Yes and no. When Linux was originally created, it was mainly used by programmers at that time. Linux has changed a lot since its inception but it is still an excellent choice for development. Technically, you can choose any one of the best Linux distros available out there for programming.
If you are looking for interpreted cross-platform compatibility, then Python would probably be best, since some Linux systems like Ubuntu have bindings for Python. If you are looking for a compiled language instead, the best would be either C or C++.
Which Linux distro is best for programming?
Ubuntu is one of the most popular Linux distros for all kinds of users, from Linux newbies to seasoned campaigners. For programmers, the Ubuntu Long Term Support (LTS) release provides a stable development environment that they don’t need to upgrade every six month.
Debian GNU/Linux distro is the mother operating system for many other Linux distributions. Its latest ‘stretch’ release arrived recently. In any discussion of the best Linux distros for programmers, Debian and Debian downstream distros find a special place.
You might be asking “Is Raspberry Pi the best Linux distro for programmers and developers?”
The Raspberry Pi OS was designed to allow programmers to get the most out of their microcomputers, especially now that the distro supports 64-bit architecture. We didn’t want to make this list too long so we settled on just 10 entries. As you can imagine, though, there is a myriad of other excellent Linux distros for programmers and developers.
Why should I use Linux for programming?
Conversely, Linux also provides a healthy set of abstraction layers for when direct access or manual coding ends up creating more work than you want to do. There are conveniences found in Qt and Java, and there are whole stacks like Pulse Audio, Pipewire, and gstreamer.
A frequent question we ran across in our research was “Why do programmers and developers prefer Linux?”.
Linux’s inherent flexibility and modular nature are two other reasons why developers and programmers prefer it over other operating systems. You can download one of the many lightweight distros in less than a couple of minutes and they are guaranteed to work on pretty much any machine, regardless of its hardware.
What is the best text-only scripting language for Linux?
A good text-only scripting language for the Linux operating system would be Bash. If you are looking for interpreted cross-platform compatibility, then Python would probably be best, since some Linux systems like Ubuntu have bindings for Python. If you are looking for a compiled language instead, the best would be either C or C++.