Linux — Good, Bad or Just Different

Anyone who knows me well is aware that I use Linux on my com­put­ers. I use Linux, I enjoy Linux and I pro­mote Linux. But any­one who has used some fla­vor of Linux will have one ques­tion come to mind.

What fla­vor of Linux do I use, enjoy and promote?

One of the joys about using Linux is the abil­ity to change and mod­ify it to do what you want it to do. And many peo­ple have mod­i­fied one Linux dis­tri­b­u­tion or another to such an extent that they end up releas­ing it as their own dis­tro. Which is great and remains within the spirit of what Linux is all about. But it also means there are hun­dreds of Linux dis­tros to choose from.

Over the last 4+ years, I’ve installed and used sev­eral dif­fer­ent Linux dis­tros. Ubuntu, Linux Mint, Debian, Man­driva, Zorin, PCLin­uxOS, etc. Most Linux dis­tros are avail­able as free down­loads and once you have burned the down­load to a CD or DVD, you can actu­ally boot your com­puter up from that disk and run what is known as a Live envi­ron­ment. So at the expense of a few min­utes down­load­ing time and a blank disc, I’ve tried a lot of other dis­tros, like Fedora and Open­SUSE.

Cur­rently, there are four com­put­ers around here. An iMac dual boot­ing OS X and Ubuntu, a Dell lap­top dual boot­ing Win­dows 7 and Linux Mint, a Dell desk­top triple boot­ing Win­dows 7, Linux Mint and PCLin­uxOS, as well as this Dell desk­top dual boot­ing Linux Mint Debian Edi­tion and PCLinuxOS.

See the beauty of Linux? If you find a dis­tro you like, it takes mere min­utes to install it and use it. I wanted to see what Open­SUSE was like, so I tried it in a Live envi­ron­ment. When it came down to it, i didn’t much care for it. So I logged out of it and tossed the disc onto the mount­ing stack of Linux discs on my shelf. Cur­rently, I am pri­mar­ily using Linux Mint Debian Edi­tion and Linux Mint as my oper­at­ing sys­tems of choice. PCLin­uxOS isn’t bad, so I keep it around. But the longer I use LMDE, the longer I stay away from PCLin­uxOS. One of these days, I’ll get sick of that Ubuntu install on the iMac and will replace it with some­thing Mint-flavored, most likely.

Linux is all about choice. Buy a com­puter with Win­dows installed and you’re stuck with what Microsoft wants you to use. Buy an Apple and you’re stuck with what OS X has to offer. Install a Linux dis­tro and if you want some­thing dif­fer­ent, then install a dif­fer­ent distro.

But when I see Linux users talk­ing about how Linux is going to end up at the top of the oper­at­ing sys­tem heap, I have to chuckle. The incred­i­ble choice and flex­i­bil­ity of var­i­ous Linux dis­tros is exactly what will pre­vent Linux from ever becom­ing the num­ber one oper­at­ing system.

Show some­one that ban­ner with the four, differently-colored squares and that per­son will imme­di­ately rec­og­nize the Microsoft logo.

Show some­one the out­line of an apple with a bite miss­ing and that per­son will imme­di­ately rec­og­nize the Apple logo.

Show some­one a pic­ture of Tux and they might put the pen­guin together with Linux. But with the wide array of Linux offer­ings, their var­i­ous logos never get a chance to stand out and be noticed. The financ­ing Ubuntu receives from Canon­i­cal helps them gain a lot more expo­sure than other dis­tros. But I am one of those peo­ple who was really happy to leave Ubuntu behind. And how many peo­ple rec­og­nize the Linux Mint logo, appear­ing over there in that first sidebar?

A really good online friend has chided me for favor­ing Linux as I have. But as I have con­tin­ued remark­ing on the advan­tages of using Linux, she has decided she would like to give it a try. I’m rec­om­mend­ing she try Linux Mint, but if she decides she really enjoys using it, I’ll encour­age her to switch over to Linux Mint Debian Edi­tion. But the most impor­tant part is that Linux will gain another user and she’ll be free to install what­ever dis­tro she likes.

And isn’t being free one of the sup­port­ing pil­lars of Linux?

Related posts:

1. Still Lov­ing Linux
2. A Home­com­ing of Sorts
3. Why Spend All That Money?

Tagged as: Debian, Fedora, Linux, Linux Mint, Mandriva, openSUSE, Zorin.PCLinuxOS