Fedora vs Ubuntu vs anything - where next with Linux?

[David Thorne]

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Thierry Sayegh De Bellis wrote:
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> >
> > So fedora on a desktop - defo yes, on a server, I use CentOS
> >

I second this.  I have a combination of both Ubuntu and Fedora on my
home PCs/laptops (As it happens my desktop is usually Ubuntu and my
laptop usually Fedora due to the slightly lower memory requirements of
Gnome on Fedora - 198 versus 256 on Fedora 9 Vs 8.04)

Fedora 10 is an amazing distro - Fedora have recently up'ed the ante
with Ubuntu in superb style.  Linux Format gave Fedora 10 10/10 and
Linux Magazine gave it a very favourable review too.

There are a few niggles on Fedora that I don't like (Running full Sun
Java isn't easy if you wish to use it as a default JVM for instance, and
some of the Eclipse plugins I use don't like OpenJDK, GCJ or similar)
and there is always the difficulties of being able to install a media
player but not automagically having MP3 codecs, but on the whole This
isn't too hard to over come with additional repositories as already
mentioned.  Ubuntu makes it very easy to install proprietary drivers
(Indeed the article at
http://itmanagement.earthweb.com/osrc/article.php/3796126/The-Secret-Lives-of-Ubuntu-and-Debian-Users.htm
seems to suggest that 86% use proprietary NVidia drivers.) It depends on
what your opinion is on proprietary software on Linux.  Both Red Hat
(Inc.Fedora) and Debian do their best to stick to FOSS standards in
their default install - indeed on Fedora 9, even if you have installed
mplayer - if you try to watch a WMA video it will take you to a page
where you can pay for drivers to view it.  I haven't tried to watch a
WMA in Fedora 10 yet - I try to avoid the WMA standard where ever possible!

Fedora on a desktop is now a superb choice.  Can I suggest though if you
aren't sure, run a virtual machine (VirtualBox has both open and closed
source versions, although the most open are probably KVM/Xen with QEMU
or similar) of Fedora on your Ubuntu box and try it "exclusivly" (IE
open the VM and run that) for a few days and see if everything works to
your liking.

I am tempted to ditch my Intrepid install for a Fedora 10 and just run
Ubuntu in VMs from now on, but I won't stop using either distro.  They
both do what I need them too although they can take some fiddling to get
there for certain aspects.

Regards,
Dave



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