Re: Blind vs. mainstream distros

[Linux for blind general discussion]

Debian Testing isn't exactly a rolling release in the same way as Arch. 
Debian Unstable probably comes closer, but even that's not the same. The 
problem is that Arch for example takes all component packages from the 
same desktop version, ie. GNOME, whereas Debian even unstable takes 
parts of 2 or 3 different versions and tries to fit them together. 
Worse, back when I ran Debian Unstable on a desktop, I had lots of 
apt-get breakage where packages were broken due to dependent packages 
that had either fallen behind the broken package or new dependencies 
that had been added to the broken package, but were not yet in the 
repository. These things don't necessarily fix themselves in Testing 
unfortunately, as the only requirement for a package to enter Testing 
from Unstable is a 1-week waiting period, which will naturally be just 
as many days behind for the dependency as it was when the packages 
entered Unstable. There is a good reason why Debian's newer repositories 
are called Testing" and "Unstable." Arch at least tries, and for the 
most part does, keep all component packages for the major desktops at 
the same version. The only exceptions I've seen are where some packages 
don't get a point release, so you may see for example MATE 1.18.1 and 
1.18.2 packages, but you will never see MATE 1.16 and 1.18 packages, Nor 
do you often see packages that break due to missing or old dependencies, 
as those are supposed to be filtered out in Arch testing and earlier. I 
did see a single exception to that where a Python package broke due to 
an outdated dependency, but this is quite rare in Arch, as I have only 
seen that once or twice in more than 6 years.
~Kyle
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