Re: How would I get debian unstable?
On Wed, Jun 4, 2008 at 10:26 PM, annne annnie <goturtwig@yahoo.com> wrote:
> I'd like to use debian unstable, but I do not know how to get it. If
> someone could direct me to a site that has the steps set out or type the
> steps or something it would be much appreciated. I have the image for
> debian testing from about a month or two ago (it's lenny), can I use testing
> to get to unstable?
You surely can; essentially, you install [some version] of Debian,
then edit /etc/apt/sources.list to change various references to (say)
"testing" to indicate "unstable". Or change "stable" to "unstable."
Then, run "apt-get update" to get the unstable list of packages, then
"apt-get dist-upgrade" to shift to "unstable."
> Also, why did you people choose to use debian? Is it just better than other
> distributions? It seems like you people are elite linux users, and I just
> wanted to the differences between debian and some other distributions. I
> haven't tried many, but to me they would all seem the same (I'm new).
The crucial differences between Debian and other distributions are two-fold:
1. It has a public, democratic governance system, whereas other
distributions tend to be under the control of some non-public
organization.
To some extent, the various Red Hat derivatives are controlled by Red
Hat Software, irrespective of public participation. Likewise for
Ubuntu and Canonical.
Various Linux distributions have gone away due to changes in direction
of the "owners" (Caldera being a most obvious example); there is
little risk of that taking place with Debian due to its governance
model.
2. As a result of the wide-spread participation, there needs to be a
great deal of policy, which indeed extends to tooling for managing all
sorts of aspects of software packaging and the interaction of packages
with one another and with the distribution.
Traditionally, the "engineering" of Red Hat-sourced distributions took
place entirely internally to Red Hat Software, and packaging was a
"pre-cooked" thing where you could only be fairly certain that things
would work if the packages had RHAT people working on them. The RPM
tool could build packages and manage a local installation repository;
in contrast, Debian has long had a VASTLY more extensive set of
package tooling addressing *way* more high level issues, and helping
to enable a much more diverse set of contributors to contribute
well-integrated packages.
The consistency of having the huge set of diverse, yet well-integrated
packages is what has enabled the creation of "private labelled" things
like Ubuntu and Knoppix that derive the huge set of software by virtue
of harnessing Debian's work at relatively little cost.
--
http://linuxfinances.info/info/linuxdistributions.html
"The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over and
expecting different results." -- assortedly attributed to Albert
Einstein, Benjamin Franklin, Rita Mae Brown, and Rudyard Kipling
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