View source for Ubuntu Server or Ubuntu Desktop?

Whether you choose to use Ubuntu Desktop or Server depends on whether you plan to use your box primarily for ZM or as a multi purpose box

The key differences between Ubuntu Server and Desktop are:

* The server version does not have a GUI installed (which means you can't really use solutions like TeamViewer or X11 based remote graphics systems until you install a graphical desktop)
* It has fewer processes loaded at startup
* It has lesser packages installed

Personally, I'd strongly recommend you go for Server instead of Desktop for the following reasons:

* It is faster
* Takes up less memory
* You can ssh into it any time and interact with it
* You can use byobu or other interfaces to use multiple terminals etc. (don't expect them to be as nice as a GUI desktop)
* If you really want later you can always install a desktop. If you are installing a desktop GUI, I'd recommend lubuntu

Note: Some folks recommend using a web based UI for ubuntu server called "minfy". Well, some screens of minfy need Java, which I really don't like. Plus I use OS X, and Java is always a pain there.
I use byobu.

BTW, I installed ZoneMinder directly from the GIT repo on Ubuntu server. You need to install several packages which you can easily figure out following instructions here https://github.com/ZoneMinder/ZoneMinder
The only caveat is after ZM got installed, and running, I realized that none of my logs were showing up in custom scripts that I wrote that use ZM logger perl packages. 
To fix that, you need to install:

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sudo apt-get install libjson-perl
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