Hi Michael,

> (apologies to jmh for sending this twice, forgot to send it to the 
> list)
> 
> > I'd like to know how others are dealing with this.  Is anybody using
> > Ubuntu clients with SL servers for instance?  Any other words of wisdom
> > on this topic?

For servers I use SL308, SL45 i386 and x86_64 and soon to use SL5 i386 and x86_64.

For desktops, I use PCLinuxOS 2007 business edition. It's only i386 at the
moment (64bit soon), but it's mandrake/mandriva based so is a snap to
administer and very easy to use.

> Personally, I don't think its scientific applications in general that
> are lacking, but Firefox 2.0, for example.  I don't mind installing
> the odd application in /usr/local/bin, but I don't want to have to
> install most of the things I use that way.
> 
> I've just started up a lab that is using Linux workstations and
> servers, and I felt it was a lot easier to just install Fedora on the
> workstations.  Lots of flexibility (and lots of rope to hang yourself
> with.)
> 
> But, for our servers, I need them to be compatible with Redhat and
> very stable.  In general, there aren't users using them directly.  SL
> seems like the way to go.
> 
> I've used Ubuntu, and I felt like it got a bit messy.  There are so
> many things available, but a lot of them didn't work very well.

Michael.