Hi Richard,
2008/4/26 Richard Fateman <fateman at cs.berkeley.edu>:
> I am thinking of converting an old intel laptop to run some version of unix,
> since the laptop
> is otherwise kind of redundant.
> Students here seem to prefer ubuntu.
> Is this a good idea if I want to run lisps and maxima? Or is something else
> better?
>
> It would be nice to have a simple installation, and an otherwise functioning
> unix networking system..
> Thanks for suggestions.
I've run a version of Linux/FreeBSD since the early 90's and have used
most distros. You might have some hardware/config issues with whichever
distro you pick and switching to another will often fix this - which is
why people have strong prejudices for what is best.
The only potential headache is upgrading between major versions of a
distro release; this obviously wont affect you immediately, but its a
good idea to keep a note of what you had to tweak, or use two
hard disks like I do.
Truth is, all distros are fairly good these days - easy to install and have
graphics config tools for network settings etc. They can sometimes work
fine out of the box, but it is less work to be where the crowd is if you do
have any problems. Ubuntu is very popular, I've been reasonably happy
with it for the last couple of years. It is easy to google for the
version name e.g. "ubuntu gutsy" + "your problem".
As for lisps and other things you feel close to, I'd always build from
source. To get sbcl going, I usually download the binary cmucl from
http://common-lisp.net/project/cmucl/downloads/binaries/) and use that
to build the sbcl source, thereafter using sbcl itself, its very
straight forward. For the rest of your system that you 'just want to
work' using the builtin package/update system is fine.
Personally, I'd wait a week or so to see if there are any problems with
Ubuntu Hardy Heron as it has just been released, and then go for that.
Hope it works out for you.
Richard