Why do you use debian?

[CwF]

...What I need now is some good systemd introduction to learn how to use it....

Code: Select all

 apropos systemd > ~/Documents/Reading_List.txt

lots!

[cpcbegin]

I use Debian because is very stable, very secure and take advantage of hardware to the limit.

[Fossy]

Debian Long Term Support (LTS) : Supported by security and release teams

Debian 11 “Bullseye” i386, amd64, armhf and arm64 August 15th, 2024 to June 30th, 2026
Debian 12 “Bookworm” i386, amd64, armhf and arm64 June 11th, 2026 to June 30th, 2028

https://wiki.debian.org/LTS
https://cdimage.debian.org/debian-cd/cu ... so-hybrid/

[lakido]

Why do you use debian and not another distrobution?

I like the logo
... years ago I tried it with Ubuntu, RedHat, Slackare, and some other... I like the installation process, it never fails! ...
And the amount of documentation it has.

But above all for me it's the logo... I insist!

[CwF]

But above all for me it's the logo... I insist!

I think you're right, it's that simple.

[cogitech]

Hello all,

I've been using Linux as my main OS since the late 90s and tried virtually every distro except the very obscure ones. Until recently, I was walking the bleeding edge with a couple of the popular rolling release distros and I realized that consistency, reliability and security are more important to me than having the latest packages.

Debian bookworm has been a fantastic fit for me so far. There have been little problems here and there but they have been easy to fix. This distro is simply the right choice at the right time in my Linux journey.

[flashycat8827]

My enterance into the GNU/Linux and FOSS side of things was a litteral trail by fire. I was an overly ambitios 12/13 yearold middle/high schooler who wanted to learn his way around the alternative software side of the computing world. I used my allowence to go down to a local Barnes and Nobel book store and purchase a copy of the Red Hat Linux Bible.

I was also lucky enough to have a father whos employeer would allow emplyees to purchase off lease IS/IT hardware from them. On sveral occasions my father would bring me back old pc of all shape and sizes, by then I also hjad installed Debian on a laptop that my parents bought me for typing school assignments. I learned alot about trubleshooting issues surounding using the braodcom-fwcutter-43 package to get wireless cards working.

[Marie SWE]

Hi all
This will be my first post in this forum and my English is not the best and my irritating dyslexia isn't directly to my favor either. Hahaha
I ran into this thread when I was looking for information on an effective firewall.

Why Debian .. It's unfortunately not completely voluntary..... I escaped from windows when win7 reached EOL2020 and win10spyware is not an option and replace all my computers to Apple is way-way to expensive.. I have to many of them
After around 30 years with windows and Microsoft ms-dos since 1987, Linux it is not an completely painless experience.
First I tested all flavors of ubuntu, but it just felt wrong in some mysterious way that can't put my finger on. Then I switched to Mint18.3 which worked fine with win/linux network and all, but when I had to switch to Mint19 some things stopped working, so I switched to LMDE3 Which worked well and was super stable.. just a BIG downside with LMDE... it had a short life before EOL

So Debian seems to be the only distribution which is a LTS version with a little longer life before EOL.. which I am used to from Windows, I really hate to install and tweak computers from core more than once during a computers lifetime. (after installations, setups, tweaks and configurations, I create a recovery partition and a imagebackup of each computer to my server to avoid doing new core installation on each computer ever again.. just a 15min recovery and some security updates and the computer is fit for fight again.)
There is one downside with Debian and that is it's lack of user-friendliness. After 30 years with windows, used to GUI's since the mid/late 90s is the gui-lackiness the only disadvantage i have notised.. otherwise Debian seems to be a good, stable, reliable and promising distro to have on my work-machines.
I have now used Debian in almost 2weeks and I have not managed to configure the 1st computer completely yet.. and I have 6 more computers standing in line. But I'm working on it and I have notice that my microsofts/windows knowledge is my nemesis. I am used to spending a maximum of 3-4 hours/computer on the first install to finished computer with a recovery partition.. I am used to GUI's since the 90s, so Linux feels like a time travel 25 years back in time to ms-dos and win 3.1 And a big downside.. the terminal doesn't have spellcheck for dyslexics hahaha

But it will be fun to learn Debian and to see how Debian develops over time and attracts more and more users, so Debian can compete on the market against wincrap and apple.

I wish you all a nice day and take care of you and your loved ones in these covid times
//Marie

Wow, almost three years ago.. darn have i used Debian that long

Lets see what have changed since my post.. a review on myself

(((I really hate to install and tweak computers from core more than once during a computers lifetime.)))
Yeah this one still goes.. I'm even less enthusiastic nowadays as computer sucks even more.. and i still hate installing computers, but even more it is a hate-hate-hate installing computers now three years later.

(((So Debian seems to be the only distribution which is a LTS version with a little longer life before EOL.)))
i was thinking of CentOS and then IBM/Redhat killed it.. Then came Alma and Rocky they also mention 10years before EOL.. The Redhat pulled a rabbit out of the hat and made it harder for the 1:1 Alma and Rocky builds.. So now everything is in Limbo.
Depending on how my future turns out, i will go Redhat on my server if Alma or Rocky dont find a solid path to go.. it is to much rumors going on on that topic
On my two work desktop and my work laptop i will go back to windows but not crappy home/pro rolling crap.. i will go server2022 re-tweaked for desktop usage.. that will give a version of Windows LTSC but 70% cheaper and i dont have to register a business to get the licenses..
My older two laptops and one desktop will still run Debian12 until they die or end up on the retro shelf.. they barely run Debian now without the CPU's going over 50% on simple tasks.

So why do i use debian.
i still use debian as i have come to that point that Linux is Linux and distributions doesn't matter.. Everything is just about the installed packages that makes the distribution.
With using the root distro instead of mint/ubuntu/mx or all debian forked distros.. i get a cleaner system a lighter system and i can make Debian look like or even become another distro if i want too... But i kind of have my own distro as i dont use Debian out of the box,, i tweak my system and remove stuff and add my stuff, so it kind of becomes a new distro. as distros is about the installed packages and the re-tweaked system.
I have a bad habit of telling the truth. and that do piss off both windows fanboys/girls and linux fanboys/girls.
Windows isn't perfect and becomes even worse for every release.. i do say that on windows forums(tenforums as one example) but i also say the truth about Linux in linux forums.. Linux as server OS is the king of the world... it is just best.. but Linux as desktop/laptop OS is not.. It is so many things that just have to many issues to become a good Desktop/laptop OS.. But it has evolved the last 5½years i have been using Linux as desktop OS. So if they just can fix the big issues, then Linux might become a good Desktop/laptop OS in 5 or 10years.


One of the i tell the truth not so appreciated things. *LOL*
On the LMDE6 release day.. or if it was the day after.. I took an Debian12 Xfce iso.. installed that one.. then i modified that one to become LMDE6.. then i posted that on a Mint forum as.. oh look at my LMDE6 install....
My post was removed a few days later when i told them it was Debian Xfce i had reshaped into LMDE6.. The mint people didn't appreciate my statement that Linux is linux and the installed packages is what makes the distro.


So lets post three pictures out of the 60picture slideshow i made.


So this is why i use Debian as why use a fork of debian if you can make Debian into whatever you want it to become.


Debian becomes LMDE6.. a post i got deleted from a Mint forum.

LMDE6 original is to the left.... and Debian12 Xfce is to the right
This was just to make a point that Linux is Linux and the packages is what makes the distro.

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Take care folks ..., and good luck to all you new Linux users that just starts to discover a new world.
Just remember.. Linux isn't windows or Mac-OS.. as Windows isn't as Mac-OS or Mac-OS as windows... so do not expect Linux to act as windows, as you will just become disappointment then.. Linux is its own thing, a new world for you who never have used it....
always use the right tool for the right job.. you dont use a spoon to fix a roof leak.


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[bbbhltz]

Every time I try another distribution, I find myself coming back to this one.

Did the Ubuntu thing, came back.

Did the Arch thing, and its cousins, and came back.

Even used Alpine Linux and came back.

Nobody could ever say I haven't tried getting out of my comfort zone with regards to Desktop Linux.

[eor2004]

Every time I try another distribution, I find myself coming back to this one.

Did the Ubuntu thing, came back.

Did the Arch thing, and its cousins, and came back.

Even used Alpine Linux and came back.

Nobody could ever say I haven't tried getting out of my comfort zone with regards to Desktop Linux.

Been there, done that, I've had my good share of distro hopping too, but IMHO it gets very tiring after awhile!

[Organic_Marble]

I switched from Windows to Ubuntu 12.04. I was a satisfied Ubuntu user through 18.04 But then they started "knowing what was good for me". Installing new software schemes on my systems without prior authorization. Like Snap,Pro, ESM, phasing apt updates. If these things are good, tell me about them and let me decide if I want them on my computer. As it turned out, I did not think they were good and it became increasingly difficult to get rid of them. 20.04 was the last LTS version where I cared to fight that battle.

So I started looking around. It didn't take long. To a long time Ubuntu user Debian is "Ubuntu without the crap".

So I moved our desktops over to Debian 12 and I'm really happy with it.

My servers will stay on Ubuntu 20.04 for a while because I don't want to face converting them over until I absolutely have to. Eventually they will move to Debian as well.

[M22]

I have heard of the "STABILITY" of the stable branch of Debian. After Bookworm introduced streamlined installation with all firmware, including non-free, included in the official default stable branch ISO, it just made the transition from other distros easier.

Unfortunately, a big blunder happened recently with the Nvidia dkms with an update which rendered Debian unbootable. Ironic, yes. And this happened within a month I came from Arch. (Imagine my horror, coming, expecting a distro known for its "stability") Hopefully it doesn't happen again.

It's time for a distro to take care of itself with minimal inteference from me rather than I trying fix constantly and to make it work as in Arch, especially after updates. I would rather focus on what I am doing than fixing what is supposed to help me do my work.

Otherwise, yes, it's stable, and it ..... just ..... works. In fact, many of its components work much much better than Arch. Printer and Bluetooth comes to mind. Debian cruises with ease with these, whereas I faced lots of hiccups in Arch.

(P.S. my comparison is mostly with Arch, since I was using it for majoirty of the time I spent with Linux.)

[sinterva]

I had a lot of struggles with my last laptop, I used MX-Linux because that was the cool new thing and I had just thrown windows in the garbage.
Yet I struggled to make MX-Linux work properly on my laptop, after totally wrecking my install, I had enough,
so I installed debian around 2018 or so, because I figured the most stable linux might give me a reprieve from all my computing troubles.

It didn't fix everything, as there was some real hardware issues in there that only cash and a new computer could fix,
but it made my computer more stable and I had less issues overall.

[vapourer]

I have been happily using Arch or Manjaro for around 10 years. Always KDE. Every now and again I got the hopping bug and tried Debian, the only other distro that I would consider using, but struggled to get a complete system working, often due to problems with audio but also frustrated with old versions of software.

Last week KDE6 was implemented in Arch and caused chaos on my PC. Tried all ways to make it stable but failed. The solution - move to a non-bleeding edge distribution that will stay with plasma5 for a more judicious time. Tried several debian KDE distros but most wouldn't boot to desktop. Finally tried Debian12 itself and, wow, what a change from previous attempts. Super smooth installation, everything worked immediately including Nvidia graphics and audio. I use a few obscure applications that I would previously get from the AUR but I have found alternative sources and I am extremely happy. I do have an installation of Win10 on a separate SSD which is rarely booted and I will need to use that for some gaming in the short term as I play Starfield and that requires latest video drivers but for all other work I can see myself staying with Debian.

[blackdragon]

Debian is stable, uses low system resources, and gets slow updates.

[nikobit]

My use history was: Mandrake - Red Hat - Mandriva - Debian - Ubuntu - Debian then I preferred to stop switch over. Stability. Firm support for reliable packages. Most of the software that wasn't pre-packaged into the Debian could be found online with original '.deb' packages.

[my2we9dy]

Started off with Xubuntu. Once I got used to that, wanted to get rid of the bloat that it comes with and logical choice was to try out it's "base" (if you will), Debian. There were some pain points in the beginning - had to install non-free WiFi items separately, some tweaks needed to be done (which worked OOTB in Xubuntu) - at one point wanted to give up and go back to Xubuntu but boy am I glad I persisted (Thanks to this forum in part). Every now and then I tried Fedora/OpenSUSE/Gentoo etc. but I always had Debian as a backup/fallback. Recently ended up wiping all the other distros and kept only Debian 12. Couldn't have been happier. Stable/less frequent updates/LTS support until 2028/it simply works - I am done distro hopping. Might try Ubuntu 24.04 LTS in a Virtualbox, just for curiosity if nothing else but Debian will be my Primary distro forever (unless they do something bozo like sell themselves to Canonical or something )

[panpan]

The question is not why I use Debian, but why they use Debian! https://distrowatch.com/search.php?basedon=Debian