The Difference Between Debian and Ubuntu (part 2)
Continuing yesterdays post…
Package Maintenance
Every Debian package has an assigned maintainer. The maintainer may be a single person or group that is reachable with an email address or commonly a mailing list. Maintainers must be specified in the maintainer control field with their name and email address.
Ubuntu packages usually don’t have a designated maintainer. All packages in Ubuntu are maintained by teams. In Ubuntu the main and restricted packages are maintained by the Ubuntu Core Development Team and the packages in universe and multiverse are maintained by the Ubuntu Development Team. Ubuntu does not allow binary uploads for any architecture, all builds are performed in clean chroots by Launchpad and uploads are source-only.
Bug Tracking
The Debian bug tracking system, called Debbugs is a set of script used to maintain a database of reports. All the database input and changes are done by email and developers do not need Internet access or accounts on the host system. Outstanding, recently closed, and other listings of reports are made available on a web server and by an email request bot. Each bug report gets its own email address so that other submissions can be made to the report. The web listings of the bugs can be mirrored by email or HTTP. The Debbugs scripts have been parametrized so that they can be used for other Linux projects besides Debian. Since Debbugs is completely run by email and no authentication is required to make a report this means that Ubuntu users as well as other Debian based distribution users can submit bug reports for Debian directly to Debbugs.
Ubuntu uses Launchpad to track bugs. Using the Launchpad bug tracker makes it so that bugs can be kept track of in multiple contexts. For example if a bug is fixed upstream but not in Debian, or fixed in Debian and not Ubuntu. The system can store links to bugs filed upstream and in Debian and is capable of notification to the Ubuntu developers when there is a change in status.
Collaboration
Debian and Ubuntu do a pretty good job working together on many things from package development, to bug tracking, and there is a good deal of Debian users who help Ubuntu users in figuring out problems with their systems, installing programs, or what ever else they can do to help make the users experience better. There are also quite a few areas where they clash. Many of the policies, opinions, and goals of the two distributions are different and can cause some issues with interactivity between the developers. There are Debian users out there who look down on Ubuntu users with the assumption that they are just kids “playing Linux”. Though there is some animosity between the two different user communities, I think that over all they do get a long quite well. A Debian user may mess around and make fun of an Ubuntu user when asking a question but more than likely it will be followed up by either an answer to the problem or a way to find the answers they need.
Utnubu
Utnubu (Ubuntu backwards) is a Debian Project that basically reverses what Ubuntu has done with Debian. Ubuntu uses a lot of the packages that were originally created for Debian in their releases and use the advancement of Debian to better their distribution. Utnubu was created to take some of the better packages that exist on Ubuntu and not on Debian and bring them to Debian. There are some places where Ubuntu does excel above Debian and by using some of the better parts of Ubuntu within Debian the hope is to make an even better Debian. If you want to read more about Utnubu take a look at the Utnubu Wiki
After starting to write this article I realized that the differences and commonalities of Debian and Ubuntu are far greater than I will ever be able to list here. Though I didn’t go in to much technical detail, or specific information about the projects and companies involved in the background I hope that I have outlined some key differences. Many of the differences have been listed by them selves in the past such as the difference between corporate backing and strict FOSS and are easy to find with a quick search.
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Tags: Ubuntu
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September 13th, 2008 at 8:54 PM
“Package Maintenance” – You forgot that to get a package into debian, you either have to befriend the mainstainers, or nobody will look at your package for 4 years! :)