Our changing fortunes on DistroWatch

[canadianwriterman]

Anyone notice how openSUSE has recently crept up on Ubuntu in the Distrowatch rankings? In fact, if you change the criteria to look at the last 30 days, there is getting to be a three-way tie with Fedora now:

1 Ubuntu 2930+
2 openSUSE 2524+
3 Fedora 2083+

Check it out: http://distrowatch.com (http://distrowatch.com/index.php?dataspan=4)

[woedend]

eh..its a benchmark of...well, nothingness. Ive used arch for some time, and have never clicked through it on distrowatch.
in fact, a lot of people even claimed that ubuntu(not necessarily ubuntu in itself, but perhaps users) "cheated" to get it to the top. I doubt this, as it is a great distro.
that said, based on graphics websites for things such as gdm and wallpapers, ubuntu seems to be the most popular by far as far as at least user participation and if not actual desktop users.

[MedivhX]

DistroWatch is the stupidest thing on Earth. Popularity is measured by clicks...

[Lord Illidan]

Well, I don't see any reason to be concerned because of this. Both are good distros...and Ubuntu has been top dog far too long.

[canadianwriterman]

DistroWatch is the stupidest thing on Earth. Popularity is measured by clicks...

While that may be, DistroWatch is still extremely widely quoted in the media and in reviews that our users and potential users read. Whether DistroWatch is a valid measure or not, it is still a powerful influence on the people we are trying to reach.

[chaosgeisterchen]

SuSE and Ubuntu will be top 2 for a long time..

Once SuSE may be number one again. But this is very unlikely to happen.

[ComplexNumber]

Once SuSE may be number one again. But this is very unlikely to happen.it will be anything up to 1 year before fedora and suse are up there at number 1 & 2 (in either order)

[puppy]

I actually don't care - let's be honest there's not that much to choose between the distros - it's the community that matters. And the reason I'm recommending Ubuntu to all my linux-curious friends is because of the response they're likely to get when researching problems in these forums

Ubuntu users *are* the human beings - I'm not sure what Suse users are - venusians maybe :confused:

[darkhatter]

doesn't distrowatch even say that their rating system is a bad, why do we keep using it.

[maniacmusician]

well as canadianwriterman aptly put it, it's widely cited and does have influence on potential users. So I guess that's why it matters.

[bruenig]

Distrowatch's rating system is inherently flawed. If you use a distro, it is unlikely that you would be searching around on distrowatch to figure out its pros and cons and whatever else it provides. By using it, you already know those things.

[darkhatter]

shouldn't Red Hat of all distro be a lot higher then 28

[Ireclan]

I myself have used SuSe- 10.00 I believe...As it uses KDE, I found it to have great eyecandy, but it also had other great features such as YAST (which, for the short amount of time I spent fiddling with the distrobution, I gathered to be an equivilant of a high-powered Windows Control Panel) and a graphical GRUB loader (which I dearly wish Ubuntu would adopt). Yet another thing I have noticed is that SuSe seems to come with more packages by default than Ubuntu (including games- which, for reasons I have yet to understand, are strangely absent from Ubuntu). All in all, I found SuSe to be quite pleasing for the short amount of time I utilized it.

[darkhatter]

I myself have used SuSe- 10.00 I believe...As it uses KDE, I found it to have great eyecandy, but it also had other great features such as YAST (which, for the short amount of time I spent fiddling with the distrobution, I gathered to be an equivilant of a high-powered Windows Control Panel) and a graphical GRUB loader (which I dearly wish Ubuntu would adopt). Yet another thing I have noticed is that SuSe seems to come with more packages by default than Ubuntu (including games- which, for reasons I have yet to understand, are strangely absent from Ubuntu). All in all, I found SuSe to be quite pleasing for the short amount of time I utilized it.

shouldn't post this kind of stuff here, most ubuntu users claim that yast is buggy, slow and doesn't work

[maniacmusician]

lol, he can post whatever he likes. I only used SuSe once on my really slow laptop, and yast didn't seem that bad. It at least had a lot of options and was a place that a newbie could go for configuring things. It makes sense to have something like this for ubuntu, and it's already being worked on....for GNOME anyways. As I understand it, KDE is supposed to live with KControl (And no, I don't really think the "System Settings" program counts)

[meng]

Which has the greater impact on users? A Distrowatch ranking or a good user experience? Of course I oversimplify the issue, and both are important to some degree. But I think the DW ranking pales into insignificance when compared to the stability/usability of the distro itself.

[Aranel]

shouldn't post this kind of stuff here, most ubuntu users claim that yast is buggy, slow and doesn't work

Infinitely slow, yes. But given time, it works without trouble for me on another machine. I definitely prefer Ubuntu, but if there's any distro that's going to overtake it, SuSE is definitely the one to do it. I haven't even tried Fedora, but I hear it's pretty cool too.

[Lord Illidan]

Infinitely slow, yes. But given time, it works without trouble for me on another machine. I definitely prefer Ubuntu, but if there's any distro that's going to overtake it, SuSE is definitely the one to do it. I haven't even tried Fedora, but I hear it's pretty cool too.

Or another distro might come up and sweep the opposition away, as Ubuntu did before.

[MedivhX]

...Yet another thing I have noticed is that SuSe seems to come with more packages by default than Ubuntu (including games- which, for reasons I have yet to understand, are strangely absent from Ubuntu)...

Ubuntu is on CD (Dapper has DVD version too), and SuSe is DVD-only...

[darkhatter]

Ubuntu is on CD (Dapper has DVD version too), and SuSe is DVD-only...

Suse is 3 cd's for the default kde or gnome desktop. The other disks are extra, and the dvd contains all the cd's.

[AndyCooll]

Ladislav Bodnar himself has said that this ranking should be treated with a pinch of salt, and that it is no way necessarily an accurate guide to a distros popularity or otherwise.

It is merely a "popularity" ranking of the distros people visit when using the distrowatch website.

:cool:

[Mathiasdm]

DistroWatch is the stupidest thing on Earth. Popularity is measured by clicks...
Ridiculous :roll:

Distrowatch is not meant as a popularity contest. It shows a list of distributions, and how up-to-date they are. The 'popularity list' is a minor detail.

Having said that, it does show 'trends'.

[canadianwriterman]

Two points to add. First, I think some newcomers to Linux who discover DistroWatch, do use it as a guide for exploring their Linux options. Imagine a new user seeing the distros at the top and then deciding which to try because they must be good if they are so popular. But, more importantly, I have read many articles on Linux which use the DistroWatch statistics on which to base comments like "..the wildly popular Linux distribution..." or "...the most popular by a wide margin...".

Having said that, I understand that DistroWatch is not an accurate measure of Linux users of any given distro. However, it's interesting to watch how things are changing.

One more thing. Based on today's Novell-Microsoft news, I think SUSE should be dropped from the listings in protest. Any one agree?

[Dual Cortex]

well as canadianwriterman aptly put it, it's widely cited and does have influence on potential users. So I guess that's why it matters.

I actually joined the Ubuntu community because of that website, makes me kind of feel embarrassed now :).

[ComplexNumber]

and there we have it......ubuntu is now been overtaken by openSuse.

[earobinson]

Meh, its a good thing in my opinion, If we stayed "on top" for to long then the os could grind to a halt. Also its important to note that distrowatch measures interest not people using the os

[lyceum]

For those that care... just wait until Feisty comes out. Novell is in the news, and Open SuSE just came out with 10.2 and they have good eye candy.

Once the hipe dies down, Ubuntu gets eye candy, which will come in the next releace, the tides may change. If you really care, got to the Ubuntu home page every day on as many different PCs as you can. Wait, that may be cheating. :)

[earobinson]

also we are still on top for the last 6 months and that to me seems more important since ubuntu comes out every 6 months, however we do have a red down arrow beside ubuntu

[Brunellus]

also we are still on top for the last 6 months and that to me seems more important since ubuntu comes out every 6 months, however we do have a red down arrow beside ubuntu
we come to this point semiannually. Next release, we'll be swimming in DW clicks and back at No. 1.

[mips]

Well if csnonical dropped the Ubuntu, Kubuntu, Xubuntu, Edubuntu names and the other public efforts followed suite we could just have Ubuntu which would have a rating of over 3000.

We should just have the name Ubuntu - followed by the desktop/window manager name gnome, kde, xfce, fluxbox etc

[ibanez]

I've tried the new open SuSE & I must admit I love it, ( but SuSE was one of the first I cut my teeth on.)
I'm not about to desert Ubuntu because of a Distrwatch chart, But have to say be carefull, it seems since edgy Ubuntus popularity is waning.
Maybe something to do with the hundreds of posts of install problems.
Maybe Feisty will put us back up top.
The community is most certainly the friendliest, most helpfull I've ever come across, Time will tell.

[justin whitaker]

I think that the widespread reports of Edgy being, well, Edgy that sunk the ranking more than anything else. Too many hardware and software issues.

Then again, the distrowatch ranking is little more than a popularity contest. Everyone of us can name what the top distros are, without even looking at it: SUSE, Fedora, Mandriva, DSL, Gentoo, Slackware, Ubuntu, and Debian. Did we need to ask Ladislav that? No.

Pick the one that works for you, and roll on. \\:D/

[darkhatter]

\\:D/

am I the only one that finds that dancing guy annoying. I don't think the ubuntu rank got smaller I think the OpenSuse rank got bigger, but I don't watch the ranks to much so I'm not sure

[lyceum]

Well if csnonical dropped the Ubuntu, Kubuntu, Xubuntu, Edubuntu names and the other public efforts followed suite we could just have Ubuntu which would have a rating of over 3000.

We should just have the name Ubuntu - followed by the desktop/window manager name gnome, kde, xfce, fluxbox etc

You know, that is a really good point! If they are all officially Ubuntu, they should be counted as one! So really, Ubuntu is still the distrowatch champ. Too bad that counts as much as our forum beams :) But, it does feel good to be #1.

[earobinson]

we come to this point semiannually. Next release, we'll be swimming in DW clicks and back at No. 1.
ya but its still good, I think mandrake really stagnated when there rain was 2 long

[darkhatter]

If I get this correct, distrowatch only counts when Ubuntu is on top, I have nothing to say to that.

I think Mandriva 2007 was a very good release, I never used Mandriva 2006 so maybe thats why I don't hate Mandriva. I used 2005 and other then the theme, I thought it was pretty good.

[lyceum]

If I get this correct, distrowatch only counts when Ubuntu is on top, I have nothing to say to that.


lol! Yeah, its great bragging rights that doesn't matter when the rights are gone. :)

It is always nice to be #1. Getting knocked down reminds us how little it means. Ubuntu is still #1 in my book.

[frodon]

Does someone noticed that they make a difference between ubuntu, kubuntu, xubuntu, fluxbuntu and even ubuntu CE so if you add all, ubuntu is still first.

[mips]

Does someone noticed that they make a difference between ubuntu, kubuntu, xubuntu, fluxbuntu and even ubuntu CE so if you add all, ubuntu is still first.

That was kinda my point in post #30