Distro Selection and Understanding.

[Newbie221]

What are the differences ???

I’m in a general discussion with a friend in regards to Linux. After telling him about some of the different distros he asked why so many. My limited knowledge and non tech mind was unable to give him a proper explanation.

I do understand that some distros are geared towards desktop, some server oriented, lightweight applications for older computers and such. But to truly explain why one is best suited for a certain application I’m lost. I simply just don’t know and would like to learn more without going too far down the rabbit hole.

So my question…… Is there a resource that can explain some of this or a guide that helps a person choose what would work best for their given situation ? Most things I’ve been able to find focus on desktop environment and it’s prepackaged applications.

I would like to be capable of explaining why Bodhi is a great lightweight choice or why Ubuntu or Fedora make a good choice for servers.



Thanks for your time
Newbie221

[ivar]

this link takes a shot at an explanation - hope this helps:

https://itsfoss.com/what-is-linux/

[vimes666]

This one tells a lot in a few minutes: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ShcR4Zfc6Dw

[vimes666]

Of course distrowatch.com is always a good resource for specifics and reviews.

[Moem]

After telling him about some of the different distros he asked why so many.

Simple: because they can. People fork distros, or start new ones, because it's possible and because they have an itch to scratch. It helps a lot if you realise that most distros are simply what the developer(s) wanted to use themselves, and so they built it.

[spamegg]

Most distros are actually very very similar to each other. Main important things are:

1. People / corporation behind the distro. What kind of people they are, how they think, how they communicate with their users, how they make decisions, how they react to problems / failures. Mint devs are excellent in this regard.

2. The "root" distro it's based on, and the package system. Here we have Fedora-based, Arch-based, and Debian-based. Most distros are Debian-based, and use the .deb package system.

3. The approach of the distro. Is it a Long Term Support, stable, slow distro, or is it a "rolling-release" frequently changing and breaking distro, or is it immutable, etc.? Arch is rolling by default. Fedora has different versions. Debian is almost entirely slow / stable, it has a Testing branch but only few distros are based on that.

[Hoser Rob]

There are a lot more distros than you may realize, more than 200 listed at distrowatch and that's not exhaustive. Personally I think it's ridiculous to have that many. Why so many? IMHO it's a bunch of people wanting to be a big fish in a little pond.

The differences between Linux distros is not so much as many think either. They all get their kernels and the GNU wrappers from the same places. Some come with newer software than others. But they're much more alike than different.

For servers it's going to be largely about the documentation. Red Hat is the ruler in the server world, not Fedora. If you're using Fedora you are basically a Red Hat beta tester.

For desktop users it's about user support. For beginners Mint and Ubuntu are the ones to go for for that reason. They're also long term support. There's a reason that LTS rules in enterprise Linux. Rolling releases break themselves regularly. And newbies won't know how to fix them.

Bodhi is a good light choice but it's not significantly lighter than others. No Ubuntu based distro is truly light any more. For that you need something like Antix, which uses window managers instead of full desktop environments. Antix will run in 150Mb or less and is really fast, but it's also very clunky to set up and use.

The trouble with lightweight distros nowadays is that browsers and web pages, which is supposed to be a mundane activity, take huge amounts of RAM now. So saving a hew hundred Mb of RAM isn't going to make much difference.

[AZgl1800]

for the casual Desktop home user?

Linux Mint Cinnamon is my DE of choice.
why?

because it emulates the MS Windows GUI so much, that a newbie can transition from MS Win11 to LM21.3 Cinnamon in one day, and not feel like he landed on Mars.

this forum provides hands on Support that just simply cannot be surpassed, IMO.

I am very familiar with Microsoft, started playing with "computers" with a Motorola 128 byte chip that had to be programmed one Register at a time, with a 16 digit Keypad.

then the Tandy keyboard came along, then Apple II took over the mainstream, until for me, in 1981 they pissed me off by over-charging so much for a 16MB ram board, that I could buy a whole 286DX for the same price

I left Apple forever after that.
my work place in IT support has caused me to be a Windows user since DOS 1.0 and 3.6 then 6.3? then Windows GUI appeared....

having said all that, I stay with Mint Cinnamon, because I do NOT have to use Terminal very much, just a few simple lines that I can remember.
inxi -S shows me what I am running now.

john@FX705GM:~$ inxi -S
System:
Host: FX705GM Kernel: 5.15.0-94-generic x86_64 bits: 64
Desktop: Cinnamon 6.0.4 Distro: Linux Mint 21.3 Virginia
john@FX705GM:~$

and that just about ends my Terminal knowledge.

[Newbie221]

Thanks to all for sharing your time, you've been helpful !

Newbie221