculous. But he says the purveyors of Linux distros can call their product whatever they want.

https://ubuntuforums.org/attachment.php?attachmentid=280217&d=1529973083
Blasphemy!

[QIII]

What can I say? I don't like the look of hair shirts.

[1clue]

What can I say? I don't like the look of hair shirts.

+1.

Or the look of people who eat something from their foot. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I25UeVXrEHQ

[bodhin2]

ya. caught that when the video came out.... brilliant guy but.... foot skin corn chips don't make it with me i am sorry to say ( or not so sorry...) :-) :-) :-)

[1clue]

ya. caught that when the video came out.... brilliant guy but.... foot skin corn chips don't make it with me i am sorry to say ( or not so sorry...) :-) :-) :-)

Yes. Intelligent, driven, and likely one of the biggest reasons why Linux exists as it is today. But there's a difference between an extremist and a saint. The religious references are unwarranted IMO.

[thenailedone]

Yes. Intelligent, driven, and likely one of the biggest reasons why Linux exists as it is today. But there's a difference between a fanatic and a saint. The religious references are unwarranted IMO.

So your preference is fanatic? Or you believe RMS is one? :confused:

[1clue]

So your preference is fanatic? Or you believe RMS is one? :confused:

I changed the wording while you were typing, but really either will work. My preference has nothing to do with it.

RMS and Torvalds are both humans with distinct moral structures and distinct values which are unique to them. Neither is a saint. Both could be viewed somewhat as fanatics, although as I understand it Torvalds does not seem to believe that FOSS is the only type of software that should exist; only that HE chooses FOSS. RMS has built his life around the premise that all software must be FOSS, in the same way that Bill Gates has built his professional life around the premise that all software must be owned. Both are extremists in that regard, because each holds a position which by definition anchors one end of the same scale.

I personally believe that there is plenty of room in this world for many world views. Free and non-free software can happily coexist on the same system.

Edit: To expand on this, I believe that the correct answer in real life usually is some moderate position between the extremes. I do not insist that my wife uses Linux, although I use it or some other free UNIX if possible, relying on Windows or Mac OS or some commercial UNIX only if I must "go there." I however do not insist that anyone else feel the way I feel, and I do not berate other viewpoints.

[pauljw]

The last official word on the subject I heard about was that he is now on Fedora after ditching openSUSE (was fed up that you need root privileges to change time/date, add printers etc.) - This was some time ago so I am not even going to try and find the links now.

Also it's pronounced GNU/Linux :cool:

Not in my house it isn't. If the "genius" spent as much time working on his project as he does spewing his point of view, he may have actually created a functioning Hurd kernel to go along with his tools, which after all these years, one has to wonder how much of that was actually his doing. 30yrs is a long time to be unable to accomplish what a college kid did in two...

[ardouronerous]

What is Linus Torvalds opinion about the Debian, Arch, Gentoo, Funtoo and Slackware?

Linus Torvalds on Linux Distributions

Linux creator Linus Torvalds gave an interview in which he talked about what he likes and doesn’t like in a Linux distribution:

I’ve used different distributions over the years. Right now I happen to use Fedora 9 on most of the computers I have, which really boils down to the fact that Fedora had fairly good support for PowerPC back when I used that, so I grew used to it. But I actually don’t care too much about the distribution, as long as it makes it easy to install and keep reasonably up-to-date. I care about the kernel and a few programs, and the set of programs I really care about is actually fairly small.

And when it comes to distributions, ease of installation has actually been one of my main issues – I’m a technical person, but I have a very specific area of interest, and I don’t want to fight the rest. So the only distributions I have actively avoided are the ones that are known to be “overly technical” – like the ones that encourage you to compile your own programs etc.

Yeah, I can do it, but it kind of defeats the whole point of a distribution for me. So I like the ones that have a name of being easy to use. I’ve never used plain Debian, for example, but I like Ubuntu. And before Debian people attack me – yeah, I know, I know, it’s supposedly much simpler and easier to install these days. But it certainly didn’t use to be, so I never had any reason to go for it.

When I reviewed Slackware last month three of my four main criticisms all boil down to ease of use. I drew the ire of some Slackware users for stating that, in my opinion, Slackware isn’t user friendly due to it’s lack of graphical administration tools, lack of a package manager with dependency checking, and lack of a decent repository of additional software packages. Some even took issue with my using a conventional definition of user friendly, specifically that a distribution be intuitive and relatively easy for even a non-technical user to install, configure, and maintain.

Ease of use isn’t just for newcomers. Nobody would question Linus Torvalds’ expertise when it comes to Linux or his technical skills yet he stresses ease of installation and ease of keeping a distro up to date. In that context his preference for Fedora and Ubuntu over what he calls “overly technical” distributions makes a lot of sense. While he only names Debian I think we can safely assume that Gentoo and Slackware would fit into this category.

The reason Ubuntu, Fedora, Mandriva, and SUSE are leading desktop distributions is that they all try, and to a great degree succeed, in allowing users to concentrate on something other than the OS, like the work they want to do with their computer in the first place. All of these distributions allow you to get under the hood to customize and tweak to whatever extent you might want or need. What they don’t do is force you to get under the hood just to get configuration done. A large repository means that you aren’t forced to compile from source on a regular basis. Linus Torvalds’ comments on distributions are in line with what the majority of Linux users I’ve worked with and talked with over the years prefer, even highly technically competent users.

Linus makes one other point which is worth noting:

Me personally, I’m a believer in choice. Yes, it can be confusing, and yes, it can cause the market to look more fragmented, but on the other hand, it also begets competition. And competition is good – and it’s good even within a project. It’s what makes people try different things, and it ends up being very motivational.

So I don’t personally think we’d have gotten anywhere without all those wild-and-wacky distributions. I’d rather have a bit of spirited discussion and even infighting than a staid landscape with a single vendor (or a couple of vendors who carve out the market)

The freedom of choice that the plethora of Linux distributions offer pretty much guarantees that Linux users will always be able to choose a distribution that suits them best. It’s clear that for a sizable number of Linux uses that choice will be a Linux distribution like Debian, Gentoo, or Slackware.



Source: https://linuxnewslatest.wordpress.com/2010/12/09/hello-world/

[bodhin2]

Nice!

[monkeybrain20122]

Linus apparently thinks that Debian is too difficult to install.https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qHGTs1NSB1s

[ardouronerous]

Linus apparently thinks that Debian is too difficult to install.https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qHGTs1NSB1s

Not just that, Linus finds that Linux distros like Debian, Gentoo and Slackware, distros that make things intentionally difficult, defeats the whole purpose of a distro, according to Linus, a distro should be easy to use, update, configure and lets him focus on what he does best, mostly the Linux kernel, because he doesn't want to work on the OS, he wants to work on the kernel.

I can appreciate Linus's philosophy, for example, I just want to use my computer to play Youtube videos, listen to my favorite mp3 music, read articles, and explore the world with Google Street View, etc, I don't want to waste my day tinkering on my OS.