Where to find official list of Linux distribution.
 

Hi, I'm a newbie.
As a part my curiosity on Linux distributions, my research paper focuses on the comparison of all/most Linux distribution.
As I started my research I couldn't find the official list of all Linux distribution.
I browse some from pages like Wikipedia and linux.org
Yes, I found those list of distribution but my question is:
Are those in the list are official?
Where do I find the official list of Linux distributions?
Please help me.
I'm hoping for your answers, and hoping to ask again as my research to complete.


Thank so much.

blackafterdark

Have you tried: http://distrowatch.com

Hi,

Although I don't really know what you mean by official list, this site is very up to date with all the different distro's out there: Distrowatch

Or are you looking for all the linux kernels that have been created (if I look at the linux.org link you posted). If so: The Linux Kernel Archives

Hope this helps.

That's quite a project. The linux.org site will show 220 plus distros, a wikepedia site showed about 275 and I recall reading there are well over 500 different distributions of Linux. Linux.org and distrowatch would probably be the best and distrowatch also gives their assessment of the most popular.

I doubt there is an official list. Who would make it, Torvaalds I guess?

By "official", you seem to be under the impression there is some governing body responsible for linux. However, anyone can release a linux distro. Whether or not anyone else uses it is a different matter.

To all,
Thank you so much for your time and effort to response my questions.
Maybe I have to select one reference for the Linux distribution that I'll be using for my review(Distrowatch, Linux.org or Wikipedia).

Thank you.
blackafterdark

You'd do well to take a smaller selection of distributions to focus on, because
1) you can't possibly list all existing distributions, because very probably they're not all listed in one place (or even in few enough places for you to go through)
2) new distributions probably get released during the time you write your work
3) even listing the names would be a massive piece of work, and giving any further details would probably be just too much
4) the reader (whoever that is) would get more out of your work, as would you, if you paid more attention to a smaller number of distributions.

Even if there existed 500+ distributions, a lot of them were very similar to each other, perhaps differing only in preinstalled package selection (or their versions), themes or such. If you instead focus on distributions that differ notably from each other, and are used by more than only few people in addition to the creator, you'll get somewhere. For example you could start off by studying the differences between RedHat (the commercial ones), Slackware, Gentoo and Debian. You could take in some notable similar distributions, like Ubuntu or Fedora, and see how and why they are separate projects. Then you could eye some "specialized" distributions, that are aimed at gaming, being "Windows-like" and so on, and you'd soon have plenty enough names to write on. These are just some ideas to ease your work, because if you'll take too big a bite, you'll get bored and quit the work before it's finished--and that's not what you're after, right? :)

Remember to mention the date when you checked the list you're referring to, because web content changes all the time, and the distribution list you read probably isn't the same anymore when the reader gets to it.