Linux and data storage?

[Sean M McMahon]

I don't know of any site which compares distrobutions.  The thing to 
remember is  distrobutions are a method of collecting and packaging 
programs.  The main difference you see is where things are located on your 
system, how your system handles upgrades, what comes with a "standard" 
system.  Some are very large in size while others are not.  Most of the 
programms are the same.  when you get a functioning system using info and 
man will tell you the options for that program.  I can really only speak 
with limited authority on two distrobutions, fedora(formerly redhat) and 
debian.  Both have pre-compiled speakup kernels with speakup available. 
That means that you can boot speakup and linux with speach if you have a 
hardware synthesiser.  All distrobutions use the same keywords for the 
name of your synthesiser because that is controlled by speakup and that 
information is available in a few places on the speakup website.  Both 
distrobutions have a ystem for organizing, managing software.  Debian's 
system is more advanced I think then rpm because if you install a package 
which needs another package, you should get that package as well whithout 
having to specify you need that package.  Debian clasifies their versions 
as either stable, testing or unstable.  Stable is what they determine as a 
production system, it's disadvantage is that it may lack some features or 
software you need.  Testing will have a few more buggs but  more features 
and unstable continues this trend.  The standard Fedora distrobution with 
speakup will be more recent interms of what it offers for software, how 
well it detects your hardware like usb and cd berners then the standard 
speakup debian distrobution.  To install debian you can get or bern  cd 
images of all the cds or do an installation which starts with floppies 
and/or cd images and install the rest as you need it over a internet 
connection.  The standard fedora distrobution is better suited for berning 
cd immages and installing.  Fedora has a better howto for installing 
itwith speakup, but debian also has great documentation explaining the 
general installation procedure.  Keep in mind these are just two 
distrobutions to choose from there are several others, slackware, gintu, 
etc.  Because this is linux, you don't have to stick to one distrobution's 
philosophy or even use a packaged distrobution at all.  You could start 
with one distrobution and install everything else from source not using a 
package manager.  I chose Debian because I like it's package manager, it 
was easy for me to setup as a command-line or console system, I could 
install what I needed over a network and I have a co-worker who is 
familear with Debian.  I can't say one distrobution is better then another 
or that speakup runns better on one or another because everything is so 
customizable.  Some may need more tweeking to make everything work the way 
you want.  I hope that answers some of your questions, that I haven't 
confused you and that I haven't said anything incorrect here.