During much of the time I was running Ubuntu, I told myself that I'd be running Debian instead, if only I could get everything working. I have tried the Ubuntu Lucid Alpha 2 build, and I still appreciate so many things working out of the box on my 2002-03-era Toshiba Satellite 1100-S101 laptop.

I am thinking the unthinkable…..I am considering changing from Ubuntu 8.10 for my desktop to Debian 5. I have been running the Debian 5 Lenny candidate for awhile and have bee very pleased with the stability and features.

I do tend to go on. But here's the short version of why I'm running Debian instead of Ubuntu.

Hunter goes from Debian 32 to Ubuntu 64 and eventually sticks with Ubunty Lenny 64. Learn about his experience with the Beta version of Debian Lenny for AMD 64

Debian 5 Lenny is an excellent desktop or server option that is worthy of consideration. I have been running the Debian 5 Lenny candidate for awhile and have been very pleased with the stability and features. This article is a list of some of those new features...and there are a lot of them.

Welcome to Part 2 of Open Source Operating Systems. If you missed Part 1, click here. Today we will focus on Ubuntu. I really like Ubuntu. It was the first Linux distro that I used and I really think it is intuitive and very similar to Windows XP.

A few weeks ago, I wrote about five features that make Ubuntu so much more enjoyable to use than certain less-Free operating systems. The comments on that post got me thinking about several other great features that I didn't mention. So to give those their due, here's a second list of five things Ubuntu does that I couldn't live without.

When Debian issues a point release, as it just did with the current Stable distribution Lenny going from 5.0.3 to 5.0.4, it's no big deal. They happen. But you don't need to throw out your Lenny install CDs or do any kind of reinstallation.

So in part one we disabled unwanted or unneeded programs from starting up when we turn on our computer. However those programs are still installed and taking up space. This space could be better used for other things. Important things like music, movies, recipes or maybe even some work related stuff.