Best Linux Distribution For Django

Hi all,

After answering a couple questions on the forums, I've come up with one I need answered. What Linux distribution would work best with Django when it comes to production?

I've been personally using Ubuntu, but I'd like to see if there are any distributions that could give better performance (Such as CentOS or Debian).

Hello neg,

In terms of performance Ubuntu has been always a real top dog, if you look at phoronix.com in many different bench mark testing Ubuntu usually comes out on top. However if you are looking for something new maybe give Arch Linux a try, generally in my experience Arch Linux is the fastest I have ever used but does require time for setup and future maintenance that I did get tired of maintaining that setup and just moved back to Ubuntu. If you are still interested in the other distributions here are my thoughts, fedora is the best representation of the gnome desktop, openSUSE offers Windows users some familiar system and user management tools with YasT and Debian is great for stability and longevity but will feel a little behind the times as packages are a little out of date.

In most cases other distributions are based on other main distributions but I see no point in mentioning or ever using as they rarely do any other work then lay there own custom skin over the top of something else.

I need to do more research with Django before I comment on that however if you got it running in Ubuntu generally will work in any Linux OS at that point. When I find out more I will comment back on that subject.

EDIT: So I did some research on Django and seems to be well supported on most distributions from Ubuntu, openSUSE and Arch Linux, Fedora documentation looks like it is 5 or 6 years old and would not tempt it with those. If you simply type into a search engine "how to install Django in Ubuntu" you will see plenty of guides.

Looks like Django is in the official Ubuntu repository which means it could be installed via terminal or software center however it is Django 1.3 and it looks like they are on version 1.7. So you will find instruction how to install from downloading the tar.gz from the site. If you need any help with that then just let me know.

DMGrier said:

However if you are looking for something new maybe give Arch Linux a try, generally in my experience Arch Linux is the fastest I have ever used but does require time for setup and future maintenance

Click to expand...

Arch is way too much hassle, yes it's nippy but you spend 99% of your time on it configuring it!

With Ubuntu, the way to make it faster is to simply not use the awful Unity DM, and use something like GNU Mate or Cinnamon. CentOS and Debian make great workstation and server distros because of their long maintenance cycles (and ridiculous stability) but the patch release time (mostly in the case of Debian) borders on glacial sometimes and Ubuntu is just so much easier to configure!

Also avoid Fedora IMO, it's basically Red Hat's tech demo for RHEL and from memory has very short support cycles...

As I always say something being to much of a hassle is up to the user, in our case I would agree but it never hurts to recommend something new as I have seen people prefer Arch over anything else.

Unity is no where near as bad as you claim, Unity is no heavier then Gnome 3 or KDE and with the next release of Ubuntu Unity is dropping compiz and moving to Qt which will make it as elegant as Gnome 3 or KDE and be as light as xfce.

I would keep my eye on Fedora as Red Hat has really been moving them into a different direction lately. Fedora is now releases every 12 months and is supported for 18 months. There is now a desktop, server and cloud edition and they work very closely with the gnome project to build a compelling modern desktop. I use Ubuntu but recently gave Fedora 20 a spin and was very impressed with the speed, performance and quality of things from gnome and the new gnome app store. My only complaint is the amount of apps in the repository is less but I think if they continue in this direction that will soon change.