Opensuse debian and fedora linux

Comparison to other distributions

Fedora users or potential users sometimes have questions on how Fedora compares to other distributions in the Linux world. If you are wondering if Fedora is the right distribution for you, refer to the following pages: http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Overview http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Is_Fedora_For_Me Linux distributions are very diverse and the following is not meant to a comprehensive comparison of all distributions, nor are they a unbiased review or distribution bashing. Instead, this article looks at some other popular distributions from a Fedora perspective. We, in the Fedora Project, certainly believe in the diversity and encourage that by working close with upstream projects that benefits all Linux distributions and not just Fedora.

Contents

Debian

Debian is a community project and a popular Linux distribution.

Similarities

Like Fedora, Debian is very focused on free and open source software. A good judgement of whether a particular software project is truly free and open source software can be made on the basis of whether it is available via the Debian and Fedora repositories.

Both projects have a large body of collective knowledge from the community in the form of community governance, policies, and packaging guidelines.

Differences

Debian uses the deb format, dpkg package manager, and apt-get dependency resolver. Fedora uses the RPM format, the RPM package manager, and dnf dependency resolver.

Debian has free, non-free and contrib repositories, while Fedora has a single global repository that contains only free software applications. Debian has a larger repository with over 20,000 software packages. Fedora has around 15,000 software packages, although it should be taken into account that Fedora does not include a non-free or contrib repository.

Unlike Fedora, Debian does not follow a time-based release model.

Ubuntu

Ubuntu is a popular Debian derivative and consequently many of the similarities and differences between Debian and Fedora apply to Ubuntu as well.

Similarities

Fedora and Ubuntu both use many of the same command line tools, like nearly any Linux distribution, including cp , mv , rm , sudo , wget , etc.

Just as Fedora is sponsored by Red Hat, Ubuntu is sponsored by Canonical Ltd, a UK-based software company that profits mostly on charging for Ubuntu support. Ubuntu also has its own StackExchange website called Ask Ubuntu, which is similar to Fedora’s Ask Fedora Discourse-based website.

Ubuntu has a server and cloud edition like Fedora does.

Differences

Ubuntu is commercially supported by Canonical while Fedora is a community project sponsored by Red Hat. In that sense Fedora is more akin to Ubuntu flavours which are the community based projects with special goals (usually customizing the Desktop Environments); the bigger difference in that comparison is that Fedora works as one unified project even with regard to spins while Ubuntu flavours usually act as a separate projects.

Ubuntu is based off of Debian, but Fedora is not a derivative of another Linux distribution and has a more direct relationship with many upstream projects by using newer versions of their software.

Ubuntu has more relaxed policies involving proprietary or patent-encumbered software and selectively tolerates it to some extent.

Ubuntu also uses the deb format, dpkg package manager, and apt-get dependency resolver.

Ubuntu’s default desktop environment is GNOME (with minor alterations), but Ubuntu can also be used with desktop environments such as Unity, KDE, Xfce, LXDE, and MATE. Fedora’s default desktop environment is GNOME, but there are also Fedora spins of other desktop environments, such as KDE, Xfce, LXDE, and MATE.

openSUSE

openSUSE was founded by SUSE, LLC as a predecessor of Red Hat Linux. Because of similarities in packaging software, there are many similarities between openSUSE and Fedora.

Similarities

Like Fedora, openSUSE uses RPM as a package manager.

openSUSE also has a time-based release model that comes with their Leap version; however, Fedora releases a new major release every six months while openSUSE has a new major release every nine months. Tumbleweed is another openSUSE version, based on the rolling release cycle where the packages are updated more often.

openSUSE has adopted the Fedora trademark license agreement with a few minor differences, and openSUSE has mostly adopted the Fedora Packaging Guidelines as well.

Differences

openSUSE uses the zypper dependency resolver instead of dnf. Both of these dependency resolvers use a SAT-solver for quick dependency resolutions.

openSUSE is freely available, but also sold as a retail boxed product with limited commercial support from SUSE, while Fedora is a community project with no retail business. As of the version 15 of openSUSE Leap users can migrate to SUSE Linux Enterprise (SLE) if they need support and wish to become a SUSE customer.

Mandriva successors

Mandriva Linux was a distribution by Mandriva S.A. Since it is no longer available both Mageia and OpenMandriva are referred here as Mandriva successors.

Similarities

Like Fedora, Mandriva successors use RPM as a package manager.

Differences

Mandriva successors use the urpmi dependency resolver instead of dnf. They have an official non-free repository for redistributable but non-free software. And usually have a somewhat more relaxed patent policy.

Mandriva successors has a home-grown set of configuration tools, written in perl with GTK+ bindings. Mandriva derived distributions use their own graphical network configuration tool and status applet, rather than NetworkManager like in Fedora. Mandriva used to require all shared libraries to be split into separate packages and to be provided in both x86-32 and x86-64 form.

Copyright © 2023 Red Hat, Inc. and others. All Rights Reserved. For comments or queries, please contact us.

The Fedora Project is maintained and driven by the community and sponsored by Red Hat. This is a community maintained site. Red Hat is not responsible for content.

• This page was last edited on 13 December 2022, at 04:32.
• Content is available under Attribution-Share Alike 4.0 International unless otherwise noted.

• Privacy policy
• About Fedora Project Wiki
• Disclaimers
• Code of Conduct
• Sponsors
• Legal
• Trademark Guidelines

Источник

openSUSE:OpenSUSE and other distributions

This page will give you, as an openSUSE ambassador, arguments in a discussion about the value of openSUSE for people who want to help in Open Source. See here for an article about the major technical differences between openSUSE (12.3) and other Linux distributions.

The page is under construction and mostly contains arguments advocating the use of openSUSE over other popular distributions. Feel free to add any braindump or question you have! If you have arguments against having both we can discuss them and make even better arguments for the ambassadors.

Contents

Questions

Why openSUSE and not Debian, Fedora or Ubuntu?

One useful talking point you might need when somebody asks you «Why openSUSE?» comparing us to Fedora and/or Ubuntu:

• Fedora does well in pushing forward the Linux stack and testing new technologies.
• Ubuntu does a good job at simplifying and making things easy to use for basic tasks.
• openSUSE Leap is for those who need to «get work done», as it has a longer release cycle and more focus on stability than Fedora. It has better tools (OBS, Studio, YaST) and much more flexibility than Ubuntu.
• openSUSE Tumbleweed is for those that want to have the latest software, yet still want enough system stability so that they are not constantly wrangling bugs. It follows a rolling release model, yet offers superior system stability to Fedora Rawhide.
• Debian offers fair performance on a server (although it offers no enterprise grade support), however, it can be either outdated («Debian Stable») or unstable and unpredictable («Unstable» and «Testing» development trees).

None of the above is black and white. openSUSE does experimental things, has the occasional instability and can be inflexible in areas. But the big picture is as described above — despite differences in individual experiences.

From a community point of view openSUSE is far more open than Fedora, Ubuntu, Debian and many other distribution. Other distributions tend to be more tightly controlled by corporate sponsors or community governance processes that leverage technical boards, community committees, self appointed benevolent dictators (

• does openSUSE offer something more than Fedora and Ubuntu?
  • A key differentiator here is YaST — no other distribution provides such a comprehensive and integrated tool for installing, configuring and administrating the distribution. You get one tool that can be used on both the command line as well as the GUI or via a web browser instead of multiple individual tools with varying quality and usability (e.g. different looks and work flows).
  • Our community is another advantage. We’re an open, bottom-up community while Ubuntu has Shuttleworth as self-appointed dictator, going around and telling people what to do (for example the highly controversial move to Unity).
  • moreover, openSUSE has a strong focus on collaboration and doing what is good for Free Software, very much unlike Ubuntu which tries to get software developers to specifically target Ubuntu which is creating ‘special’ GTK and Qt interfaces.
  • No, it’s not. Some think it is faster — it isn’t. Zypper downloads the differences of packages (instead of the full package) from several servers at once. Thanks to Mirrorbrain the openSUSE mirror infrastructure can’t be beaten. Moreover, zypper has the fastest dependency solver in the world — and also the most accurate. It offers alternatives if problems are found instead of just bailing out with an error message like apt-get does. The one thing that makes people think zypper is slow is because by default, it updates the repositories any time you use zypper. This can be disabled easily, however. It is there to make sure you always have the latest repository information. Our repositories update on average far more often than Ubuntu’s as many openSUSE users have a large number of OBS repositories. OBS makes delivering new software so easy for packages that they do it all the time. But if you disable the auto-update and use zypper ref manually, it beats apt-get any time.
  • Sure, they offer an ‘LTS’ version. Which is 5 years — almost twice as long as openSUSE offers. However, that does mean you’re stuck with old software. It is much more difficult to install new software on older Ubuntu than on older openSUSE. Also note that Ubuntu’s support is very limited, they reject fixing some bugs in LTS even if there is already a fix upstream. Their support for LTS is mostly limited to kernel updates.
  • This is an illusion. Debian (and also Ubuntu) splits up packages much more, count language & debug & source packages etcetera. We have those in separate repositories to not clutter up the software installation.
  • For openSUSE you can find a HUGE amount of software in OBS (120.000 packages!) and also use packages from other distributions (or rebuild them in OBS yourself if they are incompatible).
  • Moreover, openSUSE packagers are very friendly. If you ask on the build service mailing list for a package you can usually count on it being packaged in no-time.
  • see the other generic openSUSE arguments.

  How openSUSE is handling security?

  Security is one of main Linux advantages, but not all distributions are equally agile to provide their users with security patches.

  Indirect indication of how serious is one distro’s approach to security is when other security sources quote it in their reports.

  Источник