Ubuntu vs. Other Distros

[Paul Bramscher]

I've used linux since about '99 (mainly RH 5.2-9, AS 3, FC 1-3, SuSE 6.x - 8.x, Debian, and messing around with m68k).

I'm at a crossroads with my "favorite" distro. I'm getting somewhat disappointed in the extra-charging that goes on with RH's and SuSE's offerings for the "enterprise" or "professional" versions. I found straight Debian (and Gentoo) to be too time-consuming to setup.

Ubuntu seems to have people with a good attitude behind it, technology and otherwise. I'll be installing it in the next couple of weeks and giving it a test run.

I see that it lacks a usenet newsgroup (at least my news server does not get it). So this looks like the best place to pose this question: how does Ubuntu compare with other distros? Strengths? Weaknesses?

[FLeiXiuS]

We are devoted to what we do, all of our community. Everyone plays a part in our community regardless of who you are, even the Windows users.


Ubuntu is still so very young; were still in developement.

Breezy should be a huge show off. I'm guarenteeing #1 distrobution of the year.

[somuchfortheafter]

strengths... ubuntu= awesome

other distros= not awesome at all

weeknesses... ubuntu= causes the dreaded "distro envy"
other distros= recieves the distro envy

[/blind devotion to ubuntu]
all kidding aside ubutnu is one of the fastest distros for its ease of use and scalibility so try it and see what you think...

[desdinova]

This week I've just swapped from Suse to Ubuntu after around a year - before that I was using Mdk and before that RH (from around 97 onwards).

I've found Ubuntu the best distro so far, and Gnome 2.10 has finally got me to swap to Gnome after YEARS of KDE - I starting using KDE around the 1.x versions.....

But the beauty of Linux is choice - if Ubuntu isn't for you, some other distro is....

[poofyhairguy]

how does Ubuntu compare with other distros? Strengths? Weaknesses?

Not the best place to ask if you want an objective opinion. Its advantage is that is an easier Debian.

[nobodysbusiness]

Compared with Mandrake (the distro I switched from), Ubuntu has several strengths, and a few weaknesses:

Everything works so well, so seamlessly, and so predictably compared with Mandrake. In Mandrake, many of the config utils would have a confusing interface and not work the way I expected, or not work at all. It had a menu editor, but sometimes it would lose edits or do strange things. With Ubuntu, if it has a particular feature, you KNOW it will work as expected... period. Most of the things that Ubuntu is currently missing are likely to be in the next release (such as a graphical installer), so then Mandriva will have nothing on its side.

[Lovechild]

weaknesses: does not prioritize proactive security, young (long way to go to catch up technologically with other distros), it's brown, text installer, sudo (I find that highly confusing not to mention a dangerous design decision)

strenghts: generally works well, easy to add non-free elements, free cd shipping, strong community, based on Debian (which means lots of free development time).. oh and potential

[hypeiv]

In the past I have used slackware untill I got into redhat b/c of the ease of the .rpms. But when I first saw saw debian about 3-4 years ago I fell in love with apt. From then on I always had to run a debian based linux. One thing with debain was you really were on your own for setting a lot of things up. I tried xandros b/c it was debain based but it was just too dumbed down. For me ubuntu is the perfect balance since its not hard to set up and also its not dumbed down any. If you have installed redhat in the past you will be able to easily install ubuntu is less than an hour and try it out. You can also try the live cd but that doesn't really show you much. I used to be a KDE guy before I tried ubuntu and I wonder how I ever put up with it now that I use gnome. IMHO once you work with a distro that has apt its pretty hard to ever work on a distro that doesn't have it.

Another webpage you may want to check out is ubuntuguide.org. A lot of the information is pretty basic but it really got me going on setting up my computer the way I wanted it.

As far as the sudo thing I don't think its that big of a deal. Ubuntu by default won't let you log in as root which i think is more secure. You have to sudo (super user do) commands or load up a terminal with root permissions. I just changed the terminal background for the root terminal so I always know which one it is.

[az]

Debian runs faster than most of the other distributions. It is obscenely stable. Debian is easy to maintain. Debian has a committment to free software and it makes it easy to avoid using proprietairy software.

Ubuntu is all of that and pretty much configured the way I want it out of the box. I do not have to go hunting very far to get the peices I am missing, if that is the case.

The fact that it is streamlined is great in that you do not get swamped with a different bunch of software families; However they are easily installed if you want them.

Ubuntu also fosters the ocmmunity around it. In the way that other debian-based ventures cultivate packages, Ubuntu cultivates the people who develop the packages. I think this is ahead-thnking.

Ubuntu reaches out to be accessible across cultures. By targeting the needs of users not neccesarily targeted by other distributions, it can spread free software where it has not gone before. Imagine the outpouring of new software that can be created by the millions of potential users in third-world countries.
If a person uses Ubuntu as the first experience with a computer, it is much more likely that that person eventually contributes something back to the ubuntu community than if it were another distro, or a proprietary system.

That's all I have for now...

[trivialpackets]

I've used linux since about '99 (mainly RH 5.2-9, AS 3, FC 1-3, SuSE 6.x - 8.x, Debian, and messing around with m68k).

I'm at a crossroads with my "favorite" distro. I'm getting somewhat disappointed in the extra-charging that goes on with RH's and SuSE's offerings for the "enterprise" or "professional" versions. I found straight Debian (and Gentoo) to be too time-consuming to setup.

Ubuntu seems to have people with a good attitude behind it, technology and otherwise. I'll be installing it in the next couple of weeks and giving it a test run.

I see that it lacks a usenet newsgroup (at least my news server does not get it). So this looks like the best place to pose this question: how does Ubuntu compare with other distros? Strengths? Weaknesses?
Ubuntu is my current system, and overall, I'm very happy with this. I tried slackware, and quite honestly, I loved it. I loved the tools that came with it for making and compiling software by hand, and overall I had no issues whatsoever with the installation of the system. I've tried others with slightly less satisfaction than slackware and ubuntu gave me. Why ubuntu? Because I work full time, have a family and go to school full time when not in the summer. The system upkeep using apt and synaptic are much simpler and straight forward, and my wife can use ubuntu and will do so happily for just about everything. Besides that the community has been second to none, and I'm glad to have been a part of it and hope to continue. The software is done well, and has already made tremendous improvements.

[pdk001]

im a big fan of ubuntu since hoary released

[Martin Witte]

I think one of the best things of Ubuntu not mentioned in previous posts is that with a basic install you have a functioning desktop system with no duplicates in software - just one window manager, one office set, one webrowser, etc. If you do not like the defaults it is very easy to change those with your favourite browser, wordprocessor, text editor, etc thanks to the rich repositiries.

If you add on top of the basic install a few things from http://ubuntuguide.org you have within say three hours of installation (that is with a DSL connection...) a Linux desktop which is way more functional and less bloated than the other distros I tried (Debian, Suse)