Re: [Swarm-Support] Recommended Linux distro for Swarm

[Paul Johnson]

Doscher, Crile wrote:
> Hi all (and Paul in particular I suspect),
>
>  
>
> Has any one got a recommendation on the best distro for Swarm?  I've
> used Fedora most recently and just wondering if Ubuntu is a better
> option.  Or is it a matter of personal taste?  Thanks -
>
>  
>   
I am supporting people who use Centos 5.3 in our computer lab with RPMs. 
I switched from Fedora because Fedora is too frequently updated and 
version 8 of Fedora was so bad for my systems that I spent a countless 
number of hours tracking down fundamental problems.  So if you are 
looking for a system you can install and use for a few years, Centos is 
a good bet. (same as RedHat enterprise linux, basically).  I try to 
remember to copy RPMs I build up here

http://pj.freefaculty.org/Centos

I also have one Fedora system where I make RPMS for swarm.  Alex 
Lancaster is already an official package maintainer in the Fedora group 
and he will take this over, I think, and swarm may pop up in the 
official Fedora channel at some point.  Until then, you can use what i have.

http://pj.freefaculty.org/Fedora (or
http://pj.freefaculty.org/Swarm, which should be symbolically linked)

I have Ubuntu on a laptop and make deb packages with that.  I just  
uploaded them

http://pj.freefaculty.org/Ubuntu

Ubuntu is mostly like Debian, with some beautification, AFAICT.

So I think you are "pretty safe" if you have any of those major flavors.

I do not have any SUSE boxes, but in the past sometimes people have 
given me accounts on them and RPMS were built without too much trouble. 
I've never run Slackware, Gentoo, Mint or PClinuxOS or any of the myriad 
of other Linuxes.

If you are only interested in working on Swarm models,  Centos is surely 
the way to go, I think.  If you want to watch movies or play mp3,  or 
use a current version of TexLive or LyX or R or open office, then you 
have to do a lot more package building and maintenance with Centos.  If 
you want newer stuff, and you don't want to build all of it yourself, 
then you need Fedora or Ubuntu, but that comes along with the 
ever-present danger of breakage and frustration. 

I really do prefer the RPM packaging system to the Debian packaging.  
I've done both lately.  I can promise you this.  RPMs are much much 
easier/cleaner to build and it is about 10x simpler to create an RPM 
repository than a Debian repository.  But I also have to admit that I 
have had a much lower rate of hardware/driver flaws in Ubuntu than I had 
with Fedora.  More things "just work" in Ubuntu that Fedora.  That's 
partly because the Ubuntu people let the Fedora guys test out the new 
stuff before they adopt it.  I am told that things do eventually get 
fixed in Fedora. But I don't want to be spending any more time debugging 
things like the kernel HPET (High Precision Event Timer) to find out why 
the CPU is always pegged at 100%. 

On the other hand, my opinion is that the quality of advice you get in 
the Fedora email list is much higher than in the Ubuntu list.  I think 
that's because Ubuntu seems to have grown rapidly among noobies, and 
when the noobies are asking questions and answering each other, you see 
some really low quality threads develop.  On the other hand, the users 
who survive with Fedora are, almost by necessity, tougher and more able 
to solve problems.

pj
> Crile
>   


--
Paul E. Johnson                       email: address@hidden
Professor, Political Science          http://pj.freefaculty.org
1541 Lilac Lane, Rm 504                              
University of Kansas                  Office: (785) 864-9086
Lawrence, Kansas 66044-3177           FAX: (785) 864-5700