Debian fanaticism

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curtvaughan
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Debian fanaticism

Post by curtvaughan »

Wow. I just visited a Debian forum and read through all of the vitriol about other Linux distros (esp. Mint and Ubuntu, or as they describe, *buntu). I am amazed at the hatred these folks have for other distros and end users in general. Their main flame toward Mint / Ubuntu is that "these distros encourage Windows users to migrate to Linux". Really? I just installed a virtualbox lmde, so just wanted to peruse the background of Debian. I guess it's a stable OS, but its developers are rather not. They seem to really only be interested in OS development "qua" OS development - end users are an inconsequential tangent. Anyway, I remember Unix fanatics going back to the '80s - SystemV vs. BSD vs. VMS/CRAYOS/IBM/...ad nauseum. Not pretty. I retired some 7 years ago as a sys admin/programmer. I now have an iMac that I like because of its stability as a, yes, proprietary BSD based system which my wife and my grandkids can use, an iPad, and two laptop PCs running Mint Cinnamon/Mate/XFCE, and vbox versions of Ubuntu and LMDE. I am fascinated by the option of playing around with Linux as a hobby, and also as a means to get work done. The religious attitudes of the Debian folks really put me off. Sometimes one loses the forest for the trees. Cheerio!
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curtvaughan
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Re: Debian fanaticism

Post by curtvaughan »

P.S. - and thanks to advice I got through Linux forums, I also have an old Macbook Pro (9 years old) running Linux Mint Cinnamon 17.1. Rather nice, given that Apple dumped software support for this great old machine several years ago.
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exploder
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Re: Debian fanaticism

Post by exploder »

I always refer to what you describe as "elitists". I can think of at least 3 or 4 distro forums that are like that. Fortunately there is a section in the forum right here where you can ask any questions you want about LMDE and you will get treated right. :) I have been on the Debian forum myself and experienced it first hand. It's relaxed here and people are happy to help you in any way they can.
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Re: Debian fanaticism

Post by waldo »

"Elitists" is kind of you. I might have chosen another word. :wink: Many of them are the stereotypes who live in their parents' basement surrounded by empty pizza boxes and Coke cans. They have finally found a fraternity that accepts them, and they don't want the group diluted by "The Others". Leave 'em be; they deserve each other.
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Re: Debian fanaticism

Post by RacerBG »

I'm Debian user myself but I will NEVER register in their forums because of the above reasons. One thing which you can see often there is topic like "how stable is testing or sid" and they will start to attack right away: "Why would you choose testing instead of stable, we have backports, blah, blah, blah". They only care about stability, security and anti-newbie policy. The truth is however that Debian can be used by anyone and anyone can make a choice or say what he wants to say. Sadly they will never understand this. :roll:

When LMDE 2 Betsy arrives I will try it out for sure and maybe I will stay with it.
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MartyMint
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Re: Debian fanaticism

Post by MartyMint »

curtvaughan wrote:The religious attitudes of the Debian folks really put me off.
Well, to be honest...you did step into their church.
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Flemur
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Re: Debian fanaticism

Post by Flemur »

No kidding.

For the heck of it I installed Debian and signed up for their forums - ended up with three "foes" (polite word for "jerks who waste your time") almost immediately.

Reminds me of this:
"Academic politics is the most vicious and bitter form of politics, because the stakes are so low."
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Re: Debian fanaticism

Post by Crewp »

I am a big fan of Debian, and there are those who act as you say, but not all. That said, I use LMDE because I like Debian, and am a bigger fan of Cinnamon, and the Mint tools. Mint does for Debian, the same it does for Ubuntu, and that to me makes them shine. It's to bad some close there minds to others opinions, and others likes or dislikes.
But this is what makes us human. Just look at all the uproar over things like systemd, Mir, Unity, Hey, if it's not for you, Linux is a big world, no one is forcing you to use something you may not like, for what ever your reason. Although, the Mint community, is one of the nicest to be part of, there where those who left when Clem announced that LMDE was moving to stable. Things are always changing in the Linux world, and with it comes growing pains. But it's for the best, look how far Linux has come, in say the last 5 years. If people want to be rude, or poo poo some thing new or different, just let them vent, and move on.
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Re: Debian fanaticism

Post by exploder »

Waldo, I liked your description! :) There are some good people on the Debian forum but they get over shadowed by the self proclaimed elitists or evangelists. They try and make Debian seem a lot more difficult than it really is too. In reality Debian is extremely easy to install, it just takes a while. These same people seem to always install some obscure window manager on their system to try and meke themselves seem more knowledgeable.

I can picture these guys in their mom's basement just like Waldo described! :lol:
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Re: Debian fanaticism

Post by xenopeek »

While not wanting to invalidate anybody's personal experience, let's be careful and not judge an entire community or distro by it. Like with any group of individuals, in some communities you'll feel at home and in others you won't. But that's your personal experience. Acknowledge that you have a choice what communities to join or part, and other people will make other choices based on their preferences.
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exploder
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Re: Debian fanaticism

Post by exploder »

No one said the entire community was like that. There are community members I know from other forums that belong to the Debian forum that are terrific. The community members we are discussing just seem to turn a lot of us off to participating on the forum.
curtvaughan
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Re: Debian fanaticism

Post by curtvaughan »

Refreshing replies from all of you above - it just reinforces my observation that with maturity the Linux/Unix communities have become as diverse as the general computing public. I guess one thing I like about the Mint community is its ability to graciously embrace both the gurus and the noob's, as well as a large number of those somewhere in the middle. I did not mean to come off as judging the whole Debian user base, and some observed that the pure Debian forums are rather skewed toward those with the "grumpy guru" syndrome - those folks have largely run off users not of their abrasive persuasion. Yes, I mistakenly stepped into a forum, not realizing it was a church. Iwill look forward to exploring the LMDE forums in the future.

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exploder
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Re: Debian fanaticism

Post by exploder »

curtvaughan, this might sound like a dumb question but are you by any chance related to SRV? Just happened to notice your last name and where you are from.
curtvaughan
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Re: Debian fanaticism

Post by curtvaughan »

Ha! No, but I'm a great SRV fan from back in the day, and I actually have a brother named Steve. Go figure. But yeah, I'm proud to share SRV's name, spelling and all. Who knows, we may be some sort of weird cousins a thousand removed. :mrgreen:
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exploder
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Re: Debian fanaticism

Post by exploder »

I had to ask! You like Linux and SRV, so you are cool in my book! :D
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JOPETA
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Re: Debian fanaticism

Post by JOPETA »

¿Fanatics? . Debian most friendly Edition is only two years old because They were thinking of wide users spectrum, while were working....in the cave.
Ni cola de león ni cabeza de ratón, prefiero ser diente de ajo.(Javier Krahe)
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MALsPa
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Re: Debian fanaticism

Post by MALsPa »

exploder wrote:In reality Debian is extremely easy to install, it just takes a while.
I agree.
exploder wrote:These same people seem to always install some obscure window manager on their system to try and meke themselves seem more knowledgeable.
I don't agree with that generalization, though. I don't think that anyone, not even your typical Debian elitist, chooses to use a particular window manager for that reason. Or maybe I'm wrong, but I don't think that's why most people do it. I've used various WMs over the years, partly out of curiosity, but also because it's just something I like to do. I like to see what else is out there, and I enjoy learning how to get along in different environments. Not everyone needs (or wants) a full DE; maybe a tiling WM or something is better for how you like to work.

As for the Debian User Forums, there are some jerks over there, no doubt. The mods there kinda let everything go. But there are many, many members over there who really know their stuff, and those forums are filled with great info. One thing I like about it, I rarely have to post any questions over there because I can almost always find solutions by searching the forums. If you go over there and post questions without doing some homework, without first doing some forum and/or web searches, yeah, you might got jumped on a little bit. You can either laugh it off, take it with a grain of salt, and learn from it, or you can get upset about it and run away, whatever. The way I figure it, I'm a Debian user and those are my forums, too, so I'm not about to let a few jerks run me off. So I just ignore the jerks (or let myself be entertained by 'em, at times) and take advantage of what the Debian community has to offer, which is really a great deal -- if you decide not to let certain things bother you.
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MALsPa
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Re: Debian fanaticism

Post by MALsPa »

Probably the one thing I dislike most about the Debian User Forums is the Ubuntu-bashing. I think it's been a lot worse in the past than it is now.

But, frankly, there's been a lot of Ubuntu-bashing here, too. Which I find incredibly ironic, for obvious reasons.
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Re: Debian fanaticism

Post by MartyMint »

MALsPa wrote:Probably the one thing I dislike most about the Debian User Forums is the Ubuntu-bashing. I think it's been a lot worse in the past than it is now.

But, frankly, there's been a lot of Ubuntu-bashing here, too. Which I find incredibly ironic, for obvious reasons.

Ubuntu bashing, while childish and immature, is almost understandable seeing it from a Debian perspective...
Imagine how you'd feel if the general consensus was that it took Canonical to come up with Ubuntu to finally make your distro usable...
I might have a chip on my shoulder too if I were a long time Debian advocate.

Ubuntu bashing on Mint forums is...I agree...bordering on the bizarre... :shock:
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Re: Debian fanaticism

Post by deleted »

When you choose a distro,
You choose a distro, a repo, _and_ a forum.

There are many reasons why someone would chose a distro _based_ on a distro for this very reason.
That is, look at why some folks choose Linux Mint over *buntu, or #!/SolydXK/siduction/LinuxBBQ/semplice or Debian.

Technically they are based on Debian, but folks will choose those distros instead of the "mothership" for one reason or another.
I heard the other day, "There are Coke and Pepsi. If I prefer Pepsi, that doesn't mean I hate Coke".

-Hinto
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