[kwlug-disc] What's the best desktop distribution?

[Raul Suarez]

William,

You gave good points for an administrator.

My understanding of the question was for Office use.

Office users are not meant to be computer savvy. Even if we are, we just want to get our work done. No tinkering with upgrades and kernel replacements, that's why we pay the tech support. We just need a usable and stable system where we do our job. Whether it is programming or selling insurance or assembling a virtual appliance.

We don't care if the distro depends or not on GUI, We depend on GUI to do most of our work.

Yes, I am a tinkerer, I like breaking things and putting them together, but when I am working I just want things to work, and if they don't I care that I get good support.

Raul Suarez

Technology consultant
Software, Hardware and Practices
_________________
http://rarsa.blogspot.com/ 
An eclectic collection of random thoughts


--- On Tue, 2/2/10, William Park <opengeometry at yahoo.ca> wrote:

> From: William Park <opengeometry at yahoo.ca>
> Subject: Re: [kwlug-disc] What's the best desktop distribution?
> To: "KWLUG-Kitchener Waterloo Linux User Group" <KWLUG-disc at kwlug.org>
> Received: Tuesday, February 2, 2010, 1:07 AM
> I don't understand this "learning
> curve" thing.  Yes, you have to know
> how Unix does things.  But, this is Linux, and Linux
> is Unix.  Of
> course, Slackware starts you off at console (runlevel 3),
> whereas other
> distros go directly to X (runlevel 4/5).  But, once
> you bring up X and
> KDE Desktop, it's difficult to tell which distro you're
> running.
> 
> Essentially, main difference that I see are (a)
> installation process,
> and (b) package formats.  And, I like Slackware's way
> of doing things:
> 
>     - By default, you install every package from
> Slackware DVD, and then
>       turn it on later.  This is faster
> than other distros, by an order
>       of magnitude, in terms of cpu time and
> user time.  In other
>       distros, installing means turning it
> on, and you have to run
>       around turning things off. 
> Fedora/SuSe allows you to install
>       everything, but you have to click a
> lot.  Debian expects you to
>       know what you need at install time.
> 
>     - Slackare uses 'tar.xz' (was: 'tar.gz') as
> container.  It usually
>       has a script to do things after
> extracting the tarball, mostly
>       creating symlinks.  This is
> simple, fast, transparent, and robust.
>       Again, an order of magnitude faster
> than other distro, in terms of
>       cpu time and user time.
> 
>     - Slackware depends less on online
> depository.  So, you download
>       original source, compile, install to
> DESTDIR, make ".txz" package,
>       and finally install to system. 
> You can install directly into
>       system after compiling, but that would
> make uninstalling
>       difficult.  Slackware has no
> "dependency" issue, at all.  Again,
>       saving me time.
> 
>     - Kernel upgrade is much easier on Slackware,
> because lack of
>       modifications to original
> source.  Upgrading kernel is exactly
>       like installing any other package.
> 
>     - Slackware depends less on GUI desktop,
> treating it as just another
>       program that you run.  In other
> distro, GUI desktop is integral
>       part of "user experience".
> 
> -- 
> William
> 
> On Mon, Feb 01, 2010 at 08:55:01PM +0000, shane.msg at gmail.com
> wrote:
> > Slackware is not a bad system but like many others
> there is a steeper
> > learning curve than Ubuntu.  Since she mentioned
> an office environment
> > the fastest to learn would be Ubuntu and since it is
> built on Debian
> > it is very stable
> >
> > ------Original Message------
> > From: William Park
> > 
> > Slackware.
> > 
> > On Mon, Feb 01, 2010 at 01:57:10PM -0500, Insurance
> Squared Inc.
> > wrote:
> > > It's 2010.  You're starting fresh, with no
> preconceptions, and
> > > picking a distro for your home or office
> desktop.
> > > 
> > > What distro would you pick? 
> > > 
> > > I'm using Mandriva, but I do so because my ISP
> Mandrake on my
> > > webserver back 10+ years ago and I've stuck with
> it ever since.  But
> > > I keep hearing about all these other distros.
> 
> 
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