On 01/19/2013 05:07 PM, [email protected] wrote:
Hello:
Please provide some examples of common problems when using Debian GNU
/ LINUX....so that I may more effectively gain a better handle on the
trouble-shooting process.
Thank you!
Sincerely,
Herschel
Maybe the primary problem comes with Debian's more zealous adherance to
the Free Software philosophy. It is a good thing, for the most part, but
it has some disadvantages, particularly in the realm of hardware and the
sort of support a lot of open source drivers offer, specifically with
display drivers or wireless networking..
Biggest example of this having a downside for Debian is official debian
media not providing "nonfree" firmware for wifi chipsets, making it
often much more difficult to install the system if you can't simply wire up.
I've also got to be perhaps a little frank... Debian's multilib/java
support has always been a bit of a low point for me.
Debian does offer non-free software in unsupported repositories, but at
install time these are usually not accessible.
Don't misinterpret this as me not likign Debian, I really do like Debian
for servers (I use Debian on my server.). I don't generally find it as
ideal for desktops as many other distributions for the reasons above.
Debian Stable is maybe not the best for desktops if you're interested in
having more up-to-date software. The concept behind Stable is
near-implausible levels of quality control on the packages.
There is testing and unstable. Testing is actually maybe better thought
as the "Debian best for desktops" by many because it gets into that
balance of "recent" packages with a still somewhat reasonable amount of
stability.
Sid is not recommended for anything but actual testing and quality
control purposes. It's full rolling release but because it's about
developing packages as opposed to providing a full-on usable system as
rolling release, it's not ideally suited for desktops or servers. If you
like rolling release and want to use it as a "stable" Linux system I'd
recommend Arch instead.
But I digress.
Debian is a wonderful system! Great community, very high quality
packages, and easy to get help for. Just watch out for the caveats that
come with a "Free Software" mentality.
Conrad
