John Haltiwanger wrote: > The very fact that it makes a great starting point makes it a great distro, > imo. I too use Arch now, and definitely think it's the best. Through the > long march of distros since my journey '97, though, Ubuntu is much closer > to the top than the bottom. The fact you can pretty much troubleshoot any > problem with a quick google search is also a very nice boon to the new user/ > > That said, many other similar generation distros are decent as well, if > suffering from the flaw of relying on RPM. And the relative lack of > documentation. > > If someone wants to get to know their computer, there is always Arch. Or > Gentoo, if they ever get their overlay issues worked out. (Or slack or,... > n+1). Arch is the best of option out there right now for a second (or third > or fourth) distro, but Ubuntu is easily the best 'first distro' around, in > my experience.
I always recommend kubuntu to windoze users as that is their smallest step to freedom. What I recommend is that they first switch to firefox, thunderbird, and open office on their windoze box. After they are comfortable, they can make the switch to kubuntu quite easily. If they really have to have some windoze only program, then I introduce them to VirtualBox. Personally I don't like the ubuntus very much but keep one system up so I can help friends. IMO, the ubuntus are a little archaic under the hood and that apt package management junk is pretty lame. Probably cause I've been spoiled over the years by gentoo and it's community. I haven't tried Arch yet.
