What flavor of Linux do you use?

[Matt Goodman]

Hello all, I am curious to know what distributions of Linux are in use out there. Perhaps you could list your distribution, along with what environment it is used in (eg. small business, healthcare, government). It would be good discussion and I'd love to learn what else is out there.

I use Gentoo Linux in the following capacities:

1. Web server / E-mail server (hosting)
2. Firewall / Content Filtering (small / medium business)
3. Desktop machine with Gnome, CrossOver Office and Cedega (for gaming/general desktop fun)

Take care all, have a great weekend!

[David Lukas]

Currently, I work as at Brown University, as the sys admin for the Applied Math department. We use mostly CentOS 4 (may upgrade to 5 soon) with some machines still on RedHat Enterprise Linux 3 (with no current RedHat Network subscriptions). One reason to use CentOS is because the HPC systems we use are Rocks Clusters, which is CentOS-based, because the group that manages the clusters also helps with our user environment.

We use CentOS (not including Rocks, as I do not actually manage the HPC clusters) across most of our servers including email, web, etc., as well as desktop installations, although Windows XP is more popular on the desktop. Most of the students with their own Linux systems seem to use some variant of Debian. I have found that when students request particular open source packages to be installed, often they are not available from the standard CentOS repositories, whereas Debian or Fedora would have them ready to apt-get install or yum install.



I know Boston University has customized their own Linux distribution. They use CentOS on servers and Fedora on desktops, which seems reasonable.

I had some plans to create our own departmental distribution with a yum or apt server, but my move to Oahu looms.

[Mika Leuck]

Hi Matt,

We use Fedora for our customers' wiki, Jira and web servers (small and large customers.) Its easy to find SAs familiar with Fedora.
Our own web sites are hosted on Debian because the packages we use are most heavily tested on Debian.
We use Ubuntu for our local file server. We did this just to play around with the distribution.

[Matt Goodman]

It's amazing how administering a Linux server has gotten so much easier over the years, and yet administering a Windows 2003 (and now 2008) Active-Directory domain has gotten much more difficult. Just try implementing some relatively basic Active Directory policies and watch the fun unfold :)

I recall Bill Gates years ago stating that he wanted to make Windows more like Linux. Well they succeeded in making it more difficult to maintain, while Linux has become much easier. Never would have seen that coming.

Is there anyone using Linux + Samba (as a PDC) to replace/compliment an Active Directory server?

[Sam Chepkevich]

I use Fedora, it is getting kind of bloated though. I tried Ubuntu, it seemed to be too different from Linux/Unix, I don't like having to research my way around a Unix box. I use knoppix from time to time, it is the base for Helix a forensics package I use in a Forensics class. Maybe I will try Debian, it seems a lot of you are using it. I have a spare machine to try it out on. I know it is not Linux, but I just bought a Macbook and I am pretty pleased with OS X. What flavor of Debian do you all receommend?

[Nicholas Herring]

Gentoo here. Been using it for years, and yes I agree that any Linux distro > Active Directory. I had to write an ADM template once and almost threw our domain controller out the window. Fortunately, almost all development services are on our Gentoo server.

We have a Gentoo server name Goose for Perforce, Bugzilla, TikiWiki, IRC, and sadly no CIS like CruiseControl because we build some Windows only products. :(

He's name Goose because I wanted to yell "Talk to me Goose!" if he ever went down.

[Chris Stark]

Hi Matt,

On my server systems at home and the office, I use CentOS. It's compatible with (and functionally identical to) Red Hat Enterprise, and the most compelling argument for me is the extremely long support period (7 years). That means I can count on installing the server's OS once over the course of the hardware's life cycle. I work at the UH College of Education, and we have about 15 Linux servers. They run the gamut of web serving, DNS, DHCP, LDAP, Samba, NFS, and various services based on Tomcat. I have no complaints whatsoever with CentOS.

As much as I like stability on my servers, CentOS and RHEL aren't known for being cutting edge, so on my desktop workstations, I use the latest Fedora Linux. I had been running 32-bit for many years, but just recently upgraded to 64-bit. I haven't run into any issues yet, and it's nice to finally use all of my RAM. I mostly do typical OpenOffice stuff, PHP coding, graphics editing, and Internet stuff. I like Fedora because it makes connecting to my LDAP infrastructure extremely easy.

Finally, on my laptops, I usually go with either Fedora or Ubuntu. I like how Ubuntu is very good about dealing with laptop hardware, but I really hate orange and brown. I tend to use Ubuntu when setting up other people's systems, as it is easier for average users to administer Ubuntu than Fedora (using their own accounts for administrative actions vs. using root).

I also tend to play around with other Unixes too -- OpenSolaris, FreeBSD, and I even have an old SGI Octane. Linux is still my favorite though. :)

Aloha,
Chris

P.S. -- I am using LDAP + Samba instead of AD -- works great! I am able to support Windows, Macs, and *n*x systems with a common infrastructure. We have 1200+ accounts and never have any issues. :)

[Ben Kinsey]

I use Kubuntu at work, as a virtual machine running on top of XP. That way I can use my company's email and other windows systems, but get all the advantages of using the open source tools that run better on linux.

I am working on a web application project.

--Ben Kinsey

[Jerry]

Sorry for being a little late to the party, but I just got here (new to the island).

I run Xubuntu at home. Mainly because the site I run officially supports Ubuntu for new users, but partly because I've been spoiled by Debian-based distros and Xubuntu still runs pretty well on an eight-year-old laptop. :)

I may be look about going back to SlackWare or straight Debian.

[Matt Goodman]

My first production-level linux distro was Slackware. I found it to be very minimal and streamlined for network services. The package maintenance became very difficult, but thankfully Slackware has addressed that since Slack 3.1.

If you haven't looked at Gentoo yet, give it a shot. Although the project has slowed down considerably since its inception, the new maintainers are hopeful of its ability to stay alive.

Sadly this month will be my last month where I have my hosting business, after 10 long years I'll be closing the doors (or putting the hard drives in 'park') as it were. For my next linux distro, it will probably be in a VM somewhere. I still look forward to participating here in the linux forum. Until next time...

Good discussions though :)

[John Hardin]

I'm currently using Ubuntu and am pretty happy with it. I use it on the desktop workstation I use for my job (I'm a Linux software developer). I used to have Fedora on this system, but switched to Ubuntu last year.

I also run SUSE on a Thinkpad T41 (laptop), just because I wanted to play around with this distribution. I'll probably switch it to Ubuntu soon.

In the past I've used RedHat and Mandrake/Mandriva as well.

[Layne Katsumoto]

I use Ubuntu as my work desktop. I know that my school/work uses debain, ubuntu server, and CentOS as there servers that cover many different services eg; mail, NAT, samba, and more.

[Kenneth Kodak]

I use Ubuntu 9.04 64bit Linux in the following capacities:

1. Ubuntu sever my Web server (LAMP)
2. Desktop machine and Notebook, Netbook also run on Ubuntu, Wine for Gaming, Open Office, GMIP, Skype.