If you don't want/need any GUI, what Linux distro would you use and why?

[Ioky]

if you get a very old machine, and you are skill enough to just do many thing with just command line. And would like to program your own software with only text or very basic graphic that come with C++ which doesn't really need a GUI to run. What Distro would you use?

BTW is there a list of all the command base software? Also List out some reasons too Please

[cardinals_fan]

I wouldn't use a Linux distro. NetBSD all the way!

[LaRoza]

if you get a very old machine, and you are skill enough to just do many thing with just command line. And would like to program your own software with only text or very basic graphic that come with C++ which doesn't really need a GUI to run. What Distro would you use?

Debian, Slackware, Arch.

It would depends on what I really wanted, but it it would be a tossup between those.

[Le-Froid]

I'd use Arch Linux because it is very popular and when you install it, it only includes a command prompt ( with lots of kewl features :) )

[bobbocanfly]

I would use Arch or minimal Debian. As long as i had ncurses i would be fine. The only thing i would really miss is graphical Internet, apart from that, irssi, finch and nano would do me fine.

[ghindo]

Probably Debian. I might suggest Arch, but there are a couple of issues I ran into when I used it that stops me from recommending it.

[zmjjmz]

http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=680000
This has a bunch of fun little ncurses/commandline apps.
I'd actually use twin and the framebuffer if I really needed it.

[Ioky]

I get a question, can you even watch movie or view image if there isn't a GUI?

[zmjjmz]

Yes.
zgv can use the framebuffer to view images, and mplayer can use the framebuffer too (though it's a bit iffy).

[moephan]

I'd probably just start with the server version of Ubuntu because I already have the disks, the repos are great, and I know it's easy to install a desktop later if I wanted. I assume other distros have these qualities, but I don't know much about them, I do know about Ubuntu.

Cheers, Rick

[y-lee]

BTW is there a list of all the command base software?


A day without X (http://www.terminally-incoherent.com/blog/2007/05/21/a-day-without-x/) is a great article showing you how one can use command line utilities to do nearly everything one ordinarily does on a PC :)

[InfinityCircuit]

CRUX or Gentoo all the way...if I'm a power user with command-line interest then I'm probably doing heavy data processing or running a server. In either case, optimized binaries will prove their worth.

[init1]

I'd use Debian or ttylinux.
http://www.debian.org
http://www.minimalinux.org/ttylinux/

[zmjjmz]

ttylinux scares me...
BasicLinux has X, but it isn't turned on by default.
Same with DeLi AFAIK.

[init1]

ttylinux scares me...
BasicLinux has X, but it isn't turned on by default.
Same with DeLi AFAIK.
LOL what's so scary about it? The lack of X?

[zmjjmz]

The fact that it has 11 packages.