Right on. I suppose the reason I was asking for a security distro category, or allowing kali/whatever in the security category, is that when someone comes to the poll to find out the best security *thing*, it would be more beneficial to have an entire distro of security tools than a single security program.

I personally don't think of the polls as a place that decides which is best but to find out what is available that I might not have heard of.

Im sure that is wrong and no one else approaches it like that. But I thought it best to explain where I was coming from.

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As requested on the Nominees thread, per next year's categories (2017): Privacy Solution of the Year might be too all-encompassing. Perhaps split off Encryption Application of the Year and add applications such as dm-crypt, AES Crypt, Cryptomator to it?

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Request for 2017.

How about best live distro running live from a usb stick. (This may be the future for users?)
Also, best distro on an old box with 1GB RAM or less (for example).

Those are more focused on being penetration testing distributions.

Perhaps a category for 'security focused' / hardened distribution of the year, would be more suitable? There are a number of such distributions as I recall.

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It's possible we'll remove the Mobile Distribution of the Year category next year if it continues to be as lopsided as in the past, which would make way for one new distro category. "penetration testing distributions" seem like a very niche category to include, but it's possible there is enough broad interest. As for "live distro running live from a usb stick", we had a live category years ago but with the size of USB sticks today and the fact that most distros have a live version, wouldn't this category largely just mirror the desktop category, or is your contention that being a good live distro is different (and will have meaningfully different results) than being a good desktop distro?

--jeremy

A thought...

I sort of think that the desktop/server distribution differences are shrinking.

Centos? Desktop/server. Slackware? Desktop/server. Fedora? Desktop/server. Scientific Linux? Desktop/server. Gentoo? Desktop/server. Ubuntu? Desktop/server.

Pretty much every distro that is "for servers" has the packages to make it a desktop. So in my mind, to be fair, every OS listed on "best linux server" should be available on the "best linux desktop" list.

While I'm open to feedback, in my opinion these should definitely remain different categories. Many things that make a distro good for a server (long term support, not updating package versions, minimal packages by default, little rev, strict security policies, etc.) make them extremely painful to use on the desktop and many things that make a distro good for a desktop (quick rev, cutting edge packages, lax default security, etc.) make them completely unsuitable for real server usage. While there is some overlap, they are vastly different mainstream use cases with very little overlap.

--jeremy

Right on. Ok, to continue the thought then.

Not looking to get rid of the categories for sure... But you kind of hit what i was thinking. For example, going by your criteria alone,.. There shouldn't be overlap really. Slackware or any other distro that is currently on both lists either meets the one criteria or the other. It is either a good server distro or it is a good desktop distro.

server (long term support, not updating package versions, minimal packages by default, little rev, strict security policies)
desktop (quick rev, cutting edge packages, lax default security)

Sticking to our hard and fast rules, we should be able to successfully group them properly without much overlap no?

Your definitions:
@Jeremy - did you consider this a valid concern of the server/desktop lists?

If we were to keep it the way it is, ignoring the difference between desktop and server according to your definitions, would we not just have to list all distros on both lists to be 100% fair?

As mentioned, there is very little overlap. That said, in some cases, it makes sense to be in both categories (and many of those, the long term supported version is in the server category and the more regular release is in the desktop category). We have no plans to merge the categories at this time.

--jeremy

Running 'live' in this context means having 'persistence' on a live USB distro.

A lot of people are choosing to run from USB, so yes, it is different than a desktop system.


Edit: It could very well be good to have a category for use on old computers, less than 1gb, as some distros are dropping 32bit.

Yes. Running live rather than installed is completely different. As an example, Puppy linux, Knoppix, (and others) are meant to be run live rather than installed to a device to get the best out of them ie faster boot, more secure(?). Distros like Ubuntu that have a live option to 'test the iso before installing' is not the same as actually running a live iso on a daily basis.

More of an eg for "faster boot" &c?

(for next year) i suggest a category "image viewer" to be added.

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