[edwintorok]

Debian is a good choice (I use it as my main OS), but I think the key is to choose one Linux distribution - preferably one run by an open-source community and not by a company - and spend some time using it as your only OS and learn how to fix the most common issues.

It helps if you know other people that use that distribution: that way you can ask each-other for advice when something doesn't work as you'd like it. Alternatively one can join a user's mailing list / IRC chat room, most distributions have one.

But even if your choice turns out to be wrong (i.e. Ubuntu) the solution is not to abandon Linux completely.

In fact I couldn't imagine being able to work on anything else than Linux these days, I just depend too much on it: from a working valgrind tool, to having the source code for the entire OS.