What's your favorite server distro?

sabooky · 2008-04-08 15:37:50

For desktop my Linux path went something like this. Slackware, redhat, few years break, fedora, archlinux. Archlinux by far is my favorite distro, that said.. I'm looking for a server distribution, figured Arch users would have a good Idea on what's good.

The ones I'm currently considering are:
Freebsd 7.0 (I'm currently using freebsd 6.2 on my home server.. want to change, but will stick with it if nothing else is there.)
Gentoo (I hear it's really high maintenance.. any opinions?)
Debian (Dunno much about it, worried about "non free" software support, and making custom packages)
slackware (eh.. )
Archlinux (Kinda torn on this, I like arch a lot...dunno if I trust it as a server)

There may be others that are good that I missed, just wanted to get other Arch users opinions.

I currently have Freebsd 7.0, Archlinux, Debian (lenny) VM's installed using virtualbox. Been playing around with them for less then a week.

In short.. as an Arch user, what's your favorite server distro?

Issh · 2008-04-08 15:55:34

Im running it as a server, for 2 weeks now and hasnt let me down yet! Arch that is

Last edited by Issh (2008-04-08 15:56:26)

brebs · 2008-04-08 16:14:02

Arch is suited for a cutting/bleeding-edge desktop, but not for a serious server - its attention to security is not high enough. bzip2 is a random example - out-of-date.

Edit: bug filed.

Last edited by brebs (2008-04-08 16:21:26)

gothmog.todi · 2008-04-08 16:45:32

For me security is more important than performance, so there is no way past OpenBSD.

tigrmesh · 2008-04-08 18:45:01

If I were to run a web server, I also would use OpenBSD. Here's a quote from their website:

To ensure that novice users of OpenBSD do not need to become security experts overnight (a viewpoint which other vendors seem to have), we ship the operating system in a Secure by Default mode.

kezar · 2008-04-08 18:50:14

I use arch. Great perfs, no security problems for now (lots of scans but I like to ban).
I've got an old fedora on another machine (I didn't setup it) and I waste a lot of time on sysadmin. Here I realize how much I like arch and it's KISS philosophy.

xaw · 2008-04-08 19:39:35

I'd probably use OpenBSD or NetBSD for the job as server distro - OpenBSD because of its default security and NetBSD because you could make a server pretty much out of anything :-)

sjg · 2008-04-08 21:16:33

I'm running CentOS on my server, and found it to be secure and stable. I'd like to try BSD though - probably will at some point.

sabooky · 2008-04-08 21:34:15

My server machine is actually on a wireless connection (WPA), last I checked OpenBSD doesn't support WPA

This is a home server by the way, part of the reason for wanting to try something different is to learn another flavor of *nix.

B-Con · 2008-04-09 00:14:38

OpenBSD. DefCon uses it, there's a reason for that.

tigrmesh · 2008-04-09 00:44:38

It looks like it does support some wireless chips. Have a look here: http://www.openbsd.org/faq/faq6.html#Wireless.

Misfit138 · 2008-04-09 01:50:09

Nothing beats OpenBSD for a server.

sabooky · 2008-04-09 03:12:49

Ok well.. OpenBSD sounds AWESOME.. but still the problem of WPA support. If I ever setup a server that doesn't use WPA I'll try openbsd. Since OpenBSD isn't an option, what would be the 2nd choice.

Allan · 2008-04-09 03:15:09

I have used Debian and CentOS before and found both satisfactory. Currently run an Arch server but I wouldn't care too much if I screwed it up somehow (haven't in the last year...)

toofishes · 2008-04-09 03:41:52

sabooky wrote:

My server machine is actually on a wireless connection (WPA), last I checked OpenBSD doesn't support WPA
This is a home server by the way, part of the reason for wanting to try something different is to learn another flavor of *nix.

I'm hard-pressed to think of why you would (want to) set this up this way, but more power to you. Care to explain your network setup? I don't think I would ever run anything I considered a server over wireless- I'd much rather use trusty old ethernet for speed, and to a lesser note, security reasons.

sabooky · 2008-04-09 07:40:04

toofishes wrote:

I'm hard-pressed to think of why you would (want to) set this up this way, but more power to you. Care to explain your network setup? I don't think I would ever run anything I considered a server over wireless- I'd much rather use trusty old ethernet for speed, and to a lesser note, security reasons.

It's just a small home server, more of a tinkering project then anything. Problem is.. it's a noisy computer, so I like to keep it in another room so it doesn't bother me wiring isn't impossible, but annoying enough where it's just easier to set it up wireless.

TheAmigo · 2008-04-09 17:42:30

I have two servers (http, samba, postfix, dns, etc) that I've greatly regretted using CentOS on. I installed both when 4.0 was new, now I'm stuck at 4.x with a 2.6.9 kernel.

MySQL5? PHP5? modern kernel? compile from source. Not pulling from the repos, I'd have to keep a close eye on all those packages for security updates and compile from source every time.

Burning 5.x to disc and downing servers just to upgrade the OS software is a PITA... and knowing that I'll have to do that again when 6.0 comes out? no thanks!

That's why I've switched to Arch... no need to reinstall when a new release comes out.

xaw · 2008-04-09 19:32:44

sabooky wrote:

Ok well.. OpenBSD sounds AWESOME.. but still the problem of WPA support. If I ever setup a server that doesn't use WPA I'll try openbsd. Since OpenBSD isn't an option, what would be the 2nd choice.

Honestly, the next best thing to me is a light install of Slackware bootstrapped with NetBSD's pkgsrc for easy upgrading (as easy as is functionally possible).

dolby · 2008-04-09 19:46:35

xaw wrote:

sabooky wrote:
Ok well.. OpenBSD sounds AWESOME.. but still the problem of WPA support. If I ever setup a server that doesn't use WPA I'll try openbsd. Since OpenBSD isn't an option, what would be the 2nd choice.
Honestly, the next best thing to me is a light install of Slackware bootstrapped with NetBSD's pkgsrc for easy upgrading (as easy as is functionally possible).

theres dracolinux thats exactly that

Korey Kaczynski · 2008-04-10 09:55:35

Why is OpenBSD better than FreeBSD?

evol · 2008-04-10 22:25:10

sabooky wrote:

toofishes wrote:
I'm hard-pressed to think of why you would (want to) set this up this way, but more power to you. Care to explain your network setup? I don't think I would ever run anything I considered a server over wireless- I'd much rather use trusty old ethernet for speed, and to a lesser note, security reasons.
It's just a small home server, more of a tinkering project then anything. Problem is.. it's a noisy computer, so I like to keep it in another room so it doesn't bother me wiring isn't impossible, but annoying enough where it's just easier to set it up wireless.

Might I recommend the HomePlug/Powerline Ethernet set up?

Plug an adapter into a wall power socket, hook your Ethernet cable up and you're sorted.

Last edited by evol (2008-04-10 22:25:33)

B-Con · 2008-04-10 22:26:05

Korey Kaczynski wrote:

Why is OpenBSD better than FreeBSD?

Define "better". For a server platform, it could be considered "better" since it has more emphasis on security. FreeBSD focuses on being a usable and stable, OpenBSD places first through fifth priority on security.

jb · 2008-04-11 05:05:30

Either Arch or FreeBSD. I'd elaborate on why, but it could all just be summarized to familiarity.

sabooky · 2008-04-11 05:37:15

evol wrote:

Might I recommend the HomePlug/Powerline Ethernet set up?
Plug an adapter into a wall power socket, hook your Ethernet cable up and you're sorted.

Never tried those before, I'll read some reviews on them (I always just assumed they were no good). Thanks.

I think I'm gonna just stick with FreeBSD for now, will try openbsd if I do the homeplug thing.

I tinkered around a bit with the different virtual machines, here is my opinion so far:

Freebsd 7.0: since my current server is freebsd 6.2, this was more of the same.. no complaints.
Gentoo: Seems like a good distro, but the learning curve is pretty steep, too painful, too time consuming (keeping it around for tinkering though, it did impress me somewhat)
Debian: Gotta learn how to use aptitude and synatptic, only played a few hours with this.. too early to tell.
slackware: Haven't done a virtual box yet, dunno..package management looks annoying, and lack of patches (I have to find patches myself it seems..)
Archlinux: well the VM runs like my host desktop.. it runs great, no complaints... but due to earlier (security/stability) fears, I think freebsd is more suitable.

joephantom · 2008-04-13 03:58:41

OpenBSD. If you can't use it for some reason, Freebsd || Debian.

Arch Linux

#1 2008-04-08 15:37:50

What's your favorite server distro?

#2 2008-04-08 15:55:34

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#3 2008-04-08 16:14:02

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#23 2008-04-11 05:05:30

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#25 2008-04-13 03:58:41

Re: What's your favorite server distro?

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