I finally got enough money to get a new OS. So far I've tried only RPM based distros. I have heard only good things about Ubuntu - single CD though based on Debian. What I want to know is after installing Ubuntu, using the much talked about apt-get (provided I'm connected to the net), can I get specific Debian software packages (say related to engineering and such stuff) onto my OS ? And what about updates - how soon will Ubuntu be deprecated vis-a-vis Debian ?