Which distro to use? (Poll)

[ryan27968]

Please read this before voting. Kinda surprised no one has made a poll yet. Anyway, this is almost exactly like aTc's post, except with a poll. Here is what he said in his post:

Although everyone seems to assume debian is already decided on, we're still at a stage where we can choose something different.

Even if we do go for debian, there are three different versions of it that we can choose from.

- Stable

        Slightly outdated packages, but very solid.

        Problem here is that you might want to use something more up to date, for example, it has xfce4.8, and no sign of qt5.

- Unstable

        Not really recommended to use that on anything that's supposed to reliably work.

- Testing

        Basically everything that survives in unstable for a week or two. and doesn't cause any major breakage.

We could however, also go for ubuntu.

Don't panic, that doesn't mean you have to use unity, or any of the other ubuntu insanities.

It'll work the same way as if we were using debian, just with a more stable source of up to date packages (and the new lts 14.04 version is only.. 2 months away 

Think more of something like xubuntu/kubuntu than the default ubuntu desktop.

Another advantage ubuntu has, is that it's arm setup is slightly more mature than debian stable.

You get an arm crosscompiler included with the default x86 packages for example (makes doing an cross-sdk a bit easier), and the rest of the arm related tools are more complete too.

Some other options would/could be:

• Super Zaxxon
• Arch Linux
• Android
• Linux Mint
• OpenSuse
• Fedora
• Completely new Angstrom based distro
• Slackware
• FreeBSD(or any other BSD version)

 

[TrashyMG]

It's fun to vote, but Debian was already chosen.

It's a shame I can't pick more than one that I prefer, I like Slackware as well.

 

[Granitehead]

Completely unnecessary poll. Debian is fine and already decided on. Unstable would be best for me personally, but it was also clear that most (including me) think stable is best as a default OS (possible to update to unstable at any point, but no going back).

Edit: And the descriptions are wrong. Super Zaxxon doesn't have "great hackability", it rather /is/ one giant hack. Among other things.

 

[Ziz]

Furthermore:

Ubuntu (The same as Debian except more frequent updates, but has a bad name in Linux community)

That is wrong. Debian has as much updates as ubuntu, but the packages may be older. However if you use Ubuntu 12.04 you will get updates for software from April 2012.Debian wheezy is from May 2013. So in fact the "LTS" debian version is more recent than Ubuntu!

Furtherfurthermore: The poll between Stable, Unstable and Testing doesn't make sense, too. I think ED should use, what is unstable today, but at release it may be stable. I am talking about Debian Jessie.

 

[dreamer]

I think ED should use, what is unstable today, but at release it may be stable. I am talking about Debian Jessie.

You mean Testing.
Sid will always be Sid.

 

[sebt3]

loll

Unstable (Still in debugging stage, likely to have frequent crashes)

you sound to know debian a lots !!! (do you know about experimental ?)

Sid will always be Sid.

Because nobody would put Sid in a room with toys, right

 

[Klumpen]

This community just loves polls...

Could you please remove the highly opinionated, influencial and mostly just wrong stuff in the brackets?

 

[Ziz]

I think ED should use, what is unstable today, but at release it may be stable. I am talking about Debian Jessie.

You mean Testing.

Sid will always be Sid.

Yes, of course, thanks.

 

[LEOXD]

loll

Unstable (Still in debugging stage, likely to have frequent crashes)

you sound to know debian a lots !!! (do you know about experimental ?)

experimental is only used to test specific features, e.g. when Debian switched from XFree86 to X.org, and it isn't a full package collection like unstable/testing/stable. New, untested packages go normally into unstable, not experimental.

----

Using unstable for the preinstalled system is not a good option, because, well, it has bugs (that sometimes can even roast hardware). And while it may be fun to use the most unstable thing available, not everybody can or wants to fix/work around bugs. The OS should just work without problems.

And stable should do exactly that: working without problems. It's somewhat boring if you want to test things the newest features out though.

However, since the Pyra is going to have many bootable drives (eMMC, µSD, SD, USB?), it shouldn't be a problem to have them all if you want to fiddle around with OSes.

 

[sebt3]

I was not implying that using unstable is a good idea. But saying that "unstable is likely to have frequent crash" is miss-information at best...

Unstable only get what upstream consider stable enough to be a release. If a debian maintainer want to have fun around beta quality stuff, he use the experimental branch not unstable...

The untested part only is about debian developpement aka packaging. There is just a few debian patched in every package if any. The content of the packages are stable for dayly life even in unstable.

 

[ekianjo]

Android is not a distro.

Btw the poll function should really be restricted to specific members, there is really no end to the crappy polls these days.

 

[Ziz]

Android is not a distro.


Btw the poll function should really be restricted to specific members, there is really no end to the crappy polls these days.

Maybe we should make a poll about that...

 

[Granitehead]

Btw the poll function should really be restricted to specific members, there is really no end to the crappy polls these days.

No it shouldn't, but maybe there should be a "non-constructive" (vote ) button next to each post and thread as well as a like button and frequently downvoted posts/threads would be displayed like those written by ignored members (unless you disable the feature in the settings): "click to display".

 

[Klumpen]

Not more rules please.

People should just stop this madness by themselves.

 

[Granitehead]

Not more rules please.

People should just stop this madness by themselves.

They won't, there will always be threads which aren't strictly necessary.And forcing them to stop would be bad too.

That's why I suggested the "unconstructive" button.

I think for a forum for constructive, free (i.e. moderation only in extreme cases like outright deliberate spam or obvious insults) discussions a voting system inspired by stack exchange (but no exact copy of it, it has a different purpose) would be helpful.

 

[Grench]

An interesting option that is missing from the poll.

Linux Mint Debian Edition (LMDE).

Linux Mint (standard) is built on Ubuntu which is built on Debian Testing.

Linux Mint Debian Edition is built directly on Debian Testing.

 

[bloodfalco]

May I recommend one more? the SolydX and SolydK seem pretty good

 

[pmprog]

That's why I suggested the "unconstructive" button.

Easier way - Automatically delete a thread after 5 days if less 50% of registered members who have viewed it didn't "Like This" on the orginal post

 

[LEOXD]

That's why I suggested the "unconstructive" button.

Easier way - Automatically delete a thread after 5 days if less 50% of registered members who have viewed it didn't "Like This" on the orginal post

that would be at least 3290 likes. Using this method would delete all posts older than 5 days. We also could just ask moot if he creates us a /pyra/ board on 4chan, that would be as dynamic as the method you proposed.

 

[pmprog]

That's why I suggested the "unconstructive" button.

Easier way - Automatically delete a thread after 5 days if less 50% of registered members who have viewed it didn't "Like This" on the orginal post

that would be at least 3290 likes. Using this method would delete all posts older than 5 days. We also could just ask moot if he creates us a /pyra/ board on 4chan, that would be as dynamic as the method you proposed.

I've emphasised a bit for you. Besides, I wasn't really being serious