[buug] Setting up Debian

[Claude Rubinson]

On Sat, 27 Apr 2002, Rick Moen wrote:

> But are you _sure_ you want to revert to 2.2/potato?  Hardly anyone uses
> it, any more, because its versions are ultra-conservative to the point
> of lunacy.  And 3.0/woody is NOT the unstable branch; it's the "testing"
> branch, which has proven so extremely solid that it's exactly what's
> lead to 2.2/potato having hardly anyone using it.

I'm not so sure how true this actually is.  It's certainly true that
online (i.e, web discussion boards, newsgroups, and email lists) you
generally hear about people running Woody.  However, many (most?) Debian
users that I've met in real life are running Potato.  (Of course, Rick's
certainly met more Debian users that I have, so my sample size may simply
not be large enough.)

Personally, I tend to play it very conservative with my operating system
and applications.  Although I realize that Woody is quite solid, it's
updated rather frequently (which, of course, is why people like it).  I,
on the other hand, prefer to worry about my system as little as possible.
By running Potato, all I have to worry about is tracking the security
updates.  (The only program that I track independently is Mozilla; once
Woody's released and I upgrade, I won't even have to worry about that.)

Of course, I don't run any desktop environment or large GUI applications
(e.g., OpenOffice, KOffice, etc) and am not particulary enchanted with
eye-candy. If I were running either GNOME or KDE, I can definitely see
where I might be interested in trying to keep more current; as it is,
however, I'll take simplicity and ease-of-maintenance over keeping
current.

Just my 2 cents on some reasons why someone might prefer to run Potato as
a desktop.

Claude