this post was submitted on 26 Apr 2024
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Linux
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Linux is a family of open source Unix-like operating systems based on the Linux kernel, an operating system kernel first released on September 17, 1991 by Linus Torvalds. Linux is typically packaged in a Linux distribution (or distro for short).
Distributions include the Linux kernel and supporting system software and libraries, many of which are provided by the GNU Project. Many Linux distributions use the word "Linux" in their name, but the Free Software Foundation uses the name GNU/Linux to emphasize the importance of GNU software, causing some controversy.
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Ubuntu is just getting worse and worse. I was pretty happy running Ubuntu server for years after moving from Gentoo; I jag lost interest in spending time taking care for that server and wanted something easy.
I went to Debian half a year ago and it's been great. Should've done it earlier.
I never understood why people run Ubuntu on servers. It's madness. Ubuntu is a fork of unstable Debian packages. You don't want unstable on your server!
Ubuntu on Desktop I can understand. Back in the days the Debian release was really long so much software was a tad outdated after a couple of years. But Debian had a much faster release cycle now, and had pretty much incorporated all the good stuff from Ubuntu and left the bad behind.
We should be clear on our terminology here. Debian Unstable is called that because the package “versions” are not stable ( change ). It is not really a comment on quality although more frequent change also implies more opportunities for issues to be introduced. In Unstable, Debian may introduce disruptive changes either to configuration or even to the package library itself.
Regardless, taking a snapshot of Debian unstable and then separately supporting those packages completely eliminates these issues. That is what Ubuntu does.
Ubuntu LTS now offers up to 10 years of support without having to upgrade a release. This is far more “stable” than anything in Debian, including of course “Debian Stsble”. In fact, it exceeds the stability of Red Hat Enterprise.
I have not used Ubuntu in many years but I have been considering using it again for some server use cases precisely because it is now so “stable”. I still do not like Ubuntu on the desktop and do not like snaps in particular. I do not think snaps impact any of the server packages I would use though and I do not expect Canonical to introduce them during the support lifetime of a particular release.
For personal use, the 10 years of support is entirely free. That is pretty compelling.