[OT] Good or best Linux distro?

[John Colvin]

On Saturday, 25 January 2014 at 15:52:39 UTC, H. S. Teoh wrote:
> On Sat, Jan 25, 2014 at 11:51:57AM +0000, John Colvin wrote:
>> On Friday, 24 January 2014 at 16:14:15 UTC, H. S. Teoh wrote:
>> >On Fri, Jan 24, 2014 at 06:01:33AM -0500, Nick Sabalausky 
>> >wrote:
>> >[...]
>> >>While Linux isn't my primary desktop system, the desktop 
>> >>Linux stuff
>> >>I do work with has gone from Ubuntu -> Debian -> Mint.
>> >>
>> >>I left Ubuntu because Canonical was starting to piss me off, 
>> >>partly
>> >>because of their apparent obsession with being basically 
>> >>just an OSX
>> >>clone. So I went upstream to Debian. Still run Debian on my 
>> >>server,
>> >>but I abandoned it as a desktop OS partly because so much of 
>> >>it is
>> >>out of date literally before they even release it, and also 
>> >>because
>> >>once they do get a newer version of something, there's a 
>> >>fair chance
>> >>you can't actually get it without upgrading the whole OS 
>> >>because not
>> >>everything actually gets into backports
>> >[...]
>> >
>> >You should just run off Debian/unstable (or if you're chicken,
>> >testing).  I do.  In spite of the name, it's actually already 
>> >as
>> >stable as your typical desktop OS with its typical occasional 
>> >random
>> >breakage.  Stable is really for those people who are running 
>> >mission
>> >critical servers that when the OS dies, people die. That's 
>> >why it's
>> >always "out of date", 'cos everything must be tested 
>> >thoroughly
>> >first. For desktop users you don't need that kind of 
>> >stability, and
>> >generally you don't want to wait that long to get software 
>> >upgrades.
>> >So just use unstable or testing.  I've been living off 
>> >unstable for
>> >almost 15 years and have only had 1 or 2 occasions when 
>> >things broke
>> >in a major way. That's saying a lot considering how many 
>> >times I've
>> >had to reformat and reinstall Windows (supposedly a stable 
>> >release
>> >version!) back when I was still stuck using it.
>> >
>> >
>> >T
>> 
>> The thing with stability is, it's meaningless without context. 
>> The
>> only thing that has meaning is stability in the face of a 
>> particular
>> workload.
>> 
>> Mission critical servers tend to have very static 
>> requirements. A
>> power-user's desktop has very dynamic requirements. Debian 
>> stable
>> will be more "stable" for the server, but the same is not
>> necessarily true for the desktop.
>
> OK, but what I was getting at was that Debian 'unstable' is 
> actually
> usable for daily desktop needs in spite of the name.
>
>
> T

I was agreeing with you, in a very round-a-bout way :)