How many linux version are there

All configuration is done by editing text files. There is a saying in the Linux community that if you learn Red Hat, you'll know Red Hat, but if you learn Slackware, you'll know Linux. This is particularly true today when many other Linux distributions keep developing heavily customised products to meet the needs of less technical Linux users.

While this philosophy of simplicity has its fans, the fact is that in today's world, Slackware Linux is increasingly becoming a "core system" upon which new, custom solutions are built, rather than a complete distribution with a wide variety of supported software.

The only exception is the server market, where Slackware remains popular, though even here, the distribution's complex upgrade procedure and lack of officially supported automated tools for security updates makes it increasingly uncompetitive. Slackware's conservative attitude towards the system's base components means that it requires much manual post-installation work before it can be tuned into a modern desktop system.

Its founder, Ian Murdock, envisaged the creation of a completely non-commercial project developed by hundreds of volunteer developers in their spare time. With sceptics far outnumbering optimists at the time, it seemed destined to disintegrate and collapse, but the reality was very different. Debian not only survived, it thrived and, in less than a decade, it became the largest Linux distribution and possibly the largest collaborative software project ever created!

It is developed by over 1, volunteer developers, its software repositories contain close to 50, binary packages compiled for eight processor architectures , and it is responsible for inspiring over Debian-based distributions and live CDs. These figures are unmatched by any other Linux-based operating system.

The actual development of Debian takes place in three main branches or four if one includes the bleeding-edge "Experimental" branch of increasing levels of stability: "Unstable" also known as "Sid" , "Testing" and "Stable".

This progressive integration and stabilisation of packages and features, together with the project's well-established quality control mechanisms, has earned Debian its reputation of being one of the best-tested and most bug-free distributions available today.

However, this lengthy and complex development style also has some drawbacks: the stable releases of Debian are not particularly up-to-date and they age rapidly, especially since new stable releases are only published once every years.

Those users who prefer the latest packages and technologies are forced to use the potentially buggy Debian Testing or Unstable branches. The highly democratic structures of Debian have led to controversial decisions and gives rise to infighting among the developers.

This has contributed to stagnation and reluctance to make radical decisions that would take the project forward. Although Fedora was formally unveiled only in September , its origins effectively date back to when it was launched by two Linux visionaries -- Bob Young and Marc Ewing -- under the name of Red Hat Linux. The company's first product, Red Hat Linux 1. In , Red Hat introduced its revolutionary RPM package management system with dependency resolution and other advanced features which greatly contributed to the distribution's rapid rise in popularity and its overtaking of Slackware Linux as the most widely-used Linux distribution in the world.

In later years, Red Hat standardised on a regular, 6-month release schedule. In , just after the release of Red Hat Linux 9, the company introduced some radical changes to its product line-up. It retained the Red Hat trademark for its commercial products, notably Red Hat Enterprise Linux, and introduced Fedora Core later renamed to Fedora , a Red Hat-sponsored, but community-oriented distribution designed for the "Linux hobbyist". After the initial criticism of the changes, the Linux community accepted the "new" distribution as a logical continuation of Red Hat Linux.

A few quality releases was all it took for Fedora to regain its former status as one of the best-loved operating systems on the market. At the same time, Red Hat quickly became the biggest and most profitable Linux company in the world, with an innovative product line-up, excellent customer support, and other popular initiatives, such as its Red Hat Certified Engineer RHCE certification programme. Although Fedora's direction is still largely controlled by Red Hat, Inc.

Its contributions to the Linux kernel, glibc and GCC are well-known and its integration of SELinux functionality, virtualisation technologies, systemd service manager, cutting-edge journaled file systems, and other enterprise-level features are much appreciated among the company's customers.

On a negative side, Fedora still lacks a clear desktop-oriented strategy that would make the product easier to use for those beyond the "Linux hobbyist" target. Recent versions of Fedora have introduced a new flavour of the distribution called Atomic Host.

Atomic uses the same packages as Fedora's Server edition, but makes sure of atomic updates to the base operating system using OSTree. In the early days, the young company sold sets of floppy disks containing a German edition of Slackware Linux, but it wasn't long before SuSE Linux became an independent distribution with the launch of version 4.

In the following years, the developers adopted the RPM package management format and introduced YaST, an easy-to-use graphical system administration tool.

Frequent releases, excellent printed documentation, and easy availability of SuSE Linux in stores across Europe and North America resulted in growing popularity for the distribution. Major changes in the development, licensing and availability of SUSE Linux followed shortly after the first acquisition - YaST was released under the General Public License GPL , the ISO images were freely distributed from public download servers, and, most significantly, the development of the distribution was opened to public participation for the first time.

Since the launch of the openSUSE project and the release of version These days openSUSE is available in two main editions - Leap, which provides a stable platform with multiple years of support; and Tumbleweed, which provides a rolling release environment. The distribution often recevies praise for its easy configuration through YaST , Btrfs advanced filesystem support, and automated filesystem snapshots and boot environments.

Launched in late , CentOS was a community project with the goals of rebuilding the source code for Red Hat Enterprise Linux RHEL into an installable Linux distribution and to provide timely security updates for all included software packages. The only technical difference between the two distributions was branding - CentOS's Linux edition replaced all Red Hat trademarks and logos with its own.

Red Hat sponsored and hired CentOS developers starting in CentOS has often been seen as a reliable server distribution. CentOS Linux versions up to version 8 came with the same set of well-tested and stable Linux kernel and software packages that form the basis of its parent, Red Hat Enterprise Linux.

Despite being a community project run by volunteers, it gained a reputation for being a solid, free alternative to the more costly server products on the market, especially among experienced Linux system administrators.

Ubuntu is based on Debian see below and includes well-known apps such as Firefox and OpenOffice. It has a predictable, six-month release schedule, with occasional Long Term Support LTS versions that are supported with security updates for three to five years.

Ubuntu is also notable for its ease of use and its inclusion of a migration assistant for Windows users and support for the latest technologies.

Version The final iteration of that version is due out next month. Because of that close connection, Fedora is particularly strong on enterprise features, and it often offers them before RHEL does. Fedora also offers a six-month release schedule, and its security features are excellent. The operating system adds to Ubuntu with its own, distinct desktop theme and a different set of applications; also unique to the distro are a variety of graphical tools for enhanced usability , such as mintDesktop for configuring the desktop environment, mintInstall for easier software installation and mintMenu for easier navigation.

It also includes some proprietary multimedia codecs that are often absent from larger distributions, thereby enhancing its hardware compatibility. With good support for graphics drivers, browser plugins and media codecs, PCLinuxOS can be a good choice for beginners. Besides, it provides a really large software repository. Its first version, Mageia 1, was released in June Clear Linux is an open source Linux distribution created by Intel.

It is updated following a rolling release model. The OS is optimized for performance and security from the cloud to the Edge; as well as for Intel products. Its source code is available on GitHub. Stackscale provides two of its public mirrors in Madrid and Amsterdam. It is focused on long-term stability and governed by the community; with regular releases.

It is also a good alternative for those who are currently using CentOS, after its discontinuation by the end of On the following webpage, you can find the statistics of the most used Linux distributions over the last decade. Predictable performance, free of noisy neighbors, and greater control over your cloud environment and its costs. Share it on Social Media! Share on facebook. Share on twitter. Share on linkedin. Share on pinterest. Share on whatsapp.

Share on email. Private Cloud Predictable performance, free of noisy neighbors, and greater control over your cloud environment and its costs. Related articles. Linux: from a hobby to a collaborative tech revolution. What is a legacy system? We use cookies to provide you with the best experience in our website.

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