Here’s my take on a lot of this (it’s similar to what’s been said already, so this is more of a general philosophy of distros).
There are basically three types of distros (you can subdivide 100 ways, but these are the primary categories) 1. slower-moving, very stable, binary installs 2. fast-moving, stable-ish, binary installs 3. fast-moving, stable-ish, source installs In a relative sense, linux stability is good regardless. I only point out “very stable” because they are typically bulletproof on purpose, at the expense of some flexibility. #1 examples: Debian stable (codename jessie) Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL) CentOS (a free RHEL repackaging) The primary issue with these slow-moving binary distros is they are stable by not introducing new things quickly, so the versions of software available in their software repositories are sometimes ancient. That’s not to say you can’t install something newer, but it won’t be “standard.” If you are looking for latest and greatest, these might not be for you, but they are good for what they do. I support RHEL servers as my day job, but use debian at home. Since debian recently changed it’s stable branch, it does contain many “reasonably new” versions of most software compared to RHEL, but you won’t see fast adoption of new stuff moving forward (besides security updates). #2 examples: debian testing (codename stretch) Fedora (this is where things get tested before they go into RHEL) Ubuntu (based on debian) Pros with #2: "latest and greatest” available in the official repositories Cons: "latest and greatest” available in the official repositories It’s a double-edged sword. The closer you get to the bleeding edge, the higher the risk of something being “not quite right” but you are much more likely to find newer versions of software. It’s also worth noting; don’t let the “testing” in debian testing scare you, it’s still a very stable distro. #3 examples: gentoo linux from scratch (LFS) These are interesting in that all code is built from source, rather than installed as binary packages. In the case of gentoo, that’s not really a problem, though. The package management tools take care of the work for you, it just means it takes longer to install a given package if your system is slower at compiling. LFS is not one I would recommend unless you really want to learn how to build a linux system _literally_ from scratch. I have also run gentoo at home for years, with very few issues, but it’s an example of getting closer to the bleeding edge. Another class of linux distribution you may want to consider is anything with a “LiveCD.” These are full distributions designed to run off a bootable CD/DVD/UBS stick. There are LiveCD versions for several of the distributions out there and they may give you a better feel for what user experience you want before taking the plunge. They don’t install to your hard drive at all (although some have an option to if you wish later) and give you an easy look at how they work. I know you didn’t want to run linux in a VM, but I highly suggest that you _do_ for a while first. Again, that is an easy way to try out several distros and decide what you like _before_ committing to a dual-boot. It’s a lot easier to handle the dual-boot once you know which one you want to try. Going back later and switching to a different distro gets sticky. Based on what you’ve listed as requirements, debian is probably a solid choice (either stable; or testing if stable doesn’t have what you need). Since this is a Python mailing list, the current pythons available in stable are 2.7.9 and 3.4.2, which should give you a good indicator if that will suit your needs (i.e., if they are “new enough” for you). testing is 2.7.11 and 3.5.1. It’s also worth noting that debian does allow you to run stable, and cherry-pick packages from testing; that’s a little advanced (but something to keep in mind). — David Rock da...@graniteweb.com _______________________________________________ Tutor maillist - Tutor@python.org To unsubscribe or change subscription options: https://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/tutor
