I have a dilemma of selecting between ubuntu edition for development server. I have seen that ubuntu server dosen't have a GUI(though can be installed later). My question : is there any specific difference in desktop and server edition that will help in development of web app?
The server edition of Ubuntu is really intended to be run if you have racks of server machines on which you are deploying your application. If you are actually using this machine for development purposes, then you should simply use the regular distribution of Ubuntu instead of the server edition. That said, the only real difference is the default software; you can easily convert a server edition to an identical regular edition or vice-versa by installing/uninstalling the associated packages with the apt-get commands.