>
> Jeff Mandrell wrote:
> >
> > I am currently running winblows95/S.U.S.E. 5.3, but will soon be setting up
> > a second pc with Linux only. I would like to hear from people on the list
> > as to which Linux distribution they prefer. I am extremely new to Linux
> > (less than a month) and have RedHat 5.1, S.U.S.E. 5.3, and Caldera Open
> > Lite. Any opinions as to which distribution would be greatly appreciated.
>
> Hi Jeff,
>
> I put the same question on many lists and I tried till now Slackware and
> RedHat. Now I am downloading Debian to try it also. I did so because I
> want to find out which is the best for a home PC user. Why Microsoft
> would be the biggest on the mass market ? On this point of view I
> searched also for applications with the most interest for the free ones.
> As a matter of fact I am not working anything on Linux, I am only trying
> which is the best for an intelligent home user who also wants to put his
> mind at work not only to click the mouse.
>
> So, that is what I find out:
>
> Slackware is very reliable because its owner, Patrick Volkerdink, is
> testing himself everything he is putting in the distribution. And now he
> made also his own web site. It was simple to install but you have to
> configure yourself, it is less automatic.
>
> RedHat seems to be very good for home-PC users because it has GUI tools
> and peple are used to this from Windows. As a matter of fact configuring
> the modem, printer, mouse must not be a filosofy. This distribution is
> encouraging the newbies. The RPM GUI tool is also a good thing for
> installing applications.
>
> The DEBIAN, I didn't try it yet but I was on the list. They said the
> Debian is the most stable Linux but is not very user-friendly. They said
> it is better to begin with RedHat and then to come to Debian Because
> "you
> don't learn to drive on a Ferrari". The Debian is very dinamic, if you
> want to make a name in the programmers world there is the best place.
>
> I found applications for all the distributions: Netscape Com, The GIMP
> (an ADOBE Photoshop for Linux), Email, Text Editors, Midnight Commander
> (kind of Norton), Corel's Wordperfect8 is now free for personal use,
> StarOffice and KDEOffice are now free. KDE is now distributed packages
> for RedHat and Debian and in bin.tgz, the Qt tool which served for
> building KDE is now free. It seems also the game makers began to make
> Linux versions of their games.
>
> The distribution you choose depends only of your taste an of you want to
> work on linux.
>
> For myself I choosed a Mandrake distribution which is a RedHat with the
> KDE allready installed, with Netscape, GIMP (I am a photography fan),
> Midnight Commander (I press mc and my usual Norton Commander appears),
> the filter for my printer was in the distribution, and now I have the
> best home-PC, and all for free.
>
> Contrary to all advices I use the Netscape Composer as a text editor
> because so I have the compatibility with Microsoft. I am working now to
> install Wordperfect8 to see if it has a feature to turn the files in
> .doc files for MS Word.
>
> All above was only a personal opinion as a home-PC user.
>
> Cristian Carnutu
>
Suse 5.3 also has some nice features, also really big in europe. Alot of
scripts that came with suse where developed by Patrick Volkerdink, the
creator of slackware, so it does have a slackware tint. Also very easy to
install it has 'yast' that will walk one though the install progress, and
when the system is up and running it can also be used to configure a few
settings of the system. It does come with rpm as it's default package
manajer, which alot of users find easy to use, a couple other dist use
this packing system (red hat, caldera) and alot of programs are being put
into this format. Another good fearture about suse 5.3 and up is that is
comes with in a four cd set and has alot of program avaible on the cd, I
find this usefully since there is a slow internet connection here. But
the bad thing is, the programs on the cd are 'outdated' after a month of
getting the cd's, due to the rapid devolpment of most linux software. The
default windows manager is KDE, alot of user find this to be a
user-freindly desktop envoriment. It the 'ussually suspects' as far as
windows mangers goes, not the cd's.
Any good things is that suse 5.3 suports the delvopment of xfree86, if I
understand it right, the hired people to work full time on the project.
Suse has devlopmented a couple x servers to help support more video cards
under X. They as devloped SAX for helping setting up the X servers, it is
a very nice tool. The first time I used it, it detected and configued my
video card with no information for the user, your results will vary on
this thought.
Caldera open linux lite is another good distrubation, it comes with rpm as
it's native package manager and includes some gui conif ultilies. I only
used it breifly, but it was very enjoyable.
As pointed out above though, there is no best linux dist, it is more or
less a matter or personal taste.
One thing that you could do, is to try most of the major one, at
cheapbytes.com they seem cd for about 2-3 a piece, with $10 US you could
grab a handful of dist and see which would be the best for your current
system.
Hope that helps
