linux users?

[rommel]

i want to partition adn install linux on my hard drive jsut to check it out...was looking at the various "flavors" of the OS...any input would be appreciated...i ordered system commander it comes with turbo linux.
but what is the difference i havent a clue...redhat , mandrake anyone have an opinion?

 

[cmv]

Here are my opinions:

RedHat - The distrib all the "leet" people like to hate because it is insecure but it makes life easy if you have to run commercial products like Lotus Domino/Notes server or Cold Fusion or Oracle as RedHat is almost always one of the supported distribs if linux is supported at all...

Mandrake - Repackaged RedHat aimed at the desktop - at least it used to be repackaed RH, now it is branching out (I believe, not 100%) and doing more and more work of its own... Great distrib for the desktop and it has *really* good hardware autoconfiguration...

Slackware - One of the early distribs. Nice and simple but not user friendly (at least compared to the above). A number of people run it on servers as it isn't as hard to keep the base install down to a minimal size (for security reasons, not so much disk hoggage factor)...

SuSe - don't know, distrib from Germany, supposedly nice...

There are a number of other distribs but someone else can point them out... My personal favorite is:

Debian GNU/Linux - one of the earliest distribs. Community project, not commercial. Their stable release tends to lag a bit compared to bleeding edge software from RedHat but it is *stable*. Their unstable release is where the latest stuff is... Debian is a bit harder to install compared to RedHat or Mandrake but it is one of the *easiest* to keep up to date once you install. For example here is my process of keeping up to date:

apt-get update
apt-get upgrade

And it automatically downloads all the latest packages for whatever debian release I'm running and installs them. It is *AWESOME*... I've used linux for years but I was more of a slackware person. I just started using debian and so far I'd have to say I'm not going back to anything else... RedHat does have up2date (which is quite good in 7.0) but they may start to charge for this service at some point (it does something similar to the debian update process above).

Good luck on your choice and don't worry about it too much. Just play with whatever you feel like or whatever other people you know run and you'll be able to ask them questions if you get stuck. If you get sick of a distrib just move on to something else. The most important part is to just try one of them (and if it sucks, try another)...

 

[cmv]

Oh yeah, I forgot, there is a new distrib called Progeny that is based on Debian (and at least one of the people working on it was a founding member of Debian)... They have a beta2 ISO you can download. There are a number of sites to help you out such as linuxnewbie.org, linux.com, and linuxdoc.org (linux document project home page).

 

[rommel]

thanks for the thorough input....i think i will play with the turbo linux since i get it free and it will give me a chance to possibly make a better decision as to which to buy...and then possibly not...lol

 

[esung]

SuSE has good packaged software.. much more then RH.

 

[rommel]

do you know anything about the freebie "turbo linux" i am getting with sys commander?

 

[perry]

I've installed Turbo once or twice, found it to be just your run of the mill distro. Nothing too special about it, it should do you just fine. There are two versions of Turbo, Workstation and Server. Depending on what you wanna do with the version you're getting, you may end up downloading additional packages. The best way to learn about distros is to just try em out for yourself.

I have a Caldera ISO that I downloaded and burned today, going to flatten my RedHat partition tomorrow and try that one out. Never used it, and don't know too much about it. It shall be my distro of the month I guess.

I happen to like RedHat for some reason. I guess it's because it was the first one I installed back in 95 or so, and I've just stuck with it. I would avoid RedHat 7.0, they've done funky stuff with the libraries and it can be tough to get things to compile. The betas that are out (Wolverine was just released a day or two ago) would be better and won't leave you fighting with problems. I've found that it is generally best to avoid the x.0 versions of RedHat, it's better to wait for x.1.

Slackware is a bear to install if you don't know what you're doing. You can really get your hands dirty when you install it.

I've only seen SuSe running, never really played with it. It's supposed to be very good, and a very thorough distro (lots of included packages).

One thing to note, if you wanna keep the data on the drive you are partitioning, I know that RedHat (possibly lots of others too) comes with a program called FIPS on the CD. It is a non-destructive partition tool ala Partition Magic -- but free. Check you favorite RedHat mirror in the dosutils directory for it, small enough to fit on a boot floppy. I know a few people that have used it with great success.

 

[BOFH]

Peny

FWIW - RH 7 has no problems compiling anything I've tried as long as you have the updates applied. This is a important step both for security and for the bug fixes that have.

 

[Soybomb]

I started out in linux about 4 years ago dabbling with slack and later tried redhat. So far I still like redhat better I think. I also think slackware was about 10x easier to install than debian...I didn't care for that install at all. Honestly I didn't think caldera was a bad distro when I tried it either. For a newbie I'd definatley try redhat, suse, or mandrake I think though.

 

[rommel]

well i didnt touch a computer till i was after 30yrs old....lol...so i am not learned in the command line school which is what makes linux so appealing to me....it's kinda a cool concept and the more i read about it the better i like it....i like windows too...think it made it possible for millions of users to interact on a standardized platform irrespective of your computing skill level....so it has its place but linux is like building your own car...lol...well thats what it seems to me at this point...but i appreciate all the input and am excited to get and try turbolinux and push on from there.

 

[Zach]

They are all free you know. Got a burner? Friend with one? Bingo...

 

[sojin]

turboLinux is ok release...

the basic installation is just as easy as windows... well... almost...

beware the actual configuration after the linux is running... h/w drivers... various s/w packages... system holes... real pain in the butt...

after the ramen noodle heart attack, i decided to move my RH7 genesis behind my firewall running on win2k svr... anyways oracle was the sole reason to bring up a linux pos...

i still haave glitches in my stdlibc++ for gcc...

 

[rommel]

yeah i see that esung...and i ordered SuSE 7.1....been reading about it...was between that and mandrake...but SuSE just sounded better...has the new 2.4 kernel too...well actually comes with both...the 2.4 and the 2.2xx whatever....says you can choose to boot using which ever is most appropriate. well at any rate i am looking forword to it.