On Tue, Sep 29, 2009 at 12:49 PM, Les Mikesell lesmikesell@gmail.com wrote:
Yes, keep in mind that it took many years for Red Hat to get it right (or what they think is right) and when they did, they stopped distributing the binaries for free. Ubuntu should be getting pretty close to having the support experience they need to be a match - and so far they have promised that their version will continue to be available for free.
I don't know what Ubuntu wants eventually, but for now they seem to have a totally different mindset than Red Hat. They've positioned themselves to be the "move from Windows" Linux and, in doing that, they're basically pushing "cutting edge." Red Hat, on the other hand, made the decision to go for the corporate server (and Desktop) market. Everything they do is geared for that purpose. Their only real competition here is SuSE.
My experience with Ubuntu is mixed. It's easy to install but there always seems to be something that doesn't quite work right -- usually issues with my Intel graphics chip. I've also had problems with updates breaking what already worked. I'm using "trailing edge" hardware, so that could be the problem. If I used a Debian-based distribution it would probably just be Debian.