Re: [tlug] Mandrake vs. Red Hat

[Josh Glover <jmglov@example.com>]

Matt Doughty wrote:

> I can't think of any reason to use RH over debian. The install
> might not be as flashy, but once you are installed everything
> else is better. As far as binary package based distros I really
> don't think anything I have seen compares to Debian period. You
> can't make a mistake switching.

I knew this thread would touch off a flamewar!

Come on, "everything else is better"!? Care to quantify or qualify that 
statement in some way?

In my opinion, RPM is a much better system than dpkg / apt-foo. Of 
course, I prefer BSD ports (and how about Gentoo's portage! good shite!) 
to RPM, but that is not particularly binary-based. Intelligent use of 
RPM has served me quite well.

But, to drop the hostility to your opinions for a moment, what are some 
of the specific things that you like better in Debian?

As for RH "getting in the way", I agree that I certainly can, but I have 
to fall back to the argument that just because a distro provides flashy 
config tools and so on, the admin is not required to use them. I have 
not touched a *config tool in a good long while (discounting ifconfig, 
of course!), and not felt particularly hindered.


-- 
Josh Glover <jmglov@example.com>

Associate Systems Administrator
INCOGEN, Inc.