POLL: Which Linux distro do you use?

[FourthWorld]

I've seen a lot of Linux users here and on the use-livecode list, so I'm curious about which distros you folks are using.

This poll is to find out which distro you use the most, but if you use multiple distros feel free to note which ones in a post here in this thread. It might also be good to know if you use Linux as your primary development OS, or just for testing.

Feel free to chime in with any other comments you have about your experience using LiveCode on Linux, what works well, what doesn't, what you'd like to see improved, etc.

Thanks in advance for participating in this poll.

[Clarkey]

Richard,
I develop (a very loose definition of what I currently do!) on 'regular' Mac OSX. My main interest is web-based apps and would be running revServer on my Company VPS - if the ageing Ubuntu version (Dapper Drake 6.06 LTS) wasn't too old to support some key libraries. I will migrate to a newer VPS but meanwhile have installed revServer on my home server (running OSX Server).
Best,
Keith..

[SoapDog]

I use Ubuntu 10.10 as my Desktop Linux and use CentOS 5.x as my Server Linux.

I wish we had the old engines for BSD, Irix, Solaris available again... even if old, they are still useful. Also building RevServer for ARM would enable lots of appliances to be develop (check pogoplug or sheevaplug).

[doc]

Richard,
I primarily use Windows due to the proprietary software that is and has been required for generating income, but otherwise have been "migrating to Linux" for over 12 years now. A large part of those 12 years were spent "distro-hopping" up until about 3 years ago, when I found and stuck with Linux Mint.

My first project ever with a LiveCode related product was a simple desktop application that acted as a front end to a remote MySQL database, which was built over the course of a weekend using DreamCard for Linux. Most of my projects with LiveCode, whether built in Linux or Windows, are relatively simple "one off" text processing type applications used to enhance productivity for myself and/or co-workers.

...basically I'm a "Linux Guy" stuck in the world of Windows.

-Doc-
(David C. in the use list)

[sturgis]

I prefer dsl. Small, fast, easy to work with. I had been able to get rev running adequately on it in the past, but the new livecode method hasn't wanted to work. And I haven't had the energy to see if I can solve it yet.

If i'm installing on donated hardware, on machines that are being rebuilt to pass along to needy families in the area, and I don't have access to a windows key for the machine, I go with mandriva. I've had the best luck with it working with hardware 'out of the box' though my understanding is that openSuse is now a better choice for laptops in some cases.

[alcibiades]

Debian and only debian for myself and family and work. I used to install Mandriva for other people but now put in PCLinuxOS if they are to be self supporting, or Debian if I know them well enough that they will call me for help. Debian has the reputation of being harder to use, but it never ever falls over, and there isn't much adminstration that the ordinary user needs to do. Plus, people can do their own updates, which I try to discourage, but they can.

[sturgis]

I'll have to try pclinuxos. The main issue I've had with mandriva is breakage after updates.

[mwieder]

I use Fedora Core 13 at work, and while it's been rock-solid I can't recommend it due to the lockout of su mode. There are things you can do with sudo *after* you've hacked up a few files to allow elevated privileges, but I end up having to su all the time anyway.

I run Kubuntu on my XO box for fun, but basically I'm a command-line kinda guy, so the gui stuff doesn't affect me much. Mostly my LiveCode work on linux involves frontends to shell scripts.

[alcibiades]

DSL not being supported any more, I would think about slitaz for old machines, customize it of course because it comes with almost nothing. Very impressive piece of work. One could also try the minimalist versions of PCLinux. The nice thing about PCL is that you can give them a link to the site and the magazine, and they feel they are part of something, a nice group of people who will help them.

[psahores]

I use mostly Suse for years (from 5.1, at least if i right remember). Just cool, stable, reliable,... including Yast, support any harware i had to do with. A perfect platform for server-side stuff.
Best,
Pierre

[Willits]

I am using RedHat Enterprise Linux 6 as development workstation, because our customers use it and as they needs warranty and very long term support, it is the best distro for that !

And not having to reinstall it every 6 month is a key word, I am a developer not an administrator

Ubuntu is good if you are coming from Windows world, but I hate it as Linux user. Debian is nice and it is easy to "mod" it to do a custom embedded system.

[SparkOut]

Mepis for my fileserver and testing server. My "production" machines are still Windows. And I am shortly to obtain a Macbook for the purposes of iOS tinkering.

[Roybr]

My distro of choice is openSUSE. Nothing beats it IMHO. Its KDE implementation is perfect and zypper is an extremely powerful package manager which uses a SAT solver to solve dependencies. Plus I don't need to edit config files manually because I have YaST which is a central system config tool which has a GTK/QT GUI and an ncurses interface so it is perfect for command line servers as well. I have tried other distros but I have always come back to openSUSE. Fedora would be my second choice.

[append[x]]

Currently I am using Ubuntu 12.10.
I stopped working with LiveCode on Linux because the 5.x versions were not integrating well with Unity (cluttering the dock) and I had some major problem using the menus (maybe memory leaks). Things have improved significantly with version 6.0, so I am right back on Linux.
I deployed one app for Linux to a larger audience and had no negative feedback. Compiled programs seem to run smoothly on many distributions. My own testing is limited to Ubuntu, though.

[FourthWorld]

Thank you for your feeback. I use LiveCode on Ubuntu daily, and while many things have improved in recent versions (such as the icon behavior in the Launcher), there are still some details to attend to.

Now that LiveCode is open source, I'm hoping others will join me in working with RunRev to address those details.