Scheduled Maintenance: We are aware of an issue with Google, AOL, and Yahoo services as email providers which are blocking new registrations. We are trying to fix the issue and we have several internal and external support tickets in process to resolve the issue. Please see: viewtopic.php?t=158230

 

 

 

which Debian do you use most often?

Here you can discuss every aspect of Debian. Note: not for support requests!

which Debian do you use most often?

Unstable / Sid
6
11%
Testing / Buster
18
34%
Stable / Stretch
27
51%
OldStable / Jessie
1
2%
Wheezy
1
2%
Squeeze
0
No votes
Lenny, Etch, Sarge, Woody ...
0
No votes
 
Total votes: 53

Message
Author
User avatar
Soul Singin'
Posts: 1605
Joined: 2008-12-21 07:02

which Debian do you use most often?

#1 Post by Soul Singin' »

Back in the day when RickH ran this board, a "Real Debian User" ran Debian Testing. I never agreed with Rick on anything. (I'm a "Fake Debian User"). But I am curious to know which distribution of Debian members of this board use most often these days.

Which distribution of Debian do you use on your primary machine?
Last edited by Soul Singin' on 2019-06-14 01:35, edited 1 time in total.

User avatar
4D696B65
Site admin
Site admin
Posts: 2696
Joined: 2009-06-28 06:09
Been thanked: 85 times

Re: which Debian do you use most often?

#2 Post by 4D696B65 »

Sid on all my boxen except my nas runs stable. In well over a decade sid broke twice on me and caused short lived pain. All else was a small hiccup. Most issues were DE related, base system is almost always solid.

User avatar
Soul Singin'
Posts: 1605
Joined: 2008-12-21 07:02

Re: which Debian do you use most often?

#3 Post by Soul Singin' »

4D696B65 wrote:In well over a decade sid broke twice on me and caused short lived pain. All else was a small hiccup.
I ran Lenny when it was in Testing and I remember a lot of pain. It seemed like every upgrade would break something. After that, I always ran Stable, but lately I have been enjoying Buster in its last Testing days.

User avatar
4D696B65
Site admin
Site admin
Posts: 2696
Joined: 2009-06-28 06:09
Been thanked: 85 times

Re: which Debian do you use most often?

#4 Post by 4D696B65 »

Remember Etch-And-A-Half? Perhaps we should still do this for newer hardware support. Buster-And-A-Half next year?

I noticed sid is more stable than testing, go figure. :o

User avatar
Soul Singin'
Posts: 1605
Joined: 2008-12-21 07:02

Re: which Debian do you use most often?

#5 Post by Soul Singin' »

4D696B65 wrote:Remember Etch-And-A-Half?
OMG! I forgot about that one. Thanks for the memory. Had there been a Lenny-and-a-Half, I might still be using it. . :lol:
4D696B65 wrote:I noticed sid is more stable than testing, go figure. :o
Because broken packages are fixed immediately. Testing has to wait wait wait wait for bug fixes.

PhilGil
Posts: 384
Joined: 2010-05-08 16:43

Re: which Debian do you use most often?

#6 Post by PhilGil »

I checked Testing/Buster because that's what I'm running now, but I run Stable most of the time.

User avatar
sickpig
Posts: 589
Joined: 2019-01-23 10:34

Re: which Debian do you use most often?

#7 Post by sickpig »

Stretch because i hate updates, i reckon testing and sid must have boatloads of them. m happy with just security ones, once in a while. if there is a new version of any app which i absolutely must have then there is always the compile option :D

User avatar
GarryRicketson
Posts: 5644
Joined: 2015-01-20 22:16
Location: Durango, Mexico

Re: which Debian do you use most often?

#8 Post by GarryRicketson »

I guess I am "Fake Debian User", but do run Debian 7 24 hours 7 days a week, also Debian 6 on a machine that never goes on line, runs some equipment and controls incubaters, .... On my "primary system", the PC I use most of the time, and keep current I run OpenBsd 6.5, and use it to host several Qemu VMs, Debian 7, Debian 8(I deleted it) , Debian 9 , Debian 9 /sid , and Debian 10, Buster, another Debian 10, buster, but it will stay with the testing repos, when Buster is released. Another will be for SID,... I was not sure which option to select on the poll and kind of think these polls are pointless, so I did not select any thing.

User avatar
Bloom
df -h | grep > 90TiB
df -h | grep > 90TiB
Posts: 504
Joined: 2017-11-11 12:23
Been thanked: 26 times

Re: which Debian do you use most often?

#9 Post by Bloom »

Everything with a desktop runs either Sid or Testing. My own most-used desktop runs Sid. For several years now without any problems.
Everything without a desktop (servers) used to run Stable, but since about a year they all run Testing. Also without any problems.
So everything here is a rolling release.

peer
Posts: 443
Joined: 2017-03-26 10:14
Has thanked: 8 times
Been thanked: 20 times

Re: which Debian do you use most often?

#10 Post by peer »

my desktop runs on debian 10 testing
I have two old laptops with debian 9.9 stable
And my eeepc runs on debian 8.11 stable. I tried to install debian 9 and 10 but then I get a black screen after starting up..

User avatar
None1975
df -h | participant
df -h | participant
Posts: 1388
Joined: 2015-11-29 18:23
Location: Russia, Kaliningrad
Has thanked: 45 times
Been thanked: 65 times

Re: which Debian do you use most often?

#11 Post by None1975 »

My dektops runs Debian Stable, codename "Stretch". Works like a champ! The third machine runs FreeBSD 12 with Xmonad on top of that.
OS: Debian 12.4 Bookworm / DE: Enlightenment
Debian Wiki | DontBreakDebian, My config files on github

kedaha
Posts: 3521
Joined: 2008-05-24 12:26
Has thanked: 33 times
Been thanked: 77 times

Re: which Debian do you use most often?

#12 Post by kedaha »

Soul Singin' wrote:Back in the day when RickH ran this board....
That caught my eye :wink: ; I remember reading the real Debian user topic and references to it. If I remember right, for example a "real Debian user" always uses vi & no sudo gedit ubunto nonsense! 8)
Anyway, to answer the question, I've always used current stable on all my desktop systems and—and it goes without saying but I'll say it—on my server. I used to run testing and sid in addition to stable for testing purposes but haven't done so for a long time now but I think—laziness permitting— I might try and do that again to follow developments.
As an afterthought, I still think my conjecture (see the footnote link in my signature below) seems legit.
DebianStable

Code: Select all

$ vrms

No non-free or contrib packages installed on debian!  rms would be proud.

debian-2019
Posts: 39
Joined: 2019-03-20 18:25
Has thanked: 5 times
Been thanked: 3 times

Re: which Debian do you use most often?

#13 Post by debian-2019 »

As a beginner, my tendency is to always go with the newest stable version of a distro. But when I started to experience issues due to old kernel or old packages incompatible with newer devices I'm using, I started to experiment with the testing versions. Then I learned Ubuntu (which the stable Linux Mint is based on) is based on the sid version. That is enough to give me assurance my machine will be fine using a testing version of Debian.

User avatar
Head_on_a_Stick
Posts: 14114
Joined: 2014-06-01 17:46
Location: London, England
Has thanked: 81 times
Been thanked: 132 times

Re: which Debian do you use most often?

#14 Post by Head_on_a_Stick »

kedaha wrote:I still think my conjecture [...] seems legit.
+1

I voted for buster but I'm only testing it because the release is imminent and I will keep using it until it goes to LTS, I'm not switching to bullseye until then.
debian-2019 wrote:I started to experience issues due to old kernel or old packages incompatible with newer devices I'm using
https://backports.debian.org/

And thank you for proving kedeha's point :mrgreen:
deadbang

Wheelerof4te
Posts: 1454
Joined: 2015-08-30 20:14

Re: which Debian do you use most often?

#15 Post by Wheelerof4te »

Was bouncing between Testing and Sid every few months since 2018. (yeah, reinstalls are a pain).
Decided on Sid because it is annoying to wait for Chromium updates on Stable and Testing.

User avatar
Danielsan
Posts: 659
Joined: 2010-10-10 22:36
Has thanked: 5 times

Re: which Debian do you use most often?

#16 Post by Danielsan »

Franken Debian forever! :twisted:

trinidad
Posts: 290
Joined: 2016-08-04 14:58
Been thanked: 14 times

Re: which Debian do you use most often?

#17 Post by trinidad »

Stable only, server and desktop, and I always wait a month or two before dist upgrades. Not an old stick in the mud, I just hate problems. Nothing is more stable than Debian stable.

TC
You can't believe your eyes if your imagination is out of focus.

debian-2019
Posts: 39
Joined: 2019-03-20 18:25
Has thanked: 5 times
Been thanked: 3 times

Re: which Debian do you use most often?

#18 Post by debian-2019 »

Head_on_a_Stick wrote:...
debian-2019 wrote:I started to experience issues due to old kernel or old packages incompatible with newer devices I'm using
https://backports.debian.org/

And thank you for proving kedeha's point :mrgreen:
It says there:
"Backports cannot be tested as extensively as Debian stable, and backports are provided on an as-is basis, with risk of incompatibilities with other components in Debian stable. Use with care!"
It sounds to me like getting the same risk (more or less) as going all the way to sid. But thanks for that tip. I'm sure I will explore that option in the future.

Regarding kedeha's point, it is true in my case because there is a justifiable reason why I tried Debian in the first place. I did experience issues in Linux Mint due to problems which originated in Ubuntu. I'm trying to avoid Ubuntu problems by going straight to Debian. But the stable Debian has limitations which renders some of my devices unusable. Don't you think it is just practical to go with the more up-to-date testing version of Debian? As I pointed out, the stable version of Ubuntu is based on sid.

Bulkley
Posts: 6383
Joined: 2006-02-11 18:35
Has thanked: 2 times
Been thanked: 39 times

Re: which Debian do you use most often?

#19 Post by Bulkley »

debian-2019 wrote:Don't you think it is just practical to go with the more up-to-date testing version of Debian?
No.
As I pointed out, the stable version of Ubuntu is based on sid.
"Based on" is not the same as "is." Other distributions apply their own rules which may or may not have any relation to Debian.

User avatar
Head_on_a_Stick
Posts: 14114
Joined: 2014-06-01 17:46
Location: London, England
Has thanked: 81 times
Been thanked: 132 times

Re: which Debian do you use most often?

#20 Post by Head_on_a_Stick »

debian-2019 wrote:It says there:
"Backports cannot be tested as extensively as Debian stable, and backports are provided on an as-is basis, with risk of incompatibilities with other components in Debian stable. Use with care!"
It sounds to me like getting the same risk (more or less) as going all the way to sid.
Not really, the packages in sid haven't been tested at all — you are the guinea pig (thanks!)
debian-2019 wrote:Don't you think it is just practical to go with the more up-to-date testing version of Debian?
No, testing can be less reliable than sid because the package migration is delayed by 10-14 days so if stuff is broken then it can stay broken for a few weeks whereas sid gets the fixes from upstream straight away.

The Security Team don't cover testing/unstable at all so this can make testing rather vulnerable, mine was open the the MDS vulnerability ("zombieload") for a while.

And the API changes can break configurations and force you to keep updating them, which is a pain.
deadbang

Post Reply