Are there many different types of Linux?

ok so linux i may be wrong but that is another opperating system besides windows or windows xp,vista etc any way is linux just 1 OS or are there many different types of linux if so which is the best

There are many different distributions of Linux. Don't ask which is best because you will get as many answers as there are distributions. That will be proven in the next 10 posts following mine. I'm even going to confuse you more by saying that I use FreeBSD which is Unix, not Linux. It's just my preference but that's all any of it is. So, pick one and try it. Better yet, go to the library & take out a few books on it. Then decide.

I would say personally that Ubuntu would probably be the best for a starter, someone that is just getting introduced to linux. I wouldn't say that its the best though because every of exactly what Don said. Linux is all about customization and with customization you get preferences.

Windows (XP/Vista/etc.) is an operating system created and sold by Microsoft. They are the sole company that develops and maintains the OS. You cannot modify or redistribute Windows on your own.

Likewise, Mac OS X is developed and maintained by Apple. Just as with Windows, you are not allowed to modify or redistribute copies of the OS.

Linux, on the other hand, is different in the sense that anyone is allowed to modify and redistribute copies to anyone else. Because of this, many different distributions (think of them as "brands") of Linux emerge as new versions are created for people with different needs.

I agree with Don; if you want to try out Linux, download the "Live CD" version of a bunch of different distributions. These CD's allow you to run the operating system straight from the CD without the need to install anything.

I won't give my opinion as to which distribution is the "best", but here are some links to a few of the more popular ones:

Debian
Fedora
Slackware
Ubuntu

This is by no means a complete list; there are hundreds of distributions.

Ubuntu has become particularly popular because it focuses on ease-of-use and stability. Fedora usually contains the newest software packages available and is popular among people who like to have the "latest and greatest" of everything and don't care too much about the problems associated with beta and first-release software.

Although some of the information is probably outdated at this point, you should probably check out this post, which contains a lot of useful links to tutorials, books, and other Linux resources for beginners.

Thank you guys always go confused

Everyone have his own preferences, I prefer Ubuntu and Solaris

You really wanna know how many different flavors of linux there are? Just to give you a general idea, I'm on a slackware computer right now. On the rack behind me in my office I have 2 redhat servers, a centos server, and an ubuntu LTSP server, then on my workbench I'm building an openSuse server to replace the ubuntu server. Take your pick.....

All those flavors and not a single Debian server...tisk, tisk

The suse one might not stick around, I have until next fall to decide if I want to actually use it or not, but the centos is also on my hit list. I'm kind of thinking of taking everything to slackware because that is what I like, but am formally trained in redhat so I might go that way or with fedora.

I hate having to make these decisions, and with my new job I have to do that exclusively. w0ot! I'm running my own network now neener neener neener!

eww >.>
lol

i used to be alright with suse. novell has managed to create something visually appealing, but as for things working out of the box ubuntu has them trumped.
at least that was the case last time i installed OS, and that was v11? or 11.1?

This machine had whatever the latest ubuntu version was but it was running PAINFULLY slow, so I tried the slax live cd and it was ridiculously fast so I kept it, but yesterday afternoon I got fedora 10 and put it on and I'm pretty much pleased. I don't know why that ubuntu was slow, the only thing I can figure was that it wasn't the right kernel for this processor or something, this computer has two (2) xeon processors.......its good to work for a school with government funding! But anyway, it is running fine with the i686 fedora 10 distro, I think I'll try my ltsp server with it.

This was sent to me by a friend after asking about Linux in the 3D production environment:

"To get what Fedora and Ubuntu are all about its good to look at their roots. Fedora is a community project run by Red Hat which also makes Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL). Ubuntu is a cleaned up version of the testing branch of Debian Linux. Maybe more information than what you were looking for but here it goes.

Red Hat uses Fedora as a testing ground for technologies that will eventually be implemented in RHEL. Fedora is free of charge and run by volunteers and sponsored by Red Hat, but RHEL is a commercial product that will run about $400 per license. RHEL is used mostly in environments where stability and security are the most important factor instead of new features.

Since Fedora is more or less the unofficial beta version of RHEL it uses some beta packages and beta kernels. Its not always compatible with software like Maya and Houdini since its focus is new technology instead of legacy compatibility. Fedora generally has a very short life cycle, meaning new versions are released often and the older versions will no longer have updates and software repositories will not be available. Its nice though because it has a large community and is fairly user friendly compared to RHEL.

Ubuntu is run by Canonical which takes the testing (or beta) version of Debian Linux and adds pretty wallpapers, easy driver installation, and fixes the known bugs in the testing version of Debian. The Ubuntu community is huge, its easy to use, and the life cycle of each version is fixed at two years for normal releases at more for Long Term Support (LTS) versions unlike Fedora which is not supported for very long and the support length is no predetermined.

Debian Linux is one of the first GNU Linux distributions over 15 years old. Its known for being stable and secure and is setup in three branches. The stable branch is comparable to RHEL focusing on security and stability but doesn't always have current features and is not as user friendly. The testing branch uses the most current stable packages and kernels but isn't maintained by the security team of Debian, this is what Ubuntu is based on. Then there's the unstable branch which uses the latest packages and kernels, sometimes at the cost of stability and security. Fedora would fit somewhere between the testing version and unstable version of Debian in terms of stability and security.

Also note that Debian is a completely open source community project with no commercial sponsorship (unlike Ubuntu and Fedora). Long story short RHEL and Debian would be good in a studio or production environment, but Ubuntu is probably your best bet to starting out with Linux. Hopefully that'll give you a good head start with it."

There are indeed, as stated in the posts above, incredible amounts of Linux distro (distributions). One can even say they are endless!

There are many things to take in concern when picking your first distro.
Like:
- Do you want Linux, UNIX or perhaps BSD? You'll need to know a bit more of each three types to pick your choice)
- Are you setting up a server? Servers as you know must be stable, and Debian for example is a distro that is known for it's incredible stability. I've seen Debian distros running for years, without a reboot. But Debian does not run all the latest packages as they are going through a big loop of testings first. Thus the time between new releases is big.
- What kind of experience do you have with the new OS? Some distros are harder to setup for new users than others. Cause one might not have a fancy GUI installation but a text installation. This can be a bit confusing for new users.
And many more things of course..

distrowatch.com is a place where you can compare many distros with another.

http://www.zegeniestudios.net/ldc/
Here you can take a test that might help you choosing the right distro for you It will ask you some questions and then produce a list with distros that might give you a warm welcome in the world of Linux/UNIX/BSD.
After all, you don't want to get confused by your new OS that you jump back to Windows or something and miss these great things