Re: tlug: advice needed: choosing a distribution

[Chris Sekiya <chris@example.com>]

On Wed, 31 Mar 1999, John Seebach wrote:

> So. Which distribution to try first, that is the question, and one
> that I'm sure has been beaten to death before. Sorry to bring it up
> again.

Actually, I can't really recall any distro wars on this mailing list.

If I had to choose a distro, I would choose debian.  Many, many reasons
for doing so -- debian is possibly the most mature _current_ distribution
(slackware is actually the oldest, but it doesn't track major software
changes very well), it includes the proverbial kitchen sink, and it's a
distributed development effort.

> And I have absolutely no experience whatsoever with X. So I'm a little
> nervous about building and configuring it by myself.

Don't be afraid -- X configuration is a very useful skill to have.  I'm a
big fan of /usr/X11R6/bin/xf86config -- it generates a heavily-commented
XF86Config that often needs no editing whatsoever.  Stay away from
vendor-specific X configuration tools (RedHat's, PHT's) -- they generate
crap, in my experience.

(should I put a plug for GNOME here?  You don't really want to use KDE,
but I certainly don't want to start _that_ flamewar here ...)

-- Chris


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