Debian and Ubuntu: Can’t we just get along?

Let’s face it. Ubuntu is based on Debian – each new release of Ubuntu draws packages in from Debian’s Unstable branch, polishes those packages and with the wave of a few thousand magic wands, a new Ubuntu version is born.

Ok, ok – there is more too it than that, but it is true that although technically no longer “compatible” with each other, Ubuntu is based on Debian, and does to a certain extend depends on Debian for it’s mere existence.

You would think that these two projects (both being Linux distributions) would have the same end goal in mind, which would be to offer a free, and open PC Operating System to end users. However, with some discussions I’ve been reading lately I wonder if that is really the case, at least in regards to Debian. I’m really confused by the attitudes and beliefs of some of the Debian developers. I know of two separate occasions where members of Ubuntu’s leadership, first Ubuntu Community Manager Jono Bacon, and most recently Ubuntu and Canonical founder Mark Shuttleworth have reached out to the Debian community offering help in having the two distro’s work together to achieve a common goal of providing quality free software to the end user.

Although Mark’s attempt is probably too recent to really “call” either successful or unsuccessful, but judging by some of the comments being made, it hasn’t exactly been met with open arms by the Debian community. Some in the Debian community see Ubuntu as a “leech” that takes and doesn’t give back. Ubuntu does give back! It gives back upstream, and it also gives in a big way that Debian never has and that is by exposing the mass public to free and open software. Ubuntu got Linux installed on PC’s being sold by what is probably the largest PC Manufacturer in existence (Dell). Not only did Dell start the Ubuntu line back in 2007, it’s kept it going since! Also, Dell recently commented that they hadn’t seen any of the “rumored” high returns of Linux netbooks, hinting that the entire Linux line has been successful.

I guess what I’m getting at is that it seems that Debian developers are creating a free and open Operating System for themselves, and could care less about a “stupid user”, while Ubuntu is more concerned with the end user experience, and is committed to providing the best that the Open Source world has to offer in a nice, stable easy to use package. Although there are only small fundamental differences between Ubuntu and Debian on the technical level, there is a *huge* difference in the public “opinion” of the two projects. For example, Linux creator Linus Torvalds himself has admitted himself in an interview that he’d never tried Debian, stating (and I quote):

So the only major distribution I’ve never used has actually been Debian, exactly because that has traditionally been harder to install. Which sounds kind of strange, since Debian is also considered to be the “hard-core technical” distribution, but that’s literally exactly what I personally do not want in a distro. I’ll take the nice ones with simple installers etc, because to me, that’s the whole and only point of using a distribution in the first place.

So the creator of Linux itself has never tried your distro because it’s believed to be so “technical”. If he has that opinion of Debian how do you think the guy just wanting to try Linux out for the first time would feel? Why would you not want to work with an easy to use distro such as Ubuntu that was created from the ground up to be a competitive, user-friendly OS?

I just don’t get it.
Flame suit on – fire away!