I just read that in 2013 nasa stopped using windows and moved to linux quoting the need for a more stable ssystem with better security. They also said that they were using debian.

http://www.extremetech.com/extreme/1...ed-reliability

They also use lenova thinkpads for the same reasons.

My question is, what is the functionality difference with debian? Is it more stable than other distributions? If ubuntu is Debian based, what is the difference?

I'm currently using ubuntu studio Distro and very happy with it but I'm very interested in the reasons why nasa use Debian.

Debian uses less resources than ubuntu. Also I doubt if nasa would actually use a system that collects info about user & passes to a third party.
https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2012/1...and-data-leaks

1 members found this post helpful.

What do you mean eddy? Who passes info? Ubuntu?

I edited my last post

1 members found this post helpful.

Wow that's pretty interesting stuff.

Maybe, but it can easily be turned off! At Google headquarters they mostly use Ubuntu for their employees pc's. It really should depend on what you want and need.

1 members found this post helpful.

Debian is rock-solid stable. The reports I've heard indicated that stability was a significant concern in making the choice.

Note, too, that they are using v. 6. V. 8 was released just a few days ago.

1 members found this post helpful.

Note that Ubuntu itself is based on Debian

1 members found this post helpful.

NASA has been using Linux for a long, long time. Decades if I am not mistaken. So I am a bit surprised that only now the last laptops are sanitized.

The choice for Debian for its stability is not strange. Debian Stable is so stable that it hardly breathes. If the kernel weren't running you'd think it would be dead.

But then again, unless you are fond of doing the same job multiple times, I am surprised that NASA deviated from other distros already in use. Once you have a good distro, I would stick with it. Even if is not Debian.

Or the NASA engineers want to have as many different versions to minimize equal bugs in equal distros.

The choice for version 6 surprises me as well. I don't think Squeeze is more stable than Lenny because it is older. Older does not necessarily mean more stable in Debian. Need for resources does not increase automatically with each new version. And what is worse, Squeeze will drop from Oldstable to unmaintained. AFAIK Squeeze is not a special LTS version.

I hate to mention Ubuntu in the same sentence as Debian. Ubuntu pulls off the unstable branch of Debian. While unstable in Debian is generally more solid than production branches in other distros, the Ubuntu maintainers add some special instability flavor before they rush out the next 6 months release. So the two are incomparable.

jlinkels

1 members found this post helpful.

There are 3 free, general-purpose distros that offer high stability: CentOS, Debian Stable, and Slackware. Since Slackware doesn't come with an automatic installation tool, or a professional-grade office suite, that doesn't leave a big choice for an enterprise!

1 members found this post helpful.

Just a speculation on my part, but NASA may have chosen Debian in part for its support of older hardware. As an employee at an Air Force base for 3+ decades, I know the government has a lot of OLD machines. At home I have Debian running nicely on a 2003 machine. I dumped Ubuntu when they dumped support for my graphics hardware.

1 members found this post helpful.

Well you still have Ubuntu on atleast 1 machine, but atleast you know that debian runs on almost anything.

1 members found this post helpful.

@EDDY1
That article is dated October 2012, have things not moved on? I'd have thought that they should have cleaned up their act over the last couple of years after this had been brought to light?

Play Bonny!

1 members found this post helpful.

That's my quote yes, but I doubt they removed it, but as posted in another post itmay be able to be disabled.

1 members found this post helpful.

It would make more sense to me if NASA ran Red Hat or Suse.

With all the problems with Lenovo, it might be that no computer maker would do for such critical work.

Saying that I just got Debian 8 running the other day. I know, late.

1 members found this post helpful.