LWN: Comments on "Netcraft: Debian is the fastest growing distribution"

deceptive: high growth is easier if you are small

stevenj — Wed, 28 Jan 2004 20:49:22 +0000

I use Debian myself, but you shouldn't draw too many conclusions from the fact that it has the highest growth rate as a percentage of its current size. Debian is the third most popular in the survey, less than 1/3 of Redhat's size, and when you're small it's much easier to have a larger percentage growth.

In terms of absolute growth rate (# machines / month), Netcraft's numbers show that Redhat's growth is 2.5 times that of Debian's.

Netcraft: Debian is the fastest growing distribution

maney — Wed, 28 Jan 2004 20:22:06 +0000

How do they...

Just click on the link and see!

Netcraft: Debian is the fastest growing distribution

ringlord — Wed, 28 Jan 2004 19:28:06 +0000

How do they track distributions? Are they counting the answers from Apache
that came precompiled with the distribution?

On my Slackware servers I always compile Apache and PHP from scratch. I
never use the package from the distribution. What are my servers and the
countless others that don't use precompiled packages counted as?

Netcraft: Debian is the fastest growing distribution

wolfrider — Wed, 28 Jan 2004 18:36:02 +0000

--Not to mention the untold number of Debian systems that are multi-boot, not serving web pages, behind firewalls / NAT...

--Don't foget the number of installable live-cds that are Debian-based, as well. With distros such as Knoppix, Mepis, Lindows, et al - Debian is now easy to install.

Netcraft: Debian is the fastest growing distribution

rknop — Wed, 28 Jan 2004 15:17:50 +0000

I moved to Debian as of Red Hat 8.0. (The rpm bug that prevented me from installing the updates en masse is what drove me away, but the new enterprise licencing deals would have later if I hadn't already moved earlier.)

I suspect that many people may be moving to Debian because of its stability. Not necessarily because of the stability to bugs and updates that Debian Stable shows (although that is definitely real-- although sometimes a headache, e.g. if you get a new video card). Rather, because of the way Debian is maintained. It's probably the one Linux distribution that you can count on being able to continue to get under the terms that you are able to get it now. RedHat has shown that the RedHat distribution doesn't fit that description. (Yeah, you can still get it, but updates don't come free.) Perhaps in a few years Fedora or WhiteBox will have that reputation, and RedHat will be "back" for small-time operators. But right now, I wouldn't "trust" anybody but Debian.

If the Debian project ever shows signs of faltering or becoming moribound, that would change. The nature of Debian makes us all believe that we'll always be able to get the latest Debian and patches for free without hassle, but an unmaintained "utterly free" distribution is just as dead to the small-time operator as the "gotta pay for updates" distribution.

-Rob