Which Linux distro should I put on my Raspberry Pi server? • Hacker News Board

Re: Which Linux distro should I put on my Raspberry Pi server?

#11

Post by ksaj » Thu, Jun 11, 2020, 2:12 PM UTC

What people are saying here is generally correct overall. If you are using the rpi as a server, the distro ever so barely matters. You probably wouldn't want a gui (why give away half the CPU and a sizable chunk of memory to something you aren't even going to look at?) and every distro out there has exactly the same server packages available.

I would install the minimal Raspbian and then add the server applications you want. Also, don't forget you can completely shut off the HDMI for a tiny bit of power savings. If you are going to use https, every little bit counts.

The only reason I actually name a distro when normally I'm hugely agnostic, is because Raspbian is the official distro for Raspberry Pi, and therefor can always be expected to support rpi's various idiosyncrasies.

Re: Which Linux distro should I put on my Raspberry Pi server?

#12

Post by ksaj » Thu, Jun 11, 2020, 2:19 PM UTC

hacktember wrote: post #3

Just about any of them would do. It's like saying "I want to drive from Chicago to Minneapolis in a car. Which brand of car should I drive?" Just about all the car brands will get you there. ;) At the end of the day, I recommend figuring out your preferred distro if you haven't already and going from there. Most major distributions like Ubuntu, openSuSE, and Fedora have Raspberry Pi versions. If you're asking for opt…

The car metaphor still leaves a choice between driving a Rolls Royce or a VW Bug. They'll both get you there, but one is totally miserable in the winter. Although that is covered in your second paragraph.

If it is the 8G version, it might be worth implementing a ramdisk for the web server and web logging directories. That way the sdram doesn't get trashed as quickly, and response will be quicker.

Re: Which Linux distro should I put on my Raspberry Pi server?

#13

Post by giantg2 » Thu, Jun 11, 2020, 5:49 PM UTC

I would recommend Raspian Lite and install the server packages that you like. You can secure it similar to any other distro. I think there are checklists online that tell you how to configure it securely (root/sudo/user, ssh, permissions to change on specific folders or files).

Re: Which Linux distro should I put on my Raspberry Pi server?

#14

Post by goliatone » Thu, Jun 11, 2020, 9:50 PM UTC

shams93 wrote: post #4

I'm using ubuntu server 20.04 along with micro-k8s to have a 3 node cluster for kubernetes at home.

I tried to set up k3s with Ubuntu 18.04 when it came out for support for the pi and I couldn’t make it work. I forget right now the reasons but it had to do with a missing flag during the image build that precluded some memory management options needed.

Anyhow, I think I will try again. Any advise or gotchas I should be aware of before embarking?

Re: Which Linux distro should I put on my Raspberry Pi server?

#15

Post by LarryMade2 » Fri, Jun 12, 2020, 2:23 AM UTC

Tip - if you are going to run the server 24/7 best to use an external USB=>sata HDD instead of a flash card. Did the flash route and after a while (multiple resets) the card just died, flash does not go well for unexpected power cycling. Best to use a mechanical drive better resiliency and recovery.

I used Raspbian (*versions wernt important), mainly I'd choose a distro that works for the versions of server software that you want to keep updated (i.e. older=Ubuntu, newer=Linux Mint)