I'm replying to you off the blackbox list -- I didn't think it was a discussion for the list, but I had some information to share.
On Tue, 2002-05-14 at 18:38, Scott Furt wrote: > Paul Mackinney wrote: > > > > That's the only reason it's on my box. I run Debian, so I just install > > with > > > > apt-get install gnome-terminal > > > > Can anyone suggest a good Debian resource where i could > see the differences between Deb and Redhat? Poke around on debianplanet.org for a bit -- there's a fair number of anecdotes of people moving to Debian from RedHat and vice versa, as well as a number of discussions of the pros and cons of apt vs. rpm. > I've been a redhat user for a few years now and am beginning to think > that Redhat is bloated and not very well integrated. > > Debian and the BSD's have such a simple install/upgrade > mechanism, it brings a tear to my eye when i think about > how hard it is to upgrade my redhat machine using RPM's. I "progressed" through SuSE, Mandrake, and RedHat for over a year and a half, and never got a good handle on what was going on in my system, nor how the heck I could get past the dependencies that popped up anytime I wanted to install a new piece of software or upgrade an old one. I switched to Slackware, and quickly learned the nuts and bolts of how Linux _should_ work, but missed having a decent way to upgrade short of compiling on my own (a tedious and resource consuming process at best). I switched to Debian less than two months ago, and I don't think I'll go back to anything I've used before... The apt and dpkg tools are slick, and instead of downloading source, compiling (twiddling my thumbs waiting), installing, and trying out that piece of software I'm interested in, I can simply type at a command line 'apt-get install (some software here)' and have it moments later, ready to go. And unlike rpm, if the software has dependencies, it goes and grabs them simultaneously and installs them (it lets you know what it's doing, too). On top of all that, Debian is highly configurable, and lean. I had Slack on my server, and decided (after an increasing number of kernel panics) to migrate to Debian. In doing so, I went from a disk usage of 1.2GB down to 400MB -- and had better functionality. I simply didn't have any unnecessary programs or libraries installed. (When I had Mandrake on the server... well, it was at around 1.8GB, which was almost maxing out my primary 2.1GB partition.) Look at me, getting evangelical about a linux distro -- something I promised myself I'd never do! Anyways -- just some information for you. Choose the distribution that best suits your needs. Matthew
