[networked]

So, is the Linux distribution market now ripe for disruption?

I wonder who out of today's major players could be the next big thing. OpenSUSE seems the closest to Ubuntu in terms of user friendliness (Linus' comments notwithstanding) due to tools like YaST [1] and a PPA-like mechanism called the openSUSE Build Server for extra prebuilt software [2]. People certainly have speculated about it online for a while but we're yet to see an exodus of Ubuntu users to openSUSE.

On a related note, a major thing Ubuntu and its derivatives have going for them is the great font rendering out of the box. I wonder why other distributions haven't yet adopted it, or the Infinality patches [3], as defaults.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/YaST

[2] That said, although I've been following their releases lately I haven't used a SUSE distribution as a daily driver since SUSE 9.3, so I don't know how the quality compares; any openSUSE users here that can chime in with a comment?

[3] See http://www.infinality.net/blog/.

[antonios]

> On a related note, a major thing Ubuntu and its derivatives have going for them is the great font rendering out of the box.

This. The default freetype rendering is horrible to my eyes, even worse than Microsoft's SmearType(TM).

> I wonder why other distributions haven't yet adopted it, or the Infinality patches, by default.

Patents, I guess. Quoting Wikipedia:

> Microsoft has several patents in the United States on subpixel rendering technology for text rendering on RGB Stripe layouts. This had caused FreeType, the library used by most current software on the X Window System, to disable this functionality by default. Apple was able to use it in Mac OS X due to a patent cross-licensing agreement.

I do not know if Canonical has reached a similar agreement with Microsoft like Apple. Perhaps someone from the Ubuntu camp can enlighten us.

[mayhew]

Pretty sure the Microsoft subpixel rendering patents are only applicable in the United States.

[rmk2]

I'm really rather happy with openSUSE. I have a VPS and a RPi running Debian stable and beta respectively, but my main laptop has been running openSUSE for years and I prefer it if possible. I think this one has been updated at least since 11.4, and I've started using their "rolling stable" release (for lack of a better description), called Tumbleweed, which is really neat![1]

YaST is nice since it's there if one doesn't know how to change certain things (or if one cannot be bothered) simply with the config files, though they are always there for direct editing. Another nice thing is the wide array of Window Managers available, I've been using KDE4 for a long while but recently found myself using i3 more and more.

Regarding package management, I find zypper a delight to work with, since repository management is straight-forward (and so is gpg-key-management). It's also rpm-based, which I think makes packaging a lot easier, but YMMV.

[1]: Thanks gregkh! :)

[SkyMarshal]

>I wonder who out of today's major players could be the next big thing.

ElementaryOS is doing good things with the Linux desktop and should be a contender.

http://elementaryos.org/

[pantalaimon]

Without a company or a large community behind it, I doubt it will gain much traction. Also except for the Desktop Environment, it's Ubuntu again.

[andrewcooke]

opensuse is very good. to me (having used both) it feels more transparent - it's easier to change / configure things. you get all the automated help, but it's easier to dig down and fiddle around.

having said that, i am waiting for my openbsd to arrive. i plan to keep opensuse on the laptops, but am going to try openbsd on the server / firewall / everything box.