Hi,

Just curious as to why some of you select a particular Gnu/Linux? I choose Slackware Gnu/Linux for it's UNIX-Like structures. At first it was the first Gnu/Linux with UNIX-Like characteristics that would provide me with UNIX-Like for my PC. I do remember getting PV's first Slackware. A good read is; https://www.linuxjournal.com/article/2750

With Linux kernel development in 91-92 then we got SLS then new work by PV on SLS that grew to Slackware with extensive work by PV development for Slackware. I have been using Slackware since then with the first release back in 1993. I still have the disk sets somewhere in storage (many versions). I do use other Gnu/Linux (mostly Live) at times for diagnostic purposes but most of my work is with Slackware Gnu/Linux.

So why do you choose your Gnu/Linux? Easy of use or just the latest greatest for bleeding edge?

I started out about the same time frame as you @onebuck. I downloaded the floppies for Slackware and Debian. I no longer have the disk sets. I too had a lot of them, not just Linux. Not sure what happened to them. Why I selected Slackware, perhaps because I already had experience with Unix (job related). Debian at the time just turned out to be a dud, no fault of Debian, probably judu bad downloads. Who knows, Slackware worked, so it got the nod. I've been using Slackware ever since.

Well, this is probably going to be the Slackware fan club, so here's a dissenting voice.

My needs are
Reliability — no bleeding-edge nonsense that's liable to have an annual crisis, like Arch.
Simplicity — no keeping a dog but having to bark myself, like Slackware.
Configurability — Xfce desktop, or Mate at a pinch.

I started with Red Hat, used Fedora until it became too unstable, and then used CentOS until Red Hat ruined it and EPEL dropped various useful programs. I'm currently using PCLinuxOS as one of the most stable rolling-release systems, but I'm accumulating niggles that no-one can solve. So, on to another. The current candidates are

Salix — Slackware with added user-friendliness (you couldn't have Slack with less user-friendliness, could you?)
Mageia — Mandrake-style without the rolling-release of PCLinuxOS.
MX, Mint, or Lite — outsiders, as I'm no fan of Debian.

DEVUAN

Systemd free Debian!

After trying a good few distros in my early days, I settled on Debian, it worked how I liked to, apt was package manager, it installed all necessary dependencies, so simple to work with......then, disaster, the decision to use systemd!

That was when I started using other versions - AntiX mainly - & now Devuan - even on my RPi SBCs.

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LFS 'cos I'm a masochist

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Fedora with rawhide kernel 'cos I need all the latest-and-greatest - and devs that listen when I ask for a kernel option to be turned on. It's not worth compiling my own most of the time these days.

Interesting post. Do you mind if I ask for more detail?
As the owner of several "barking dogs," I'd like to know why you seem to think I should be barking on their behalf? Please clarify the meaning of this statement.
Precisely, what are these "niggles that no-one can solve?"
I guess user-friendliness is a relative term. To my way of thinking, it's Slackware that's user friendly... All of the others are unusable in any productive sense. I'm keen to know why you think Slackware is not user friendly?

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Hi,

I am sorry if some members think this is posted to become slanted towards Slackware. My intent was to truly find out why others chose their Gnu/Linux and possibly some supporting information. Just curious on my part.

Sure, I support Slackware Gnu/Linux as some member who know my posting style but I really am curious about other choices by members!

I have been running PCLinuxOS on my desktop lately mostly because it is non-Systemd and works really well.
c. 2000ish I started alternating Mandrake/Suse.
Finally settled on Debian for a long time until Systemd.
Debian worked well running headless in text mode for me under various uses. Running shell scripts connected to a half dozen VT terminals. Running ckermit scripts sitting between a Windows PC and a VMS/MUMPS system.
Ever since I started using Linux I have had multiple versions installed. My philosophy turns out being that the one I use wins.
Various versions of Slackware have been in the mix and it has never turned out to be the one I use. Slackware 15 will be in the future mix.

If I remember well I started with SCO Unix (after Dos and Win 3.1 or something like that) and came HP-UX, Solaris. I did not want to move to linux at all. But I was forced somehow - on my workspace.
I used to play a lot on windows (and still I have it installed), but was inconvenient for me, so installed first SCO unix and later linux (at home), next to it. Why?
Because that was free. I tried a lot of different distro/desktop, but in those days they were buggy, unstable and hard to configure. Finally somehow debian/gnome was the winner.

I started with Red Hat 6 because someone installed it for me. I tried to upgrade to Red Hat 9 from a book that I bought, but something went wrong with the installation. I then moved on to Ubuntu Dapper Drake because I bought a second-hand computer and the owner had an Ubuntu CD that he didn't want. I remember that I didn't much care for it.

The first distro that I installed deliberately was Debian, I believe Debian Etch. I installed that after trying to upgrade to Gutsy Gibbon and finding that my machine wasn't big enough to run it. With Debian, I could do a net install and just add the software that I wanted.

Then I added Crux because someone at Linux Forums recommended it as the fastest Linux to boot. I really loved Crux and was fascinated by watching the programs compiling. But we had to part company when they stopped supporting 32-bit. After that, I distro-hopped for a while. I tried both Arch and Gentoo and didn't like either. I decided that bleeding edge definitely isn't my thing; I like stability.

When I switched to a 64-bit machine, I started again with Crux and also used LFS for a long time, building each version from the last, but I went off it when they started to get so bloated. I still build the new versions as skeletons but I don't use them much.

I was triple-booting Crux, LFS and Debian when I bought my Lenovo and decided to rationalise. I really only wanted one distro for day-to-day use, not three. I was tired of the length of Crux updates and I didn't like the new systemd Debian, but I was curious about Slackware and wondered if the time had come to try it. So I opened a thread, which soon became very lively. And here I am.

Arch Linux.

When I first tried it 12 years ago, it was more BSD like. Of course that has changed with systemd.

It has pacman. Update the whole box with one command, and it works well.
It has very large repos.
It has a fairly large AUR. (User repo).
It has a great wiki that is kept up to date.
It's a rolling release. Install once, use box for next 12 years, or until it dies.
Binary packages that are signed. So fast updates. And now pacman is multi threading if you want.
Easy access to all of the sources for it's packages. Same with the AUR.
The ability to download packages on one machine into a temp directory, and then share that dir with all other machines on the LAN. So you can update 10 machines for the download bandwidth of one.
I've come to like the build system. You can make a PKGBUILD for anything, build it, then install it with pacman.
A forum with people who live arch apparently. Never had an arch problem that wasn't solvable with the forum and/or wiki.
I can build applications in C, C++, Python, and everything needed is in the repos, and it all matches. And for anything not there, there is the AUR and the arch ABS.
The most important, it works and does what I want/need. I don't lack anything using arch. Or maybe I have simply become used to it.

Downside.
It a rolling release. So after every update, first thing I do is look to see if everything works. And, that could bring an adventure. Not often but every once in a while.
The forum in knowledgeable, but not the friendliest room you've ever been in. You are expected to be a 2nd year computer science student before you ask a question. But, they tell you that on the front page.

So another words, I found it, it works, no reason to leave.

I wanted to run Debian originally. At one point I flirted with the idea of paying for a RedHat sub. Ultimately though I went and stuck with the *buntu's, namely Xubuntu. My reasoning has more to do with my laziness. The majority of my usage is media stuff. With Kodi in a ppa it's all to easy. Everything else requires me to compile or rely on third party repos (the ppa is maintained by the Kodi team directly).

As I've put Windows back on my desktop for games I don't interact with Linux really save adding media to my server or maintaining the wife's computer. My scripts pretty much do all the regular maintenance on the server and her computer aside from me running updates. Her machine is mostly for Minecraft.

I made a tongue-in-cheek comment at the start of my post and, sure enough, the Slackers got their knickers in a twist — or two, at least! So I can't resist quoting from Paul Scheer (RUTE) on Slackware: "It’s a pain to install and manage, although school kids who don’t know any better love it." Some things have changed over the last 20 years: it's stopped being a pain to install and the kids have (mostly) grown up.

Seriously, on the subject of PCLinuxOS, there are problems with keyboard shortcuts in Xfce (I should have taken my own advice and used a distro with its default GUI), the Simple Update Notifier has stopped, pdftk is dead, and so on. The update notifier is in-house software, so surely its author should have been able to respond when I posted the error messages, but no — perhaps he's moved to another distro

Nice. My post came from genuine curiosity. And I was going to try to help you fix your "niggles"... But that ship has sailed. Thanks. I've made a note to not waste any time or effort offering you help in future.