[TriLUG] Ubuntu vs Fedora, was Re: Linux Distribution for server Opinions

Alexander Ray alexjray.ncsu at gmail.com
Fri Jan 23 11:50:43 EST 2009


On Fri, Jan 23, 2009 at 11:08 AM, Maxwell Spangler <
maxpublic08 at maxwellspangler.com> wrote:

>
> I've been using Redhat/Fedora for a very long time and recently
> installed Ubuntu in a virtual machine just to poke around.
> <snip>
> I really couldn't tell much of a difference.. So I'm curious from those
> of you who have really compared the two: What significant differences
> are there?
>
>

I've never used debian, but I have gone between ubuntu and fedora for more
than a few times.  I think your different experiences depend on what exactly
that you're "poking".  If you mainly interact through graphical programs and
use Gnome or KDE on both, then it will be almost entirely the same
(visually).  I think the first (and somtimes) biggest difference is the
package managers.  I've heard a lot said about both sides but my 2 cents:
*Aptitude is more of a favorite than the rpm/yum combo
*RPM's (if you speak the language) can be made to do pretty much anything
you want them to

I've seen yum/RPM's used to manage filesystems on computer labs, and even
though there's probably a better way to do that, it worked at the time.

If you feel like learning RPM (a valuable skill) then go for fedora.

The other main difference I've found is User Base.  From what I can tell
both have considerable user bases, but theres so much more 'jabber' on the
Ubuntu side.  Fedora has a lot of highly technical users (from what I can
tell), some of whom produce top-notch documentation.  The downside of this
is they can largely diagnose their own problems.  In the Ubuntu community,
there are plenty of 'newbies' that will ask every concievable question about
things that can go wrong.  This means when you're looking for something
useful the noise/signal ratio is HUGE but theres a good chance what you're
looking for has already been asked and answered.

all of the above IMHO

(also: Red Hat is right here on State campus, and that matters a least a
little to some state students)



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