[vox-tech] Ubuntu vs. Kubuntu

[Rick Moen]

Quoting Bob Scofield (scofield at omsoft.com):

> Does anyone know of any difference between Kubuntu and Ubuntu that would make 
> one choose the latter for a laptop?

Sometimes, the current-version initial installation ISO images for
Ubuntu are slightly more mature/stable "out of the box" than their
Kubuntu kin.  Since laptops -- especially those with spanking-new
chipsets -- are such problem children generally, some folks want a leg
up on the initial-installation hurdle.

I'll further clarify below, but, before I do, here's another thought to
chew on:  Many people in the Linux desktop-user world, including almost
all newcomers, tend to think a Linux distribution is more-or-less
synonymous with its installer program.  This is, in part, because people
get so fixated on the sometimes-difficult installation hurdle that they
forget (or never knew, to begin with) how vitally important
post-installation customisation and maintenance are to their distro
experience.

The longer you've been at this stuff, the less important distro
installers become, for a number of reasons, only some of which I want to
get into.  E.g., whether the default installation supports all your
hardware stops mattering as long as it supports enough that you can get
the rest going, one Debian-compatible distro ISO can be used as
launching pad for converging onto another Debian-compatible distro's 
packages, etc.  (You also start to realise that some distros are
designed better for incremental, gradual upgradability than others, but
I digress.)


Anyhow, about Kubuntu/Ubuntu:  The key thing to realise is that _all_ of
these notionally distinct "distributions" as embodied in downloadable
ISOs are -- in fact -- desktop metapackages added to a completely
identical core OS package set, which I'll dub "Ubuntu-core":


"Kubuntu" is Ubuntu-core + metapackage "kubuntu-desktop" (KDE pkgs)
"Ubuntu" is Ubuntu-core + metapackage "ubuntu-desktop" (GNOME pkgs)
"Xubuntu" is Ubuntu-core + metapackage "xubuntu-desktop" (Xfce4 + gtk2 pkgs)
"Edubuntu" is Ubuntu-core + metapackage "edubuntu-desktop" vaguely GNOME-ish
  educational packages set (first official release = 6.06 Dapper Drake)
"Ubuntu-Server" is Ubuntu-core + server packages (metapackage name not
  known to me) including what looks like a mini-GNOME set

So, in consequence, if you start with (say) the Dapper Drake Flight7 
pre-release ISO of any of the above five _nominally_ distinct images,
install that, and then do the following:

$ sudo apt-get install kubuntu-desktop ubuntu-desktop xubuntu-desktop edubuntu-desktop 

...you end up with the exact same overfeatured, kitchen-sink desktop
system, possibly differing in initial-default package versions for some
of the constituent packages, because the ISOs will differ a little bit 
as to what their snapshots contain and when the snapshots were taken.
Further if you follow up with 

$ sudo apt-get update && sudo apt-get dist-upgrade

...the end result will converge even more, as your installed system 
auto-updates to follow developments at the online package mirrors.