Recently I read an article lambasting or rather dissecting the role that Ubuntu has played in the Linux community and according to the author of the article titled - Ubuntu vs. Debian: What Canonical Doesn't Want You To Know , it boils down to clever marketing on the part of Ubuntu folks or in other words marketing gimmicks. In fact I see this growing dissent towards this distribution in different quarters - mind you, not from the actual users of Ubuntu who love this distribution but from people who are affiliated with or use other Linux distributions.So as a long time Ubuntu user, I asked myself this very important question. Is the Ubuntu word over-hyped ? Is Ubuntu Linux riding on the wave of good will, on top of what this word actually mean ? And finally what makes Ubuntu Linux stand apart from the rest of the Linux distributions ?
Ubuntu is a word in a South African language (Bantu) which has lots of meanings associated with it. And this word originated long before the birth of Linux. When the South African space tourist Mark Shuttleworth adopted this word for his Linux distribution, the word came to be synonymous with the Linux distribution and it gained world wide popularity.
I believe the word Ubuntu has gained as much popularity from being associated with this Linux distribution as the Linux distribution has gained from the word. In other words it is a symbiotic relationship as far as the Ubuntu word and Ubuntu Linux are concerned.
Even though I have been using Ubuntu as my main Linux distribution, I have used and still use other Linux distributions too. If you look around this site, you will find reviews of different Linux distributions as varied as PCLinuxOS, DSL, Vector Linux, Gentoo .... why just Linux, I have also reviewed a couple of non-Linux OSes such as FreeBSD and PCBSD. So my intention in raising this sensitive topic is not as much as to throw dirt at other Linux distributions rather to see why Ubuntu Linux has gained so much popularity and if it is worthy of it.
The number one incentive for me to try out Ubuntu in the first place (earlier I used to be a Fedora user) was that they were shipping (still do) free CDs of Ubuntu Linux to anyone around the world. This at a time when I had to do entirely with dial-up connection to log on to the net. Even now, in most third world countries, the word broadband Internet is synonymous with just 256 Kpbs speed and many people do not even have this luxury. So the vision of Mark Shuttleworth to hand out free CDs of Ubuntu to anybody who asked for it became a major hit world wide. In fact by doing so he made Linux free not only as in freedom but free as in beer too.
But handing out free Cds alone will not bring as much popularity as it now enjoys. After all if that were the case, all software (proprietary or otherwise) which we receive free of cost would have been as popular. So there are more reasons...
Any long time Linux user will agree with me that Debian holds a special place in their hearts. It has the largest number of packages in its repository than any Linux distribution can boast off. It is stable and can be compared at par with other Unices in its uptime. But one area where Debian developers lagged behind was in creating a separate Linux distribution or should I say a separate entity which the ordinary user could easily install and use on his desktop. Debian was and is more server oriented. I had the fortune of installing Debian on my machine a couple of months back. Even though I was able to successfully install, use and enjoy it, I had to struggle a bit in figuring out how to install it. The installation is far from newbie friendly. I would go so far as to say I found installing FreeBSD to be much more simpler than installing Debian. This is one area where the Debian developers have to direct their efforts to. And I believe something is being done to address this shortcoming. But that is not all, since it is a Linux distribution oriented to be run first and foremost on the servers, it comes with a lot of additional packages which a normal user will not have a clue as whether to install or not. So some one who needed a newbie friendly Linux distribution based on Debian had to put up with trying out Knoppix Live CD.
Ubuntu Linux, I believe addressed this need. They took all the good things that Debian has to offer - its excellent repository of packages, its superior package management, its stability and then took it one step further by fine tuning it to make it newbie friendly by making it possible to install it on to the hard disk by a mere six steps.
If you look closely, Ubuntu has made a number of refinements which make it an ideal OS for the home user. For one, it comes with all the ports closed by default. As a home user who's only interaction with the Internet is web browsing, checking mails and playing a few online games, the last thing I need are unnecessary services running on my machine. And Ubuntu Desktop has made it possible. As a comparison, I found a default Fedora desktop installation to run more than 10 services including Avahi (what ever that means). And in Ubuntu the only service listening on the tcp/udp ports is the cups printing service. Run the following command to see all the services that are listening on your tcp and udp ports to get an idea.
$ netstat -taupOr better still, run nmap to find the open ports on your machine running your favourite Linux distribution and then see how many are open in Ubuntu.
# nmap -sS <your machine IP address>Ubuntu Desktop does not ship with even a compiler. So it is impossible for a person who has access to your machine to write some malicious code, compile it and then make it to run during startup, in the process compromising your machine.
And for those who want such facilities as a compiler and ssh daemon running on your machine, it is a simple case of using apt-get to download and install the necessary packages in which case you are expected to know what you are doing and its consequences.
The point I wish to make is that Ubuntu team has been successful in addressing the need for a truly user friendly secure Linux desktop that the other major players failed to address. And the potential Linux users were quick to grab at what was offered and then form a community around it.
And while on the topic of community, One of the biggest strengths that any Linux distribution can aspire for is a large user community revolving around it. It is the community which imparts life to any Linux distribution and it aids in spreading the word about the distribution. And Ubuntu has been a success on this front. This might bring up a question in someones mind. Can a community be brought ? Not at all. It is something that happens when passion is involved. If not for passion, why then would some people spend many man hours developing scripts such as Automatix or EasyUbuntu and then share it freely with the rest of the Ubuntu users ? Why would anyone go out of their way to help in getting some things working right in Ubuntu ? Are these people on the payrolls of Ubuntu? No. It all filters down to passion. And passion my friend, cannot be brought. It is something that comes from within. In my opinion, Ubuntu has taken all the right steps in stirring this passion in its users which is why it enjoys an ever growing community.
That doesn't mean Debian doesn't have a strong community following. But the community revolving around Debian consists of an entirely different set of users. That is those who are more system administrators than ordinary users. And it is anybody's guess that normal users far out number the system administrators. I myself am a fan of Debian and I am sure that any day they bring out a newbie friendly distribution at par with what Ubuntu is now, a community will form around it and start promoting it.
Lastly, by choosing to use the packages in Debian Sid, Ubuntu has made sure that its users enjoy the latest versions of the software they have grown to love. I may also add that the hardware detection of Ubuntu is above par and is known to detect the widest range of hardware out of the box.
To sum up, these are the factors that has catapulted Ubuntu as the number one Linux distribution in terms of popularity. They are as follows:
- Distributing free Ubuntu CDs to anybody who asks for it.
- Designed with the home user in mind.
- Excellent hardware detection - a quality I believe is shared by other Linux distributions.
- A strong user community backing its growth.
- Containing the latest versions of the software packages.
- Managing to grab the average user's imagination with its association with the Bantu word Ubuntu.
Update (Aug 16 2006): My intention of writing this article was not to disparage any Linux distribution be it Debian, Fedora, SuSE or any other which I am sure enjoy its right place in the Linux community. But I strongly believe that if any Linux distribution has to excite the passion in the general public in the same level as Ubuntu has then they should discard this one size fits all principle. Which means they should delink the distribution for the ordinary masses from that for running on the servers. I believe that if these main stream (and other) linux distributions take a leaf from Ubuntu and bring out a truly newbie friendly distribution - sans sshd and other unnecessary services and without the compilers and such, I am sure they will be well recieved by the common public (average joes) who wish to run Linux on their machines.
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