June 2014 – 🇺🇦BerkeleyLUG

I thought it might help a few people (including myself!) to perform the following categorized and referenced summary of the current “families” of non-commercial Linux distros. All of these distros have brief descriptions and rankings at the DistroWatch.com listing site [1].

I. Ubuntu and its *buntu Satellites

For example,

Ubuntu itself[2]
Kubuntu[3] = Ubuntu base with the K Desktop Environment (KDE)
Xubuntu[4] = ditto, but with the Xfce desktop environment instead
Lubuntu[5] = ditto, but with the Lightweight X11 Desktop Environment (LXDE) instead

II. Non-Canonical, Ubuntu-based Derivatives

For example,

Linux Mint[6]
Zorin OS[7]
elementary OS[8]
LXLE[9]
Ultimate Edition[10]
Bodhi Linux[11]
Linux Lite[12]
Pinguy OS[13]

III. Debian GNU/Linux

The “universal operating system”[14] has

an extensive range of supported hardware architectures [15]
Debian Stable/’wheezy’ and Debian Testing/’jessie’ versions available in official desktop environments, similar to the *buntu satellites (e.g., KDE, Xfce, LXDE)
Debian live[16] and netinstall[17]

IV. Debian-based Derivatives

For example,

CrunchBang Linux[18]
wattOS[19]
SteamOS[20]
SparkyLinux[21]
KNOPPIX[22]

V. Popular non-Ubuntu and non-Debian Distros

For example,

Arch Linux[23]
Fedora[24]
openSUSE[25]
Mageia[26]
Puppy Linux[27]
CentOS[28]
Chakra GNU/Linux[29]
Manjaro[30]
PCLinuxOS[31]

VI. An extensive mixture of less popular, newly-created, and niche/special-purpose Distros

For example,

Slackware Linux[32]
VectorLinux[33]
Scientific[34]
Gentoo Linux[35]
antiX[36]
Android-x86[37]
LinuxBBQ[38]
Robolinux[39]
Tails[40]
IPFire[41]
GParted Live[42]
OLPC[43]

Please feel free to add your own comments to the above, e.g., to correct major factual errors and/or significant ommissions 🙂

We meet on the second and fourth Sundays of each month from noon to three in Berkeley near the Downtown Berkeley BART station near the corner of University & Shattuck. We hope you join us at Bobby G’s Pizzeria and/or join the discussion on our email list.

—

References:

Month: June 2014

A June ’14 Distro Categorization

I. Ubuntu and its *buntu Satellites

II. Non-Canonical, Ubuntu-based Derivatives

III. Debian GNU/Linux

IV. Debian-based Derivatives

V. Popular non-Ubuntu and non-Debian Distros

VI. An extensive mixture of less popular, newly-created, and niche/special-purpose Distros

References:

Fast Lanes