Linux vs Linux

Debian has been around since the early days of Linux, and it plays an important role due to its strict free software policies (the Debian Free Software Guidelines are a key description of open source), and support for a wide range of computer architectures. Can this new release make Debian relevant to new users in the face of the Ubuntu onslaught?

Installation

The Debian installer in text mode...

...and in GUI mode.

Debian’s text-based installer may not be very shiny, but it’s quick, flexible, and actually quite intuitive in most respects. Partitioning is where it falls apart to a degree: The guided partitioning options are great, but if you need to use custom partitioning, the interface isn’t very intuitive. It works well once you understand it and it’s quite powerful – Debian supports software RAID, LVM, and encrypted file systems out of the box.

Etch actually adds a GUI installer, but it’s absolutely identical to the text version, even down to the partitioner. It’s really there for users of more exotic languages that can’t be drawn properly in text display modes, rather than as a user-friendly replacement.

After partitioning, you get to optionally enable a network mirror for downloading more software (with a good selection of mirrors on offer), and you can then enable various basic package profiles to install, such as ‘Desktop environment’ and ‘Web server’.

Etch ships on 23 CDs, but you can install with just the first CD, which includes a full desktop and application suite. If 700MB is too big, you can try the 40MB installer CD, which downloads packages straight from your local Debian mirror.

Desktop

Debian’s GNOME desktop is slightly old, but still slick.

After performing a standard install with the ‘Desktop environment’ option ticked, we sat through a completely text-based boot sequence before the GUI started, presenting us with an attractive login screen for the GNOME desktop. Debian focuses on stable, well-tested software, so while its GNOME 2.14 desktop is a couple of versions behind, it proved very solid in use. Customisation is minimal: The icons, themes, layout, and behaviour are all standard, with just a
Debian wallpaper to tell you what Linux you’re running.

Firefox 2.0 is the default browser, but it’s not called Firefox – Mozilla’s use of trademarks conflicts with the Debian Free Software Guidelines, and so the decision was made to re-brand Firefox under the name Iceweasel. Thunderbird has had a similar name change to Icedove. Everything works exactly as you’d expect though, so it makes little difference in practical terms.

Debian’s GNOME desktop is slightly old, but still slick.

Administrative tools are slightly thin on the ground though – for instance, there’s no X setup tool. The installer automatically misconfigured the resolution of our monitor, and the only way to fix it was to manually edit the config file.

Package management
Debian uses the same update manager as Ubuntu, and it works well, quickly processing downloaded updates. For adding software, there’s Synaptic, a GUI interface to Debian’s APT system, which also works well, though the command-line ‘apt-get’ and ‘aptitude’ tools are better once you learn them.

APT was always designed with major version upgrades in mind, so upgrading
to new versions of Debian is generally trouble-free.

Though Debian’s stable releases don’t come often, it’s worth mentioning the ‘testing’ branch of Debian, which is automatically built from packages that have passed some initial testing in the ‘unstable’ development branch. This gives you relatively up-to-date packages all the time, with few major problems along the way. With APT, it’s very easy to switch to ‘testing’, and then keep up with the changes.

Hardware support
Out of the box support was good on both test systems, with everything working as expected. Proprietary drivers from NVIDIA and ATI are available as well, though they’re in Debian’s ‘non-free’ repository. You can enable this repository and install the driver packages through Synaptic, though enabling the drivers may require more manual configuration editing.

Debian doing what it does best - installing software through APT.