Slackware

Like always, Slackware. :)

Slackware baby

OS X doesn't count I suppose? :)

@tadeas, Yeah, Neither does Windows :rolleyes:


Hi Trentfox, how does the Pantheon desktop environment compare with Gnome shell, or Unity Shell? I haven't tried Pantheon, but i saw an advert a little while ago for Elementary that made it look interesting.

Distribution of the Year
 

Ubuntu, without any doubt!
Ray

Linux Mint Debian Edition
 

Linux Mint Debian Edition

Rock solid KANOTIX (debian) is not en the list..... try it and enjoy it!.

Hey...? Don't forget "CentOS", It's my Distro

Arch

Personaly I like Netrunner. I'm currently using version 14.01 - Enigma 2. It is very stable, reliable, comes with many pre-installed apps and looks great! I originally used Ubuntu 9.04, some several years ago, but really preferred KDE. So after many distro hops, I landed on Kubuntu, which I really liked. Hoever, I found Kubuntu was prone to hanging and seemed to need to be restarted a lot more often than I would expect of Linux. So I finaly arrived at Netrunner 'DryLand' a year or two ago and have used Netrunner ever since.
Now if Netrunner was to be released with a Debian core, as a rolling distro, complete with KDE front end... Well, I just couldn't help myself. So my vote, as it stands for now, is for Netrunner.
Thank you for the oportunity to voice my opinion. Cheers, Jim

Linux Mint. You have access to a wide range of tested and hassle-free packages that are available for Ubuntu & Debian, plus that the Cinnamon (or Mate) is much lighter and more elegant than Unity/Gnome. In addition, every time you're in hurry and have to use a set of packages to get your job done (without distracting from what you're doing), you don't have to build up every single package from scratch. It's still customizable. By the way, I realy like WIMP design principle as it's more user friendly and easier for navigation.

Debian Stable

mostly ubuntu and also using slackware

Arch for the freedom it offers its users and its amazing documentation.

For me, it is Mageia. It is only because Mageia is the most just works on my laptop.

Slackware!
 

Slackware!

Widest Range of Choice??
 

Really? Yikes!!

Mayhaps you should take a look at Slack or Arch if you're priority is widest range of choice. Now, that said, you're going to have to work harder to get there from here than putting in a disk and clicking a few mouse clicks to get a working desktop, but from where I sit, building from ground up represents the ultimate in choice. Indeed, it is debatable whether backing out who knows what all got added by automated installer, various dependencies, and tracking down ensuing breakages is in fact far more time consuming that adding in everything that you need/want from a minimal base provided by something like Slack or Arch (or e.g. OpenBSD or FreeBSD). From my experience, I would argue that building from ground up is much less time consuming in the final analysis. At least for those who want it their way. Now, if you're happy as a clam with what that installer gave you... that is another matter. But you indicated you favore widest choice, so.... there you go. My $0.02 :)

Erm, but Slackware installs a heck of a lot for the default install so that you don't have to track down dependencies. I'm not knocking it but it differs from dependency-resolving distributions only in that the packages are there from the beginning. Otherwise you're doing your own dependency checking and can just as easily mess up as a package manager could.
I do like Slackware, by the way, but it's a little disingenuous to suggest that a package manager somehow creates breakages that you can't get without dependency management.

This in reply to my post above? Okay, admittedly I haven't installed/used Slack for many, many years now, but last I did (decade ago??) you were pretty much building/compiling everything from ground up. Just to be clear, I wasn't referencing package manager. I was thinking more in terms of what you get from a "default install" and then customizing form there. Thanks for your insights.

P.S.; Yes, I know that Debian installer offer very base, minimalistic install as well, but you need to go to expert mode, no? Anyhow, maybe o.p. was correct after all.... I've got old Debian 1.0 CD's in the pile somewhere but gotten away from Debian in recent years, so not up on the lastest.

It was, I was referring to this:From what I read here dependency problems are a Linux issue whichever distribution you use -- it's just that the likes of Debian and Fedora (to pick two) let you know of the problems by being a pain in the proverbial to get things with contradicting dependencies installed and the likes of Slackware just mean tracking things down and sorting your simlinks.
I don't think one is better than the other but I think both are as annoying.

Thanks for that. I've been too busy to go distro hoping as of late. Or maybe this is more reflection of being pretty satisfied with Archlinux and not having an intch to scratch. In any case, I probably should have just kept my mouth shut on this one :-P

Not at all, your opinion is as valid as anybody else's. I just felt the need put the other side of the coin across. I'm not particularly knowledgeable about Linux and I've been using Debian or derivatives almost exclusively on my bare metal for years so I'm happy to be contradicted. I do keep almost installing Slackware (I don't recall whether it's dual-booting on my desktop or not at present) but I never seem to get around to it.
The more distros I use in VMs the more I appreciate that they all have their place and there is no real "best" just the best for you.

Agree. I always recommend a healthy dose of distrohopping for anyone seeking "the best distro".

Slack!

just a quick tip for anyone wanting to play with Slackware:
If you install sbotools from www.slackbuilds.com you will get a ports like package manager for www.slackbuilds.com, so for instance: sboinstall blender will install blender with any dependencies, sbofind tmux will search the repo for tmux, and so on..

There are other options as well, slapt-get with the salix repo will give you a Debian like package manager with dependency resolution.

But even with these tools the 3rd party repositories are not nearly as extensive as the ones you will find for Debian, arch, or even the BSD's. Of course building your own slackbuilds from source is part of the fun with Slackware :)

Xubuntu.

Slackware GNU/Linux :D

Gentoo is the one) total choice for the user together with great tools.

Debian. Look at the percentage of distos on that list that came from debian...

Slackware, as usual.

i got Slackware

slackware
 

slackware

Slackware

Slackware is the only right answer

Red Hat was my introduction to Linux, but Ubuntu is the cleanest and fastest distro I have used. It runs my desktop P2P server, and is the choice to dual boot into on my laptop.

Manjaro (Arch)

I actually use CentOS on my desktop, but that doesn't seem to be an option. :)

Here maybe?

But, WW: http://www.debian.org/Pics/openlogo-50.png, http://www.debian.org/! :D

Ubuntu

simple...
SLACKWARE

Kubuntu! But I must be the only person that uses it; it does not appear in the choices to vote on.

All the 'buntus are lumped together under Ubuntu.

Ubuntu comes with GNOME version 3... which many people have agreed is crap. Kubuntu, with KDE, is way better.

Strange that Linux Mint was not grouped with Ubuntu.

Need I say, based on... plus, put KDE on any Linux.

P.s: edit\add; love when any Linuces user mentions software I've not heard of, it's always available in (I know this can be true in others but seems not as much as) Debian!

Linux Mint by a mile!

Man, this was a hard one this year. Been running Slackware for a long time now, but my laptop has been changed to Fedora. Put it on there to give it a try, never took it off....

Someone can interpret that in other way :P
My vote goes for Slackware

Lot's I've never heard of in that list, much less tried. I'm voting Archlinux, as it seems to suck the least and I've been pretty happy with it. The arrogance of the Arch community? Now that's another matter entire. Arch doesn't need to be an "advanced users" only distro but some seem to need to get their self esteem via dissing lesser knowledgable folk :(

Be that as it may, if you're new to Linux and have the time to spend with it, Arch will learn you a thing or three :)

I tried Arch in its pre-systemd days, it was OK, but I'm not keen on rolling releases.