this post was submitted on 28 Aug 2026
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libre
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If you want stable, you can't do better than Debian. If you want a good balance of stable and up-to-date, Fedora is good, and the immutable variants are interesting. Debian stable doesn't get as out of date as it used to, either.
are there good alternatives to Ubuntu Server? I run all my docker containers on headless US cuz I don't know any better. Maybe this thing is a non-issue but still curious what else is out there. Maybe Debian would serve just as well?
If you're using Docker, Debian should be fine. The containers include their own runtimes and make the software running on the host mostly irrelevant. For what its worth, I run matapacos.dog on Debian (without Docker). You couldn't ask for a better server OS in my opinion.
You seem to be a knowledged linuxer, do you know how to make docker compose containers start on boot. Last I used it I think I had to log on and run
docker compose up -devery time.Edit: I should have just asked the search engine which leads me to stackoverflow. See also dockers own docs on restart
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There's also the Podman way of doing things which involve using Podman Quadlets/Pods to group containers together and to start them as a rootless systemd user service (using loginctl's
enable-lingertoggle to allow services to be started without the user being logged in.I was looking at podman. And I was interested in it, though I wasn't certain if I wanted to use it since I was going to be doing docker compose stuff. Is there more you could tell me about it?
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Certainly. Podman is essentially a daemonless re-implementation of docker that integrates better with GNU/Linux systems. It uses the same Open Containers Initiative (OCI) framework and can be used a drop-in replacement to docker.
The benefit of using podman is that it doesn't require a daemon by default which makes it more resilient than docker and simpler to set up. You can migrate any docker-compose setup to podman via the
podman-composeplugin but you can also use pods (Kubernetes-speak) to deploy connected services.For example, you can use
podman-composeto generate a systemd unit file or use--in-podto create a pod from a compose file.I actually have very little practical experience with Docker beyond a high level understanding of how it works. In my experience, activating the docker systems unit was sufficient.
Thanks, makes perfect sense. Think my brain was trying to save itself from pondering the work involved in moving the containers over. My oldest ones I set up before I really knew what I was doing so I'm expecting it to be a chore to backup, migrate, and adopt them into the management container I'm using now (Arcane). Would make a nice weekend project if I had one to spare, hehe
You said it yourself. If you're just running everything in docker containers, the base os doesn't really matter as much. You could probably just run Debian. Or many other distros for that matter.
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Many thanks, sounds like worth doing if I can get over the inertia
It is worth adding that using Debian stable comes with the price of being several versions behind on most software packages. It rarely matters, but it’s a pain in the ass for the times that it does.
Releases are every 2 years, roughly. Not really that bad / old. And for major gui apps where it does matter, like a browser, flatpaks (or similar) are the way to go, generally means it comes straight from the devs when they release.
My issues that I’ve run into sat in the UXes and in drivers. Not the easiest fixes to work around for most. But yes, the packages you mention are indeed fairly simple to workaround if necessary thanks to robust, external package managers.
You can get some newer stuff (a newer kernel for one) from the (unofficial) repository on backports.debian.org
Oh that is quite useful. Thanks for the resource. If I ever find myself back on Debian, I will keep this in mind. Unfortunately, it doesn't carry any updated packages for the issues I was experiencing.
This is true, but less so than a decade ago.