I've been running Debian Etch for a few weeks now, and have liked it for the most part, especially APT. However, I am often frustrated at it how far behind it is, not having KDE4, and how many applications are only available in testing.

I've considered switching to Ubuntu (Kubuntu, actually), and am testing out the live cd. But I was wondering if all you smart people could maybe let me know the basic differences between Debian and Ubuntu.

I know that Debian has the most packages of any linux distro, or at least that's what I heard. However, Ubuntu is supposedly more cutting edge. I've also heard it said that Ubuntu sacrifices customizeability for useability (Vista in disguise). However, that's not always a bad thing. Does anyone know more about this? I'm not a hardcore programmer, but being able to configure linux is part of why I use it.

Any thoughts? Thanks!

Debian comes in 3 flavors, Stable, Testing, Unstable ... each step becoming more cutting edge. None of them has KDE4 yet, though. Ubuntu is based on Debian Unstable so there you are.

If you're a newbie...

Learn on Ubuntu for about 6-8mo. 99% of what you learn on Ubuntu, will almost directly correspond the same way on Debian...

Then switch to Debian.. I personally always stick w/ Debian Stable(Etch)..

IGF

IMHO, you should not be all that worried about the current abscence of KDE 4, because it isn't usable yet. (Note that this is my opinion based on a couple of trials with KDE 4, but not the latest 4.1 version, and YMMV...I'm hoping for 4.2 to meet my criteria for usability, but I've neen over-optimistic so far and it might easily be 4.3.)

Debian (whoever it is that embodies Debian) would claim that their thoroughness in testing means that their 'testing' is as stable as msny 'lesser' distribution's release packages. Whatever you think about that, using Debian testing isn't a bad thing.

I'm not sure this means what you seem to think it means (and I blame Ubuntu for that). Ubuntu is the Gnome version of Ubuntu, as opposed to say, Kubuntu which is the KDE version of Ubuntu. Gnome does tend to reduce configurability relative to KDE to get to an 'easier to use out of the box' user experience and it does have the effect that Gnome (or someone down the line from the user who packages Gnome) is dictating how the user interface is set up, to an extent. For people who argue that Kde just has too many settings and too much config, this is a good thing. I'm not one of them. For me, kde probably could be easier to configure, but I don't want to lose configurability to get there.

OTOH, all ubuntus tend to be a bit simplified, but I think mainly what was meant was that Gnome is less tweakable than KDE, unless you work to put tweakability back (and then you are probably building your own gnome, and that's probably not worthwhile for ordinary mortals).

And, in extremis, just because a particular distro doesn't have the gui that you want doesn't mean that you can't have it. You might have to get it from, e.g., the KDE site and/or build it yourself, but you can still have it. Usually, I find it better to wait, but if you've really got to have it...

If you are absolutely sold on Ubuntu, the KDE version (Kubuntu) has a version to download which comes with KDE4.

Ubuntu is like Debian like Slackware based distributions are like Slackware, and like RPM based distributions are like...ummm, are based on RPM, and like source based distributions are based on...ummm, source code.

Debian has it's stable, testing, and unstable branches. The stable branch is very stable at the cost of not having the latest versions.

The Ubuntu distribution is based on Debian and behaves as Debian often but not always, because Ubuntu is based on Debian and is not the Debian Linux distribution.

Don't consider Ubuntu/Kubuntu, try it. It's available on live CDs.

Maybe you will like the differences Ubuntu/Kubuntu introduces and maybe you won't.