I think Netrunner should convert to Debian rather than Ubuntu anything!~
Ubuntu has been having more and more issues the older it gets. Debian
based distros seem to be more solid and reliable.
I am so tired of all the ubuntu issues and can’t understand WHY so many
distros continue to go down this path.
It’s a valid suggestion and it might be considered with the next enigma+1 cycle.
That might be a good idea, if Debian updates more frequently than once in five years or so. The main reason I moved from Debian to Ubuntu, way back when, was that even their unstable (sid, or whatever it’s called these days) repository lagged one or two versions behind on applications I used. Ubuntu’s twice-yearly updates were a big improvement.
It’s too bad ubuntu gets worse with every upgrade! So who cares if they DO upgrade when it is only enevitable your upgraded OS will be worse!?
I found Netrunner when looking for KDE-based distros that were alternatives to Kubuntu, which at the time Canonical was dropping support for (before the Blue Systems announcement). At the time, a rolling release seemed very attractive: I could install once and then just keep updating and never have to worry about upgrades.
I was thinking of going either to aptosid or Siduction, but what stopped me is the old versions of KDE provided by those distros. Sid seems to have the latest version of everything except for KDE, which is disappointing. From what I could discover at the time, the Debian project struggles to find maintainers for their KDE packages (though this may have been mitigated by now).
All of this is to say is that if Netrunner were to go to a Debian base, I would hope that they’d either maintain their own KDE packages, or contribute to the Debian project by maintaining the KDE packages for them so they can stay up to date.
A good thing about Ubuntu is that it has support for different hardware. I’ve tried various distributions on various machines and in terms of Wi-Fi cards, microphones, video cards Ubuntu used to have the widest set of supported hardware and it’s Additional Drivers tool is really easy to use. Probably one of those features which gained Ubuntu popularity among non-Linux-experienced first-time users at this distro beginnings.
What I would really miss from Ubuntu is PPAs. If Netrunner would become a rolling, Debian-based distro that would be compatible with PPAs – I think it would surpass both Ubuntu and Linux Mint in popularity 
I found netrunner because I was looking for a KDE based distro with good look and feel in it’s default installation for non linux experts (not for me, for others like my family).
First I found and tried SolydK and liked it a lot, I was testing it for some days until I found netrunner.
What I liked more in netrunner was:
Latest version of KDE
Moun
Good desktop in it’s default settings for new users (I don’t like the blue icons of KDE).
Good set of packages installed by default, included codecs and skype.
Firefox KDE.
Mint software sources manager.
And ppa compatible.
I use to work with some ppa to install packages that aren’t in official repos.
What I really liked with SlydK:
Debian Based.
Rolling relase but with “Update packs”, so I don’t have to take care about difficult upgrades every six months. I was really attracted with the idea of Update packs, because they will take care of every update packs to be sure it will not break my system.
But for a Debian based distro, like solydK. One thing that is really necessary is:
Something like ppas.
Be sure to have all hardware compatibility for latest hardware and old hardware. (IT has good compatibility, but sometimes with old packages if it doesn’t comes from unstable)
And something that is needed on every linux distro:
package management like PBI in pc-bsd included with support to install and automatic updates in software center (muon), so you could install packages and update them in self contained packages. It will not need dependencies and will not break other packages. So you could install a new or old package without risk, you could have more compatibility with packages outside the main repositories. That’s something that really breaks things, if you don’t have ppa or your package is not included on main repositories, or if you don’t upgrade to latest libraries and they are not included in latest version of your distribution, the package could be not supported for the latest version of your distribution and you have to wait before upgrade.
Also people outside the main distribution (ubuntu/debian/fedora/whatever), could have an easier way to distribute their software between all distros and versions of distros.
Many projects tried this (i.e. klik) and were not very successfull. Canonical also started a project for their smartphone plattform. But I think even on a smartphone plattform the linux packemangement approach makes more sense. It saves tons of spaces if you don’t have to ship the same library again and again and again.
As for commercial applications such as games and some other programs the commercial companies behind those mostly ship those static binaries which contain almost all the libraries to run under every linux distribution (see Steam and its games as an example)
Honestly speaking with the Build Service (formely known as OpenSUSE Buld Service) and good packagemanagement tools in the different linux distributions such approach of packaging static applications shouldn’t be necessary anymore.
I think could be true in most of the cases, but sometimes we have small issues if we want to use Stable version of Debian or LTS version of Ubuntu, like:
What happens if I need always lates version of libreoffice?
It could be updated wit a ppa in ubuntu.
Don’t know how to do it in Debian if it isn’t in backports.
What happens if I need everpad?
I have added ppa in ubuntu, worked.
I have added the same ppa, but editing myself the sources. Also I had to add ubuntu repositories and edit apt_preferences to put ubuntu respositories with low priority. Then I installed everpad successful, but I had to install some libreries from Ubuntu to get it done.
What happens if I need latest version of openshot always available?
Doesn’t works in all ubuntu versions because it depends on libraries that could break gnome packages.
Hope it could be in backports.
Those are just three examples of what happens when I was testing it and what I have find to fix those issues. Maybe there is other easier way, but it is not included in distribution or it is not included in help?
I think handbrake and jdownloader also makes me some problems.
It doesn’t happens with all software, maybe just with less popular or software with no Debian/Ubuntu maintainers. But happens.
Also I can’t test and use all software that all people use around the world, but Im always try to install linux to lot of people around my region.
Myabe I could install 300 computers with linux in next year, but always is a challenge to know if all software that I have today, will be available and maintained the next year.
Also versions of the software differ if they are in X version of the distribution or X distribution. So, sometimes I have lot of hours testing before move to one or another version of distro.
What is doing Ubuntu with “packages click” is something good I think, because in phones and tables it’s normal to see that not every phone and tablet support latest version available for the distribution (sometimes because provider doesn’t update it, and sometimes due to hardware limitations).
Also those packages should have dependency information, because some sound package could depend in pulseaudio or something like that 
This is just what I see, and maybe is not completely real and not happens to everyone. But happens to what I tested from last 8 years.
All in all I agree with you.
Technically the “PPA” idea is there for almost every distribution. Its called Build Service and makes it very easy for developers as they basically only need to upload their sourcecode and tell the service howto compile it and what dependencies this application has. The rest, so building for the various Ubuntus, Debians, OpenSUSEs, Fedoras and so on will be done by the build service. I think this is the best solution so far. It sad that not many are using it currently. At least those who are using it show the benefit of it (just look at ownclouds downloadpage for example)
All in all the best solution for packagemanagement I saw so far is done outside the “linux”-world by the Haiku Devs ( http://www.haiku-os.org ). Their approach and idea is very uniq and modern. Sadly the code is not ready yet. I would love to see such an easy packagement under linux.
But in the linux world its hard to decide on standards for those packageformats. Just see the RPM vs DEB discussions. (the official standard is rpm btw.)
How about siduction. They are bleeding edge Debian.
Siduction is just using sid as far as I know. They get stuck as soon as debian is in freeze.
There is a new distro that is trying to be like netrunner (sort of) under debian, called SolydXK.
Perhaps a teasm up of the netrunner and Solyd team is possible, Solyd has its own repos and all the fun stuff that netrunner does.
I just came from there as I had some hardware issues under it and back to Netrunner after some time away from it.
I just hope that when the next netrunner comes out it will be easy to upgrade to… for now.
I would like to see a Debian based SE but the main distro should not change.
There is Tanglu now. It can be seen as a utility distribution for Debian to maintain the package run of river during winter.
Base LTS on Debian Stable and Short Term on Tanglu. Since Tanglu is as close as possible to Debian, the additional costs of basing netrunner on 2 distros is low. I guess.
Thanks for your entry pablodav. I was hesitating between Netrunner and SolydK. Your post helped me to make up my mind about the distros. I`ve chosen Netrunner. It has plenty of apps (some are unnecessary though) and the look of it is impressive.