Advice on what distro to call home

[zfish]

Hello to you all. I have been searching for a distro to call home and start my linux path. Not many distro have worked for me. Mageia, Fedora, Opensuse, and Linux Mint Debian has. Distro are just flavors, linux is just linux i guess. I just can't decide on which distro to stay with as I learn more about linux. What are you guys' thought on the subject. I can say Magia installed wonderfully, loading up nice, and I got no problems from it. Thanks you for your time.

zFish

[Plisgyn]

Over the years I have tried many distros and found the best one is the one you feel comfortable with and has good support on the forum. I am now using Mageia 2.

[oldcodger]

Without any hesitation, doubt or reservation Mageia is the way to go.

[saptech]

Of course, Mageia is the ONE. If you have it installed then just continue to use it. That is the only way to really get to know and like any distro, by using it.

[pete910]

Without any hesitation, doubt or reservation Mageia is the way to go.

What he/she said

Pete

[trinux]

I completely agree with Plisgyn. You can spend a lot of time trying out distros, but what really matters is if you like using it and you can get answers to your questions. If you can get all of that and the distro/community has a philosophy and attitude that fits with you than you're set.

trinux

[Waystorome]

I am using Linux in a professional context 24h/7days.
I am stressing privacy. That's why I am here now: To try and start with Mageia.

- Ubuntu: Amazon Lens and Shuttleworth reaction on critic ("We are root. You trust us with your data this or that way") is an absolute failure (I know it can be easily deinstalled, but it needs to)

- Linux Mint: I call it the Google-Distro and that is a no-go for me. Why? Because of the "so-called" "search-enhancer" in Firefox and the fact that my standard installation did send my IP to Google every 15 min. For NO reason that could interest me as a user.

- Fedora: Every search I do with Firefox send the fact, that I am a Fedora-User to the search engine. I don't like that. I never agreed to that.

So ... now I am trying Mageia. With big expectations for I know the French officer for privacy is quite active.

First disappointment before I even installed Mageia: The mageia pages are "under control" of Google by Google-Analytics. I hope the anonymize function is used?

Call me paranoid. But that doesn't mean they're not after you too ...

[isadora]

...................
First disappointment before I even installed Mageia: This forum is "under control" of Google by Google-Analytics. I hope the anonymize function is used?

Thanks for your input Waystorome, and a very warm welcome to the Mageia forum!!!

Concerning your remark towards Google-Analytics:
i will point admin at your question.

Have magical times around!!!

[doktor5000]

Concerning your remark towards Google-Analytics:
i will point admin at your question.

Well, it's already mentioned in our privacy policy: https://wiki.mageia.org/en/Privacy_poli ... _analytics
And yes, as our admin and the web team members are definitely privacy-concerned, those analytics data are anonymized.

@Waystorome: You may want to read up on that (privacy policy). Also you may be interested in the fact, that Mageia will use DuckDuckGo
as the default search engine for most browsers. For more details your may want to look at https://www.zarb.org/pipermail/mageia-d ... 20085.html

If you have more questions just ask

[isadora]

Thanks doktor5000!!!

[Waystorome]

Thanks for the warm welcome and the initiative.

I checked the webpage code of mageia.org and couldn't find the use of the anonymize-function Google was forced to offer to make it's service legal?

"You must use appropriate settings in the Google Analytics program code to instruct Google to shorten IP addresses. For each web page that incorporates Google Analytics, the "_anonymizeIp()" function must therefore be added to the tracking code. Further information can be found in Google's technical instructions at "http://code.google.com/intl/de/apis/analytics/docs/gaJS/gaJSApi_gat.html#_gat._anonymizeIp"."

English pdf:
http://www.datenschutz-hamburg.de/uploads/media/GoogleAnalytics_Guidelines_EnglishTranslation.pdf

On topic, but only in German:
http://www.heise.de/newsticker/meldung/Google-Analytics-ist-amtlich-datenschutzkonform-1343698.html

The reasoning behind is the following: The IP-Adress is (at last in Germany but EU privacy law is quite similiar) considered private data. And, even if you don't want to follow that, if you add all the info you transfer while surfing plus cookies etc., the whole amount of transfered data is quite unique. Therefore I would really recommend to use this easy-to-install technique.

Ah, yes, and thanks for the info about duckduckgo. I really appreciate that. (Though I cannot understand why Google allows DuckDuckgo to use it's registered design "centered field to insert search term" and it makes me a bit nervous ... this "allowance" or "tolerance" by the competitor (?) Google).

And, ahm, not to derail this thread any longer:

I had a lot of Problems with Windows95/98. Bluescreens and unexplainable shit. Lost a lot of nerves and money. At that time I thought: Wow - an economy that introduces Microsoft must be a very rich and stable one for it makes people lose so much time and energy.

WindowsXP was stable but was constantly phoning home i.e. delivered data about (at least!) the last movies, music you watched. And, in the beginning, it was not possible to stop it doing that. A no-go for me.

I started Linux with Suse but then didn't like the cooperation of Novell with Microsoft. And also the installer was very slow. But that's long ago. And, I must say, I am a hectic user and not a specialist, I cannot talk about details so I only have a few rough comments that might be worthless for most of you.

Ubuntu was a great success for me and I used it over four, five years - easy, fast, uncomplicated and a unique german support forum. I still have it running and have to help people who used it - as far as I can. And my usage is always like 24h/7days. Apart from the Amazon Lens-Thinking, mentioned above, I also was frustrated a lot by Unity. Unity worked for me quite flawlessly and I used it 24hrs/7days from the very beginning. But - I could go into details - its not ok for real office paperwork and that's what I am doing. And also I didn't like that they copied so many optical elements from Apple. And, yes, I know I can use different desktop environments with Ubuntu, but I always want to learn the main stream and the leading edge.

Linux Mint - aside from the obvious Google-addiction (at the time I installed and used it) absolutely ok. Especially I do like their attempt to make a direct debian distribution! But I never got no exe-Programm with WINE running ... maybe I didn't try hard enough and it has good reasons, but with Ubuntu it worked out of the box.

Fedora - destroyed my Linux Mint with installation. Perhaps because it uses UEFI-shit? I don't know. But it behaved like Microsoft on my harddisk I thought. Worked flawlessly, exe-files didn't work out of the box like they do with Ubuntu (and Wine, always). I am happy to leave Fedora because, simply, I have a better feeling about european distros because they are more used to respect privacy. It's more a culture in Europe. In fact I don't no any other country like Germany where it is considered a crime and punishable by prison to deliver/collect private data. I like that.




ps. Is there a possibility to hide the exact url behind a word? Looks less overinformative ...

[isadora]

...................
ps. Is there a possibility to hide the exact url behind a word? Looks less overinformative ...

Would be possible through:

Code: Select all

[url=http://www.url.something/]A Word[/url]

Good luck!!!

[doktor5000]

I checked the webpage code of mageia.org and couldn't find the use of the anonymize-function Google was forced to offer to make it's service legal?

"You must use appropriate settings in the Google Analytics program code to instruct Google to shorten IP addresses. For each web page that incorporates Google Analytics, the "_anonymizeIp()" function must therefore be added to the tracking code. Further information can be found in Google's technical instructions at "http://code.google.com/intl/de/apis/analytics/docs/gaJS/gaJSApi_gat.html#_gat._anonymizeIp"."

English pdf:
http://www.datenschutz-hamburg.de/uploads/media/GoogleAnalytics_Guidelines_EnglishTranslation.pdf

On topic, but only in German:
http://www.heise.de/newsticker/meldung/Google-Analytics-ist-amtlich-datenschutzkonform-1343698.html

The reasoning behind is the following: The IP-Adress is (at last in Germany but EU privacy law is quite similiar) considered private data. And, even if you don't want to follow that, if you add all the info you transfer while surfing plus cookies etc., the whole amount of transfered data is quite unique. Therefore I would really recommend to use this easy-to-install technique.

You might want to discuss that with web team webteam mailing list or report it as a bug against the websites where you think it should be used: https://wiki.mageia.org/en/How_to_report_a_bug_properly
As the product you should choose "Websites" at https://bugs.mageia.org/enter_bug.cgi

ps. Is there a possibility to hide the exact url behind a word? Looks less overinformative ...

Yup, that is called masking You need to do it like this (showing in code tags, as otherwise you don't see how it's done, only the result

Code: Select all

[url=https://duckduckgo.com/]This is NOT google[/url]

Results in This is NOT google

[Waystorome]

Thank you for the editing-instructions!

ps. And, no, I will not use the bug-reporting system for it shows - without reason - my email to everybody there. Forever. I understand, I am a nervous wreck, though I am not doing or planing anything illegal but the opposite.

[doktor5000]

Well, on a mailing list it will also show your email to all others
But you can also use the PM function of the forum to write to the relevant contacts, i'd start with Romain d'Alverny (rda)
one of the web team members and one of Mageia's founders: memberlist.php?mode=viewprofile&u=66

I've just asked him to take a look at this thread

EDIT: He's already on it ...

[rda]

I will not use the bug-reporting system for it shows - without reason - my email to everybody there. Forever.

Well, your email address is _stored_ in Mageia user database and in Bugzilla, but not shown to anyone but logged in users (that is, people we trust to join for the best of the project). In face of anonymous visitors and search bots, the email address is truncated and not identifying/useful enough to be scraped and used.

Anyway. Thanks for mentioning

Code: Select all

_anonymizeIp()

function, didn't know about this. I'll deploy it right away and update the privacy policy. By the way, we expect to migrate from Google Analytics to a self-hosted solution (http://piwik.org/ being the best candidate so far), once someone can focus on this very migration + the associated maintenance.

[Waystorome]

OFF TOPIC:
Thanx!
Yeah, maybe I am too nervous about privacy with Email and the Bugzilla thingies.
But I can assure you I recently and constantly hear(d) about people who would like their early day entries in newsgroups deleted. And it is very difficult ... to get that done.

[simonhoare]

Regarding what distro, it really depends what you want.

If you want to use Linux because you want to be a sysadmin, you need to be aware that three main distributions seem to be in use on servers and/or mainframes : Red Hat Enterprise Linux/CentOS, SUSE Enterprise Server Linux and Debian (not so much enterprise and not so much on mainframes). So if that's you, you're looking at Fedora, CentOS, Scientific Linux, Rosa or Stella for RHEL/CentOS, OpenSUSE for SUSE and Debian or even Mint or Ubuntu for Debian. Mandriva, Slackware and Gentoo are also used.

If it's just for fun/general use, I'd go for something like Mageia, OpenSUSE, Ubuntu or one of its countless variants such as Mint, PinguyOS, ZorinOS, ZevenOS, OS 4, Trisquel etc. All of these are good fun but also perfectly serious distros that you can learn a lot with and there's no shame in using any of them.

If you like to tinker, distros like Arch and Gentoo can be fun.

If you really love Ubuntu and dislike CentOS, you're going to learn more about Linux with it than you will with CentOS because CentOS will just feel like a chore. Trust your instincts and just go with the distro that puts a smile on your face when you're using it.

As the others have said, a community does help and again what you like should be a major consideration. The CentOS, Debian and Arch forums are great. For the right user. They will gladly help you but you need to demonstrate that you have done "due diligence" first. If you don't appreciate that way of operating, you won't feel comfortable reaching out for help when you need it and as a result, you won't enjoy your time with the distro.

[Fargo]

I'm new here as well and just checking things out. I've been using a Debian based distro for the last few years, but find that the software is often old and installing newer software can often break the system. Otherwise, debian is rock solid stable. But regardless I have started looking at other distros just to see what is out there. I used PCLinuxOS years ago and really liked it. Execpt I hated the rolling release aspect. I need stability more than I need current programs. But with PCLOS having the same roots as Mageia I decided to have a look at Mageia.

To help you decide what you need here are some of the things I am taking into consideratin as I look at different distros. How important are the following items:

Stability vs latest programs - Typically the more stable the distro the older the software and hardware detection. Distros like Debian or CentOS are stable but some software is old. Distros like Ubuntu have the newest software but is not the most stable. Personally I'd like to see something with yearly updates and 2-3 years support. Ubuntu LTS are tempting but I have stability concerns. Mageia might fit with the 9 month release cycle. Although I wish they could add another 9 months of support. 18 months doesn't get me through 2 years. A 27 month support cycle would be fantastic for me.

Programs - Ubuntu has a large universe of programs to choose from. Since they are the biggest distro, commercial releases like Steam are being released to Ubuntu first and may never be available for other distros. Debian and other Deb based distros also have a wide variety of programs and can ofter run Ubuntu programs. I don't know how Mageia handles outside rpms or other programs and what kind of issues that may cause.

Security - there is already some good info in this thread about security.

Tools - The biggest draw to Mageia for me is the Control Center. This was may favorite feature in PCLinuxOS and the one thing that has me looking at Mageia along with stable release cycles.

Codecs and Multimedia - How important is it to have mutimedia supported out of the box? (Since I am new, I have no idea where Mageia stands on multimedia support). This is one of the big draws for distros like PClinuxOS and Mint and others.

Ease of use - how important is easy software update and installation? I haven't used Ubuntu, but I understand software maintenances is very easy. Again, I haven't installed Mageia to know how easy or difficult it is. But its something to consider.

Desktop choices - Do you know which desktop you want (KDE, Gnome, Razorqt, Etc) If not a distro like Mageia is nice because you can play with different desktops without changing the underlying system. If you know what you like then find a distro with that desktop and don't worry about the others.

Hardware support - How many different systems will you support? I always liked PCLOS because they have fanatastic hardware support. Unfortuneatly my first experience with Mageia didn't work on 3 of the 3 computers I tried.

These are just a few things to consider how important they are too you.