My choice is openSuse. Chameleon is the best

Give Danum KDE 4.2 Mepis remaster a look... The torrent for both the 32 & 64-bit is on Linuxtracker... Download speeds for these torrents are outstanding...

JR

Is the fact that I use a distribution on my desktop and do not want to migrate from it to the offered alternatives enough to ask to add NixOS?

See, that's where the "good" admins and the "great" admins differ: the "good" admins can learn how to use the tools given to them to make their job easier; the "great" admins, when there isn't such a tool available, can whip one up.

Never underestimate the power of shell (and Gawk/Perl/Python/D) scripting.

linux only

for Server is so good!

Its interesting that Linus Torvalds was recently quoted as saying he was switching to Gnome because of his dissatisfaction with KDE. I believe that KDE really is at the cutting edge of Display Manager development and for that it deserves accolades. I have just downloaded Kstars and it is really streets ahead of similar astronomy packages. Can't totally agree that you are right about KDE being only for developers but I concede that you have point as it seems that developers are using KDE for trying out some really exciting new things.

Linus Torvalds desktop of choice will only carry weight with those incapable of deciding for themselves.Agreed. I run KDE4 on three systems (one of which is my laptop) and I have noticed a marked increase in stability and functionality. I still use KDE 3.x on my main box because it is still more configurable than KDE4 at the moment.If KDE4 was only for developers it would hardly have been made the default desktop for many of the more well known distros. It is suitable for the 'average' end user, for the power-user it is still lacking in some vital areas.

IMHO the issues in KDE 4 lies mostly in the instability of the "eye candy", The 3d desktop effects. It's when people decide they want a snowing desktop with wobbling windows that explode when they move and do flips when they minimize that kwin starts coughing and vomiting blood all over itself.

I turned off all the fancy effects in 4.0 (just effects, not compositing) and never had a plasma crash since. Same in 4.2 - I think 4.2 crashed on me once, but I was being lazy and not closing apps I was done with, had a runaway wine process going (stupid windows software, won't even run right on a real system!) And then ACPI chipped in with an attempt at a SUSPEND event. I don't blame KDE for that one.

It's true 4.1 was a huge pile of crap. That's why KDE 4.2 was dubbed "The Answer" by the development team.

I second that!!!

I really don't see what Ubuntum has that other numskill distros don't have?

But I suppose it's the old saying of different strokes for different folks.

or

the populace will follow the loudest voice.

They send install CDs over mail for free as in Canonical pays for shipping. And they have the main goal that one who receives such a gift from them should be probably able to make it work somehow (better on average than Windows..) without external help. Being comfortable for experienced users, being cleanly designed etc are just not as important for them.

And Canonical has a lot of money that is in-between charitable donation and indefinite-term venture investment from its founder and leader, Shuttleworth. I think if he just bought Mandriva, Mandriva would rule the GNU/Linux field - and it would probably be slightly better for experienced users than Ubuntu now. But of course relatively clean start also matters.

I hope that poll will not be closed next year, unlike what happened with shells - bash won every year, but there was a lot to learn from the battle for the second place. And some interesting comments about upcoming niche shells were to be found in discussion.

I also wonder whether I will get NixOS added to cast the - probably - only vote here for it. I use it just because I am tired of all the gotchas of package managers..

Ease of use and easy maintainance for the total novice. It's pretty easy for us to take for granted the amount of senior citizens who are (for want of a better word) 'frightened' of computers. The last thing they need is an environment where various alerts keep popping up on them, in most cases spelling doom if they don't installl this or that. Users in the main are not concerned with how it works or why it works, they just want it to work with the minimum of fuss. Ubuntu provides that along with stability (if you stick to the repos) and security.

If Ubuntu is as bad as some members claim, then why does Donald Knuth use it?

http://www.informit.com/articles/article.aspx?p=1193856

As it happens, I've spent the day playing with KDE4.2 on openSuse 11.1. Now, I'm a long-time KDE-disliker ("hater" is too strong a word for it), but I really like 4.2 with all the eye candy turned on. In all my years goofing around with Linux, this is the first time I thought KDE actually looked good. It also works well enough and hasn't crashed on me at all.

So I think KDE didn't take the wrong turn that so many think it has. It's a lot more attractive and less awkward than it used to be, though there's no doubt more refinement to come in the 4 series. I think 4.2 is pretty usable, and from an old dog Openbox user, this is high praise. Who knows, I might even keep it around for a while.

New to GNU/Linux OS... tried a lot. But for me, PCLinuxOS is a good starting distro but I have been using it as a server for several months now. ;-P