annne annnie:
>
> I'd like to use debian unstable, but I do not know how to get it.
Generic answer: if you don't know how to get it then you should think
twice before using it. ;-) To be honest, I am running stable only on
servers (and my girlfriend's laptop), all of my workstations run
unstable as well.
But although severe problems are very rare, unstable is only a good
choice for you if you either know the distribution quite well already or
if you are willing to learn it. Casual users without any interest in
playing with the system itself are better off running stable (or any
other distribution with shorter release cycles if you need software not
yet available from stable or backports.org).
For a start, I'd recommend to start with stable and try it for a few
months. If you know aptitude and a little bash (not necessarily
programming, only console usage) you can then go ahead and try to
dist-upgrade.
> 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?
Yes, that's exactly the way to go. There are no installers for unstable.
(You can edit your sources.list to point to unstable during
installation, but I don't know how well that works.)
> Also, why did you people choose to use debian? Is it just better than
> other distributions?
I don't know, I have never used anything else (besides short adventures
with Gentoo and Ubuntu and a few more live CDs).
> It seems like you people are elite linux users,
This is a common conception but I don't think this is true anymore (or
if it ever was). Debian has improved a lot on usability, it's just that
other distributions focus even more on polishing the "user experience"
for a regular desktop user.
In a way, Debian offers more choices and doesn't force anything on you
which you don't strictly need. On the other hand this means you have to
make more choices yourself which is hard if you don't understand your
options in the first place.
> 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 main difference between distributions is still about package
management. There are RPM and DEB based distributions, there are
source-based distributions. Then there's the choice of a default desktop
environment (Gnome, KDE, Xfce) but this already a very blurry line
because most distributions contain all of them.
In my opinion, if you are searching for a versatile system which you can
use for very different purposes (workstation, home server, learning
system), Debian is a very good choice. If you only want to use a system
that's free (in whatever sense you choose) and simply works without you
having to learn very much about it, I'd recommend Ubuntu.
J.
--
I wish I had been aware enough to enjoy my time as a toddler.
[Agree] [Disagree]
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