OT Advice for server reinstalation

[Mike Jakubik]

Stephen Swaney wrote:
> As someone from the "states" I understand that Religious wars just get us
> into a lot trouble :) 
>
>   

Hehe, indeed.

> I've worked with a lot of different distributions and operating systems for
> well over 20 years now. They all have pluses and minuses. 
>
> I use FreeBSD for routers and machines I just want to "set and forget" for
> the very valid reasons you list above. I also use a flavor of FreeBSD on my
> Mac laptop :) which I really enjoy. 
>
> I use CentOS on our MailScanner gateways because I personally find it the
> easiest combo to keep updated - thanks to Julian's pre-digested easy rpm
> based updates. 
>   

cd /usr/ports/mail/mailscanner && make install :)

> I completely agree with your statement "install crap i don't want/will never
> use". I always do a minimal install of CentOS and then `yum install`
> anything else that the Applications require. The minimal install takes about
> 10 minutes and frankly the CentOS `yum install` is faster the Red Hat's
> up2date or FreeBDS port installations. Dependencies are also very nicely
> handled. You can even script the installation the additional packages that
> are required for a typical MailScanner / SpamAssassin / MailWatch /
> Rules_du_Jour / Pyzor / Razor / DCC site setup.
>
>   

You can also use pkg_add -r <port> if you don't want to have the 
software compiled, this will deal with all the dependencies as well. The 
mailscanner port lest you choose if you want spamassassin , etc 
installed. So it's all really similar.

> Bottom line: Go with what you're comfortable with and spend some time to
> understand the pros and cons of different operating systems. Use the right
> tool for the job but understand what tools are available.
>
> Let's let reason prevail, get well informed and then let everyone pick their
> own "Flavor" :)
>   

Agreed, no OS is prefect, they all have their strengths and weaknesses. 
So use what you are best with.