[Asterisk-Users] Linux Distribution for Asterisk server use

[Jeff Heath]

I needed to learn Linux for a project about 18 months ago, so I went
down to a retail computer store and bought RedHat Linux.  Installed with
no problems, and I was up and playing around with it in about an hour.
As I got more into it (and started breaking things) I needed some help. 
The help I got from RedHat tech support was not very helpful.  It was
the e-mail help you get with the retail consumer version, so I figured
you get what you pay for and let it go.  If you had a business support
contract, it might be better, but maybe not.  The best help I got was
from joining my local Linux Users Group (LILUG in my case).  They were
great.  And when I went to a few meetings, and got to ask questions in
person it got really good!  If you have a local Linux User's group
that's not too inconvenient to attend I highly recommend it.

Anyway, at the user's group meetings their existed a "friendly rivalry"
between the RedHat crowd and the Debian crowd, so I decided to try
Debian.  Couldn't get it to install.  I really tried, even got some help
from the Debian guys on the list, but I just couldn't do it.  Now, I'm
not a Linux guru, but I can follow instructions, but I just couldn't get
it to go.

Then I downloaded and installed Fedora Core 1 (RedHat open source /
development version).  No problem.  So my newbie experience is that
RedHat is quite a bit easier to install.

Used to be that one of the big advantages of Debian was its package
management system (apt).  RedHat has a good package manager now too
(yum).  

So IMHO, go with RedHat for the following reasons:

1.  Sounds like price isn't your big issue, so if you purchase an
enterprise edition of Linux, you'll have access to RedHat tech support,
and you'll have a certain amount of CYA built in.

2.  Some might argue that the community support for Debian or Mandrake
is better, but the mailing list / IRC support you'll get with RedHat is
probably good enough.

3.  There are more books available for RedHat than for other
distributions.

4.  In my experience, it installs easier.

5.  Getting security patches and OS upgrades from RedHat is very simple
(probably is with the other distros too).

For what you're going to do with Asterisk, I don't think there are huge
technical differences between the distributions, so the main
consideration ought to be "which one can I install and learn the
fastest" and not "which one will support the most clients, or have the
most uptime".  Having said that, there is one caveat - I would stay away
from Fedora Core 3 or Debian unstable or whatever newest release of any
version.  Also keep in mind that Asterisk runs just fine on Linux kernel
2.4.x.  You don't need 2.6.x.  

Jeff Heath