Sorry for the separation of comments. I was limited in what I could put down.

Another thing that some Linux users should be aware of is if they are using Kali. I believe Cyborg and Backbox can have the same problem, but I am unsure of it. If the user installs multiple packages on top of the system, it has potential to break the way that things update/upgrade using apt-get. Again, I still have not experienced that, but I do know that it is an inherent issue, as it is in their documentation quite clearly.

The upgrades that I am referring to on Linux, though, can change installation reqs, the way that they work (or the package manager that you use), and also the presence of files. One file, in particular, is the /var/log/messages file, that records all activities on the system. OpenSUSE did away with it in their move from 13.1 to 13.2, because it is redundant to have it. Of course, you can install the capability back on, but for my students, it is not practical. I just changed the file I wanted them to manipulate, to suit the purpose at hand. Lol. :-).

Sometimes upgrades can really mess things up. Fortunately, for me, I do not experience it with Linux too often. Macs, on the otherhand, are 'Nix-based, so there are utilities that break when Apple sends an upgrade. One key item is enterprise networking utilites to work with the set domain. Lol. If one of our users upgrades and has that utility, it locks them completely out of their system. Root gets disabled, as well. Then, we are on a re-imaging phase. Lol.

Lol. Oh boy, don't I hear that. Sometimes the simplest of updates can bring several things down. Lol. I'm getting some comments on my YT channel, because WINE has changed from Version 1.7.9 to 1.8. I know that for my class, OpenSUSE 13.1 had several changes in 13.2. I had to make some quick alterations to my material due to that.

It really depends on my application. I have not tried Arch out yet. I really like CentOS for servers, Ubuntu for servers and development (since it's so easy to use), and Kali and Backbox for security. I teach using OpenSUSE, but I have to say that it is not my favorite distro. Lol. Definitely lends to the learning experience.