Lightweight Linux distro that includes developer tools? (or, the most BSD-like Linux)

Question

I cut my teeth on Minix and Slackware 1.1, but I've been in the OS X Wilderness for the last few years. I'm trying to standardize on a Linux distribution for personal and work-related use on less powerful laptops and under virtualization.

So far, NetBSD and OpenBSD are the best fit for my purposes- but after plenty of frustration I've come to the conclusion that I need to stick with Linux to get the hardware and software support that comes with it.

What I like about NetBSD/OpenBSD that I'd like to keep:

• X, but no default KDE, GNOME or XFCE!
• A sensible /etc and dot file setup- startx calls xinit, xinit looks for ~/.xinitrc; nothing more complicated than that is needed.
• Command line tools and file-based configuration: I shouldn't need a GUI to connect to a WAP.
• Decent selection of binary packages; building from source is OK, but nothing source-only like Gentoo.
• pkg_add (BSD) and apt-get both have treated me well in the past.
• Modest RAM and HDD requirements: boot + X + awesome+ two xterms takes up 80 MB on OpenBSD and 240 MB on Debian 5 and Crunchbang

In my experience, most "lightweight" and Live CDs focus on a nice desktop environment crammed into a CD or USB stick; once you add build-essentials you end up with something just about as bloated as Ubuntu or Debian full install. Crunchbang is a great example.

Thanks in advance for all suggestions!

Answer 1

It seems to me you are asking for my favorite distro: Arch Linux

The Archway delineates the distro philosophy. Some meaningful quotes:

Arch is not a distribution made for "user friendliness". It is a distribution designed to be a platform - a "base" for the user to do what they want. This means that we don't try to force a user's hand into our way of doing things, with our configuration tools, and our ideas. It should be about their ideas. [...]
In short, the Arch Way is about simplicity and giving control to the user. Keeping things simple, and agile.

The distro is easy to install and allows you to clearly define your Linux machine path, instead of offering you the world when you just want your own tidy country.

Answer 2

Archlinux should be enough for you ...

Answer 3

You may be looking for Arch. At least, that's it's stated goal. It's easy on the configuration (generally just lets you do what you want in the config files). Offhand, I don't know what it's default installation package was, but it was fairly minimal. And it has a pretty good package manager, too.

Answer 4

ArchLinux may be a good potential solutions, but I think the other two Linux distributions to consider are Slackware, and Debian.

While often not considered as sexy as other distributions (e.g. Ubuntu, Fedora), they are simple, predictable, and tend to work.

My only advice with Debian, is to only select "Standard System" and not "Desktop Environment" from the tasksel portion of the install, if you want a minimal X installation.

I hope that gets you back to the xterm, and enjoying the wonderful world of GNU/Linux. Enjoy!

Answer 5

ArchLinux is not a bad choice - frankly it matches upo very well with your list of desired features, but for the sake of adding some variety to the answers presented so far, there are a few that may be worth your attention.

I used to always use DSL as my recovery linux. Small & it worked. The kernel is getting a bit dated & lately Tiny Core Linux has caught my eye. It's FLTK based. LinuxPLanet called it a Minimal Distro with Big Possibilities. It's young as distros go, but has an active development team & new stable releases are coming out every few weeks.

Lubuntu is another nice distro, but possibly too much like Ubuntu for you. I like LXDE much better than xfce and with Lubuntu you have access to the full Ubuntu repository.

Frugalware is a lean disto intended for folk who aren't afraid of the command line. From wikipedia:

Frugalware's developers attempt to make Frugalware as simple as possible while establishing a priority based on comfortable use. Their goal is to ship consistently fresh and stable software, as close to the original source as possible.

Answer 6

Maybe to much Ubuntu, but lightweight. Another option for those prefer .deb/apt-get (it's also more supported then pacman (archlinux))

CrunchBang Linux

CrunchBang Linux is an Ubuntu based distribution offering a great blend of speed, style and substance. Using the nimble Openbox window manager, it is highly customisable and provides a modern, full-featured GNU/Linux system without sacrificing performance