Best linux distro and why?

i'd say arch linux, but dont install it if u have PPPoE through username and password. i wasnt able to configure it

i'd say arch linux, but dont install it if u have PPPoE through username and password. i wasnt able to configure it

That's not a reasonable reason to avoid a specific OS, sorry.

You should have said "If you have PPPoE, still give it a try, and see how it goes. If it fails, seek support."

Also: IRC channels. Install an IRC client and head over to irc.freenode.org to your distro's channel. Often times much better help then websearches (though always try a web search first, unless you want to get flamed in the channels ;D)

Nothing against the others, I actually think all package managers are just about as good.

Very strange opinion, but okey...

Err, why is that? On a basic level they all do the job just as well, and let's face it, RPM is just as good as DPKG and Pacman these days. Please explain (off-topic alert!).

As I said: availability of packages and DE--or should I say, polish on the DE. Debian Stable still has GNOME 2 - which can look gorgeous, but out of the box it's vanilla, ugly and horrible GNOME 2. A user's first experience with Linux should be the best possible. And trust me, dazzling effects do make people come back.

I don't think the casual users think that the look of a distro is everything, note that still a lot of people is using XP and such which isen't really beautiful, and they are totally okey with it.

It's not just the look, it's the overall UX. For instance, to create a launcher in Xfce you have to actually type in the name but it still shows you a bunch of other fields for the path and so on. That is extremely user-unfriendly and I'm glad they're looking to change it with the next version.

As for Fedora, I don't think it's a beginner distro. It's desktop, sure, but a lot of their releases feel like they're of beta quality. The main killer though is the fact it doesn't help you get proprietary drivers and codecs easily, which. unfortunately, pragmatic people need.

Well, neither Ubuntu or Fedora is targeted at beginners, they are general-purpose distribution aimed at a wide audience not just what you call beginners. I think distros like Linux Mint and such is more targeted at those.

LOL, I beg to differ. Ubuntu is very much a beginner distribution. By beginner, I mean that it's a good distribution to get 'hooked' on Linux with. Linux Mint and Ubuntu offer the same solutions to given problems. They are general purpose too. They are just a bit easier.

I also look at other things, like if the terminal comes up during the boot process (NOT cool) or especially if you boot without a graphical server (epitome of un-coolness) and if package management is graphical (Synaptic is not very user friendly).

It's a thing that will be fixed in next Ubuntu release iirc...

Ubuntu now ships with the "Ubuntu Software Centre" actually, which was inspired from Linux Mint's user-friendly Software Manager (I think it's called that).
Some key differences from Synaptic and PackageKit-style interfaces: in-built rating system, packages have custom names (they can have capital letters and spaces in their names! e.g. Mozilla Firefox (web browser category in the interface) instead of something like firefox-browser).

(...)
A user's first experience with Linux should be the best possible. And trust me, dazzling effects do make people come back.
(...)
I also look at other things, like if the terminal comes up during the boot process (NOT cool) or especially if you boot without a graphical server (epitome of un-coolness) (...)

The picture you're painting there is frightening. Why do you want to dumb things down to make the computer a black box? People need to see what their computers do; hiding this only promotes a culture of tech-illiteracy. If such unsignificant details upset people, you should ask to work on them, not on the interface.

Well no offence but the Arch Way simply does not apply to most people. Most people don't care and don't need to care about the internal workings of their OS. And it doesn't make the computer a black box; you can look at the .log files anytime you want. It's just not in your face so Linux doesn't seem super-duper archaic.

Most developers today are designers. The book 'The Art of UNIX Programming' by Eric S Raymond shows the differences in culture between Windows developers (who primarily program for the desktop user in mind) and UNIX/Linux developers (who primarily program for other programmers or sysadmins in mind). And you know what? That is the approach that makes software more approachable for someone who knows little about computers and doesn't care. We use computers as a means to an end; efficiency is very important and if you go on the PC for 20 minutes a day to check your Facebook and email, you don't need to spend hours tweaking your system or looking for programs and all that.

snip

Fair enough, but isn't Ubuntu very slow on updates too?

True, though it's certainly much faster. It uses the debian-testing repository as an upstream (of sorts, they look up info there at least, though cooperation has decreased as they have diverged more and more) and then they do their own QA on the submitted packages.

And actually, I wanted to ask you a question about this Monsieur Bougo; what do you think, as a developer, of the Linux distribution release cycle's impact on third-party software's release schedules? As an end-user (for the most part) I strongly disagree with having to wait 6 months to get an automatic update for a goddamn game. I understand completely if we're talking about software that ensures your server stays up... but games and stuff? There is no point in applying that release schedule to that.

As a developer, what do you think? I've also read what the developer of Ardour and the JACK Audio Connection Kit said on the matter. He is very annoyed about the way most distributions handle package management and likes Ubuntu's approach. He actually makes money from Ardour and he lives off of it (though with far poorer pay than he'd get if employed ($120k+ with his EXP)) and is really vexed with package management as many of his users do not see the website which offers not only various support channels for new users, but also a donate page and "bribe me for the feature YOU want" page (it works!).

What do you think about release schedules? Some say they kill the Linux desktop. Others say QA is very important with the open source model or releasing early and releasing fast. I'd be very interested to know what you think as a star OSS game developer!

Well no offence but the Arch Way simply does not apply to most people. Most people don't care and don't need to care about the internal workings of their OS. And it doesn't make the computer a black box; you can look at the .log files anytime you want. It's just not in your face so Linux doesn't seem super-duper archaic.

Most developers today are designers. The book 'The Art of UNIX Programming' by Eric S Raymond shows the differences in culture between Windows developers (who primarily program for the desktop user in mind) and UNIX/Linux developers (who primarily program for other programmers or sysadmins in mind). And you know what? That is the approach that makes software more approachable for someone who knows little about computers and doesn't care. We use computers as a means to an end; efficiency is very important and if you go on the PC for 20 minutes a day to check your Facebook and email, you don't need to spend hours tweaking your system or looking for programs and all that.

Alright, but I still don't like the idea that people would get unconsciously offended by upfront verbosity. I guess I'm projecting too much, but I really wish people would know and care more about their computers. That's essential if we want to keep (and gain) control over our hardware and software.

And actually, I wanted to ask you a question about this Monsieur Bougo; what do you think, as a developer, of the Linux distribution release cycle's impact on third-party software's release schedules? As an end-user (for the most part) I strongly disagree with having to wait 6 months to get an automatic update for a goddamn game. I understand completely if we're talking about software that ensures your server stays up... but games and stuff? There is no point in applying that release schedule to that.

As a developer, what do you think? I've also read what the developer of Ardour and the JACK Audio Connection Kit said on the matter. He is very annoyed about the way most distributions handle package management and likes Ubuntu's approach. He actually makes money from Ardour and he lives off of it (though with far poorer pay than he'd get if employed ($120k+ with his EXP)) and is really vexed with package management as many of his users do not see the website which offers not only various support channels for new users, but also a donate page and "bribe me for the feature YOU want" page (it works!).

What do you think about release schedules? Some say they kill the Linux desktop. Others say QA is very important with the open source model or releasing early and releasing fast. I'd be very interested to know what you think as a star OSS game developer!

You're mistaken, I'm not a developer. I've only written a few pieces of code for Xonotic and fixed some bugs, but I'm not involved in anything related to releases and such, be it in Xonotic or anything else.

As an end-user, I prefer the bleeding-edge aspect of rolling release models. I'm not too fond of big chunks of updates that change a lot of things at once, progressive upgrading suits me better. As for the practical aspects of this from a developer's perspective, I really have no idea what those would be.

Err, why is that? On a basic level they all do the job just as well, and let's face it, RPM is just as good as DPKG and Pacman these days. Please explain (off-topic alert!).

Saying "all package managers are as good" is like saying "all fishing rod's are as good", they're simply not, some are simpler and faster, some has more feature, and note that pacman, yum and apt(or whatever they're called) are not the same, for example pacman have held out many feature to remain a good clean code-base and is enough to fed the average Arch Linux user.

It's not just the look, it's the overall UX. For instance, to create a launcher in Xfce you have to actually type in the name but it still shows you a bunch of other fields for the path and so on. That is extremely user-unfriendly and I'm glad they're looking to change it with the next version.

I'm talking about UX too, I didnt sated that too clear though. I thought you basically said "the-look" was the true importance, sorry for that. But what I think both me and Mr.Bougo is trying to say is that hiding stuff from the users ain't the way to solve the problem. Computers aren't overall that complex, well, not UNIX at least. So why not base the interface more around the filesystem like rox have done, note that rox is outdated I don't state we gonna use that, it's their core-idea i want to get out.

LOL, I beg to differ. Ubuntu is very much a beginner distribution. By beginner, I mean that it's a good distribution to get 'hooked' on Linux with. Linux Mint and Ubuntu offer the same solutions to given problems. They are general purpose too. They are just a bit easier.

LOL ROFL LOL LMAO, please, those words doesn't fit in here. Anyway, no Ubuntu is NOT a "beginners distribution", it was, but today it tries to be as complete as Mac and Window, which are not "beginners operating systems" they're general-purpose dekstop-usage operating systems. Also, why do we need to go around the internet and say "look here windows users, we have a more stable alternative to windows which is super awesome, easy and fast.", we dont have to, most people know about GNU/Linux now days and if they wanted to switch they would, and they would probably choose Ubuntu, Fedora or OpenSuse since they've probably heard about one of those.

Ubuntu now ships with the "Ubuntu Software Centre" actually, which was inspired from Linux Mint's user-friendly Software Manager (I think it's called that).
Some key differences from Synaptic and PackageKit-style interfaces: in-built rating system, packages have custom names (they can have capital letters and spaces in their names! e.g. Mozilla Firefox (web browser category in the interface) instead of something like firefox-browser).

I'm familiar with Ubuntu Software Centre, I've never heard of Synpatic and PackageKit though. I'm not sure why this fits into the discussion. With "It's a thing that will be fixed in next Ubuntu release iirc..." I meant the boot screen.

Well no offence but the Arch Way simply does not apply to most people. Most people don't care and don't need to care about the internal workings of their OS. And it doesn't make the computer a black box; you can look at the .log files anytime you want. It's just not in your face so Linux doesn't seem super-duper archaic.

MrBougo never said Arch Linux was the savior of the problem, Arch Linux are not for the casual users, and therefore I don't understand why we even talk about it here.


NOTE: I've tried to write from a casual users point-of-view, not "Linux for Dummies" point-of-view. The fact remains that most people don't even have to ask for guidance in choosing which distro to download and if they ask it's mostly by the curiosity of what distros is out there. Also, this whole debate is both off-topic and will probably lead no where. I want to solve the problem, unfortunate I can't write a new friendly user-interface, a better sound architecture and a more LTS-oriented distribution or whatever. You seem to only want us to say "Debian-based distros are the best, new users, use them, there's no reason why except that they have cool DE's which mostly hides what happening under-the-hood and just adds enormous complexity for those who want to understand" which is simply not the case. And also sorry for being cocky, but you've already said a lot worse things, first you mock on nerds, then on me etc. etc. (talking about your PMs)

Anyway Ill from now leave this discussion and I hope any "new-users" reading this whole conversation is to not listen to any of us and try to find facts instead.

Thanks for reading.

FYI machine, Synaptic is Ubuntu's GUI package manager (front-end for the apt system). No idea about PackageKit.

Oh, okey thanks!

Since we're talking about package managers, I'd like to chip in a thought of mine...

I ABSOLUTELY hate package managers like ubuntu software center, which show apps as a whole, not separated into packages like they are on the repo, where you can pick which packages you want. That is a major step back in package management if this sticks with more distros. I came across this a few years agon on Kubuntu in packagekit - I type 'psi' (that's the exact name of the package of an xmpp client)... Normally I'd get the package I looked for, some plugins for it, some libs, etc, the needed ones tied together through dependencies. What did I get instead? A single entry of some other app that included the word 'psi' in the package description (not name) - aaaaarrrrghhhh!!! (this was at a time before Muon came into existence & I had to use Synaptic which looked horrible on KDE)

Thankfully I have that nasty experience behind me now :-).

Ubuntu Software Centre is a apt front-end and a store, it's not a package manager.

:-P
Duh, obviously, nearly all gui package apps are frontends to the real package manager on the command line, but that's not the point.

I don't think you can use apt from the command line either, you'll need a commandline ftont-end like apt-get or aptitude for that.

I don't think you can use apt from the command line either, you'll need a commandline ftont-end like apt-get or aptitude for that.

The same could be said about pacman for example. It also makes use of a package managing lib (libalpm)

I don't think you can use apt from the command line either, you'll need a commandline ftont-end like apt-get or aptitude for that.

The same could be said about pacman for example. It also makes use of a package managing lib (libalpm)

Yup, exactly!