Which distro has the greatest support?
I'm thinking of Mandriva, Fedora and Suse, based on their popularity,(iso.linuxquestions.org/)
Am I on track?
Thanking you in advance.

Slackware.

Hi,

Your query is very subjective.

Distributions are like that fine, comfortable blanket you have to sleep at night. Sure, any blanket would do but yours is special since it fits the needs for the night.

You could become comfortable with another but that one meets the needs. That is until Slackware comes along then the old no longer suits. You learn to understand how, when and why. Then the others just don't even interest you because Slackware keeps things warm and cozy.

Did anyone mention Slackware?

I believe it got a passing mention.

What do you mean by "support"?
telephone?
online chat?
e-mail?
community?---eg fora such as LQ

The strongest communities are probably Ubuntu, Debian, Slackware, and Fedora

Arch has really good documentation in its wiki.

For phone support: RHEL, SLED, or Ubuntu. The first two are paid distros, with Ubuntu, the SW is always free, but you can sign up for support.

pixellany, you are the only Arch user in LQ I see active. I used it for a while then came back to slack. You are right, most of the Arch related queries can be answered by Arch wiki and Arch forum is also good. Many devs are also active to help you out as long as you show proof of making an effort first of solving your problem. Anyways, ubuntu forum has good support as long as you ask simple questions, you will get same replies from 10 different people.
Oh, did I mention slackware?

Regards

WHAT????!!!!! There are lots of Arch users here....

Interesting how people compare Arch and Slackware---to me they are --in many respects-- polar opposites.

No I don't want to compare Arch and slack, they are definitely not similar in any way, except for the obvious KISS philosophy they both try to adhere to.

Regards

Good, in the sense of being active and co-operative but the Slackware forum here was one of my reasons for choosing Slackware -- more considered and "in depth" than Arch's. Like the difference between "Nature" (Slackware forum) and "Scientific American". Not that one is better than the other, they are just different and the Slackware forum is more closely aligned with my preferences.

I agree with Pixellany about Fedora, Ubuntu, Slackware and Debian. I used Mandriva a few years ago when it was called Mandrake and it had very good support then. You'll find Fedora a bit difficult to set up if you are not technically oriented, fun if you are. I think Ubuntu is the choice of most Linux newbies these days, has LOTS of support online and is arguably the easiest to set up for a newbie. You'll find most people have a strong preference for whatever distro suits there individual tastes. Keep doing your research, be patient and you'll make the right choice.

I've forgotten. Has anybody mentioned Slackware yet??

Hi together,

I'd mention Slackware because of the big community here at LQ.
One also has to take a look at Gentoo. My experience is that both distros have very knowledgeable community but Gentoo (additionally) is excellently documented, one can use the manuals like a cookbook, in this sense Gentoo not only is good supported but is also the simplest distro of all.

Markus

... yes, I know the Slackbook, but it is outdated.

Greatest? Well, something like Red Hat has paid-for support? Is that 'greater' than support for which you don't have that sort of commercial relationship? It can be good, if it is done well, but my guess is that this is not what you mean.

No. If you want number of users, you'd probably go for Ubuntu; that's what you'd get if you looked at popularity.

Up to a point, Ubuntu support is good. Unfortunately, that point is when you have a real technical question. Oddly, superficial, newbie-only, questions get a lot of attention, but anything harder becomes problematic rather quickly. This is odd because there are quite a number of good technical developers who work on Ubuntu, but they don't seem to answer ordinary user queries. Also, there is a lot of good Ubuntu documentation around, but sometimes you need an answer to your question, not a manual to read.

You could take the polar opposite approach and go for a slackware, gentoo or LFS-style approach. The community support that you will get will be very much more capable of dealing with hard technical questions. Trouble is, it will have to be. But, you will learn how to be self-supporting and self-reliant and you will acquire a better understanding and not need so much support. But that will be in the slightly longer run, which may not be what you are aiming for.

Good job you didn't ask which distro you should select; that would have been difficult.

Thanks for that, salasi -- made me chuckle out loud