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Following the recent CentOS fiasco, I'm advising friends to go with Debian. It's rock solid and can be depended upon.

alexdumitru 6y ago
I've switched from CentOS to Debian 7-8 years ago (Debian 7) and I just love it. I was trying a lot of distros, but I always came back to Debian and I stopped doing that for the past few years because Debian just works.
nerdponx 6y ago
Maybe for servers. But it still has plenty of rough edges as a desktop OS. Mint is a much better choice (IMO) for the desktop, that still is somewhat within the Debian ecosystem.
- jbirer 6y ago
  What are your rough edges? I have found Debian Unstable with latest Gnome to be way more stable and productive than I expected.
  - flukus 6y ago
    I'm not sure if they count as rough edges, but most common things I've come across tend to be security related and the limitations on a normal user. From (foggy) memory you can't sudo by default, and you also can't mount as a normal user. These things are probably perfectly reasonable choices to make for a secure server but annoying for a desktop. This may not count as desktop, but another annoying one is /usr/sbin and some other common directories being missing from the default PATH. Still, it's way less annoying than ubuntu's constant nagging about updates and trying to shove snap in your face.
  - vdfs 6y ago
    For me it was outdated browsers, i switched from Ubuntu just for Chromium and was shocked when i saw the version available, not just Chromium but also Firefox, they backport fixes but don't release new version to stable channel. Not really comfortable using Unstable/Testing channels which my have newer version. It's also hard to download first time you want to install, coming from Ubuntu there is just one x64 .iso and one big "download" button that auto select the right file. In Debian i had to google which file to download from CDs and DVDs version just for x64. And there is the install UI, it give you a 2006 vibe. This small things are easy to fix but still there for some reason, probably because they focus on core and more important stuff, but this are great things to have for new users.
    - zozbot234 6y ago
      > Not really comfortable using Unstable/Testing channels which my have newer version. Debian now has a backports channel with up-to-date kernels, browsers and more, and those packages will install cleanly on a Debian Stable release. You're not supposed to use Testing/Unstable packages, as installing these on Stable will give you a mixed system that's not necessarily expected to work, and might also break unpredictably upon further upgrades.
  - nerdponx 6y ago
    Similar to what flukus said, the default configuration is surprisingly minimal in some cases and surprisingly sophisticated/messy in others. And for a desktop user everything is kind of a bare default experience. And that's not to mention the ancient package versions, but if you're a moderately experienced desktop user you might want to consider using Sid/unstable anyway.
pknopf 6y ago
Fill me in? What recent fiasco?
- Karunamon 6y ago
  CentOS as we know it is basically going away. Worse, they reneged on their promise of long-term support for the last release. What will be known as "CentOS" will be the "stream" version, i.e. a rolling release distro with goals completely antithetical to what was out there before.
- pabs3 6y ago
  CentOS 8 had its EOL brought forward to 2021 and CentOS 9 won't exist. Folks are expected to switch to CentOS Stream, RHEL or another distro. https://lwn.net/Articles/839257/ https://lwn.net/Articles/839257/

I've switched from CentOS to Debian 7-8 years ago (Debian 7) and I just love it. I was trying a lot of distros, but I always came back to Debian and I stopped doing that for the past few years because Debian just works.

nerdponx 6y ago

Maybe for servers. But it still has plenty of rough edges as a desktop OS. Mint is a much better choice (IMO) for the desktop, that still is somewhat within the Debian ecosystem.

jbirer 6y ago
What are your rough edges? I have found Debian Unstable with latest Gnome to be way more stable and productive than I expected.
- flukus 6y ago
  I'm not sure if they count as rough edges, but most common things I've come across tend to be security related and the limitations on a normal user. From (foggy) memory you can't sudo by default, and you also can't mount as a normal user. These things are probably perfectly reasonable choices to make for a secure server but annoying for a desktop. This may not count as desktop, but another annoying one is /usr/sbin and some other common directories being missing from the default PATH. Still, it's way less annoying than ubuntu's constant nagging about updates and trying to shove snap in your face.
- vdfs 6y ago
  For me it was outdated browsers, i switched from Ubuntu just for Chromium and was shocked when i saw the version available, not just Chromium but also Firefox, they backport fixes but don't release new version to stable channel. Not really comfortable using Unstable/Testing channels which my have newer version. It's also hard to download first time you want to install, coming from Ubuntu there is just one x64 .iso and one big "download" button that auto select the right file. In Debian i had to google which file to download from CDs and DVDs version just for x64. And there is the install UI, it give you a 2006 vibe. This small things are easy to fix but still there for some reason, probably because they focus on core and more important stuff, but this are great things to have for new users.
  - zozbot234 6y ago
    > Not really comfortable using Unstable/Testing channels which my have newer version. Debian now has a backports channel with up-to-date kernels, browsers and more, and those packages will install cleanly on a Debian Stable release. You're not supposed to use Testing/Unstable packages, as installing these on Stable will give you a mixed system that's not necessarily expected to work, and might also break unpredictably upon further upgrades.
- nerdponx 6y ago
  Similar to what flukus said, the default configuration is surprisingly minimal in some cases and surprisingly sophisticated/messy in others. And for a desktop user everything is kind of a bare default experience. And that's not to mention the ancient package versions, but if you're a moderately experienced desktop user you might want to consider using Sid/unstable anyway.

pknopf 6y ago

Fill me in? What recent fiasco?

Karunamon 6y ago
CentOS as we know it is basically going away. Worse, they reneged on their promise of long-term support for the last release. What will be known as "CentOS" will be the "stream" version, i.e. a rolling release distro with goals completely antithetical to what was out there before.
pabs3 6y ago
CentOS 8 had its EOL brought forward to 2021 and CentOS 9 won't exist. Folks are expected to switch to CentOS Stream, RHEL or another distro. https://lwn.net/Articles/839257/ https://lwn.net/Articles/839257/