I have asked a question https://askubuntu.com/questions/124119/has-the-ubuntu-heating-problem-for-sony-vaio-users-been-solved which didn't seem to get any answers, but I desperately want to use a *nix based operating system (to enhance my programming skills).
What *nix type OS should I use that is light, works for most important tasks of a programmer and at least has a browser, which doesn't cause (or shouldn't cause) heating problems for Sony-Vaio?
Try Lubuntu. It is an official Ubuntu variant with the same support and packages. It uses LXDE so it is much more lightweight.
Echo the Lubuntu tip but one step further would be to get Lubuntu Core.
Lubuntu core is the lighest one; it is still Lubuntu, but with only the bare minimum packages pre-installed. That means, although you will have bits and bobs you need like a text editor and things like that, you won't have things like libre office bulking out your system.
You can add what you like after basic installation anyway. It does get all the Ubuntu repositories as standard but you can download the lubuntu specific ones from here.
and you can get the ppa by chucking that into terminal:
sudo apt-add-repository ppa:lubuntu-desktop/ppa
sudo apt-get update
Don't mind that it's called desktop. All the distros seem to be this way. Just bare in mind you will need to set it for a laptop on installation.
The following links might help you:
