Hi
I am using RedHat Linux9 and I am planning to move to some other distribution which will be more professional than redhat. By professional I mean "for experts". I heard that distributions like Slackware, Suse, Gentoo and FreeBSD(unix) etc are more "professionals" than RedHat. Am I right? Your kind advice is required.
Thanks.

3 out of 4 isn't bad. Slackware, Gentoo and FreeBSD are "more expert." I'm guessing that to mean CLI and editing .confs to get the job done. I had SuSE 9.1 Pro installed for a few hours the other day before I changed to Slackware 10. SuSE was like a WinXP clone. It's pretty and YaST a GUI for administration. If you try SuSE carefully go through what software will be installed. I didn't and ended up with a machine that didn't have any compiler or development tools installed.

Gentoo is a terrific system that allows you to customize just about everything (including how optimized your software is). But to initially install one will take a little while (for a first timer I'd probably count on between 2-4 hours). But if you've got a saturday you can waste there is none better in my humble opinion.

jpbarto

Slackware is for you... It is a pure distro. I am using Slackware 10 and it is GREAT!!!

thanks guys....
Is there anyother distro in your view which can also fit in my options. I will appertiate your contribution and your kind remarks.

Not to nit-pick, but "experts" can can and do use RedHat too! It just gives you the option of a "lifeline" if you want it. When you say "professional" I think of what distro "could" be in the backoffice of the local IT firm. I think you'd be hard pressed to fine anything more popular than RedHat or Slackware, although others are stepping in everyday. If you want to get real serious, you could always try something like Source Mage, but a good middle of the road distro that I've used before is Arch.

You mentioned FreeBSD so I guess that means I can talk about it. If you are willing to try something other than Linux, I personally have a soft spot for FreeBSD, but be aware hardware compatibilty is lagging about a year behind Linux. If you have a brand spanking new video card that you want to use video acceleration with, stick with Linux for now.

Take a look at
http://distrowatch.com/

Use the search feature here at LQ. This type of question is asked several times a day.

I will add Debian to your list. It's my main distro and a lot of companies use it.

that's some sig you got there darth

Trying to make sure people get all the help available

that's a good point. I was trying to think of a way to introduce up-n-coming coders to the GNU standards (suggested code syntax, common practice, etc) ... because honestly, I don't think alot of people who are starting to write OSS apps know that they are there.

And there is other stuff too, like informing someone about troff or texinfo ... or (for the non-developers) distrowatch and linuxiso.org.

I don't really know where I'm going with this ... so I'll just shut up now.