I've ready that Ubuntu is significantly different from the Debian it's based on, but I don't know exactly how. Recent Ubuntu releases' startup and system service control mechanisms are very different from Red Hat/Fedora's.
Major distos such as Ubuntu and Red Hat/Fedora often have their own patches which make their version of some packages (e.g. the kernel) different from the generic version of the same release of that piece of software. Those patches may or may not eventually find their way into that piece of software'd core. E.G. Fedora has had a patch to make the root= kernel boot parameter allow identifying the root device by its volume label, instead of its device address, but the vanilla kernel doesn't recognize it (or didn't, the last time I tried it). Some distros have used different locations for the same software. E.G. Red Hat has always put KDE in /usr, but SuSE used to put it in /opt (I have not looked at a recent version, so I don't know whether it still does that, or not). There are an increasing number of standards (e.g. Linux Standard Base) which seek to reduce the differences between distributions. Try checking your local bookstore. There are a few magazines which devote a whole issue to a particular distribution and talk about installing and using it. I know that SAMS Publishing produces the "XXX Unleashed" books for several major distros, O'Reilly has a similar series, and so does at least one other publisher. I can't say how good any of them are -- the last time I bought one of those books was before the old Red Hat 7 came out. Douglas On 07/15/2008 02:13:36 PM Scott Rohling wrote: > RedHat uses rpm files for package management - debian uses deb files. There > are lots of package managers but the dpkg command is much like the rpm > command. You can also use apt-get - which is somewhat like yum. > > To me, the package management is the most obvious difference - I'm sure > there are others, but the first thing I ran into was how to install/use the > packages and mgmt tools. > > Scott > > On Tue, Jul 15, 2008 at 11:17 AM, Mark Post <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > > > >>> On Tue, Jul 15, 2008 at 10:40 AM, in message > > <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>, Jon > > Brock > > <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > > > Hijack: > > > My only exposure to Debian so far is with Ubuntu, which I recently > > > started up in a virtual box on this PC. Is there a good reference for > > > the differences/peculiarities of Debian versus, say, Red Hat? > > > > I would say that it would be far easier to document what is similar between > > the two. Basically it boils down to "they're both Linux." (Somewhat of an > > exaggeration, of course.) > > > > > > Mark Post ---------------------------------------------------------------------- For LINUX-390 subscribe / signoff / archive access instructions, send email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with the message: INFO LINUX-390 or visit http://www.marist.edu/htbin/wlvindex?LINUX-390
