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Originally Posted by ayush.27
If I give Fedora or openSUSE a try (at home), what can I expect?
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Linux. In use, you'd probably notice how up-to-date packages were (the enterprise Linuxes are, of necessity, more conservative, so expect, by default, Debian itself, SLES/SLED and RH to be in one group and the more consumer-orientated distros to be in another, although you can often enable other repos with more up-to-date packages to blur the lines somewhat).
In sys admin (as opposed to day-to-day use) there are a few more differences, with different commands doing more or less the same thing for networking, for example.
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What would be the significant changes that I would have to get used to?
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Different logos and wallpapers??? More up to date selection of packages, depending on which distro we are comparing to which? More services enabled by default on some of the 'a bit casual with respect to security' ones? No clear pattern that all deb-derived are in one group and all rpm distros in the other, though. The difference is more closely between conservative enterprise distros and bleeding edge consumer ones.
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Are debian-based distros generally more user-friendly?
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There are probably more user-friendly debian distros, but, if you really want, I can probably find one or two deb-based distros that are actually almost user-hostile (pen testing, etc). So, not than the non-enterprise ones, really.
For SuSE (and mandriva, which you don't mention) they have gone down the route of a unified admin tool. This can make the admin tool a bit big, which some people don't like. Others find it easier knowing that all admin can be done in one place. but there is no reason that this is a .deb vs .rpm thing, although the two most obvious that have gone down this route are .rpm (I think, maybe, Mepis has done something similar, and that's .deb).
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Is it true that you can't update as easily on RPM based distro as you can on ubuntu/mint?
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No. It used to be true that package management on SuSE was a bit clunky wrt Synaptic, but what with rpm compression, diff rpms, a couple of changes of dependency resolving package manager and a change of front end, it might even be the best of the lot now.
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Do fedora and openSUSE have notifications for new updates?
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Yes, for security updates (I assume that's what you mean); for non-security, in SuSE you go into package management and the version is highlighted in a different colour.
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Is installing new software as easy in RPM based distros as it is with Synaptic Package Manager?
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Haven't used fedora for a long, long while, so I'll pass on that one, but for openSUSE it is as easy. From distro to distro (irrespective of the package format) there can be differences as to how clearly packages are organised, which might be an issue, until you get used to your particular distro's 'philosophy' of how to deal with complex situations.
However, taking a Fedora or OpenSUSE Live CD for a "test drive" may be an educational experience; if you are comfortable with both .deb and .rpm, you will have a good foundation for the majority of distros.
