Unfortunately, there is no surefire, simple way of getting the distribution name. Most major distros are moving towards a system where they use /etc/os-release to store this information. Most modern distributions also include the lsb_release tools but these are not always installed by default. So, here are some approaches you can use:

1. Use /etc/os-release

   
   
   

   awk -F= '/^NAME/{print $2}' /etc/os-release
   
   




2. Use the lsb_release tools if available

   
   
   

   lsb_release -d | awk -F"	" '{print $2}'
   
   




3. Use a more complex script that should work for the great majority of distros:

   
   
   

   # Determine OS platform
   
   UNAME=$(uname | tr "[:upper:]" "[:lower:]")
   
   # If Linux, try to determine specific distribution
   
   if [ "$UNAME" == "linux" ]; then
   
       # If available, use LSB to identify distribution
   
       if [ -f /etc/lsb-release -o -d /etc/lsb-release.d ]; then
   
           export DISTRO=$(lsb_release -i | cut -d: -f2 | sed s/'^	'//)
   
       # Otherwise, use release info file
   
       else
   
           export DISTRO=$(ls -d /etc/[A-Za-z]*[_-][rv]e[lr]* | grep -v "lsb" | cut -d'/' -f3 | cut -d'-' -f1 | cut -d'_' -f1)
   
       fi
   
   fi
   
   # For everything else (or if above failed), just use generic identifier
   
   [ "$DISTRO" == "" ] && export DISTRO=$UNAME
   
   unset UNAME
   
   




4. Parse the version info of gcc if installed:

   
   
   

   CentOS 5.x

   
   
   

   $ gcc --version
   
   gcc (GCC) 4.1.2 20080704 (Red Hat 4.1.2-54)
   
   Copyright (C) 2006 Free Software Foundation, Inc.
   
   

   
   
   

   CentOS 6.x

   
   
   

   $ gcc --version
   
   gcc (GCC) 4.4.7 20120313 (Red Hat 4.4.7-3)
   
   Copyright (C) 2010 Free Software Foundation, Inc.
   
   

   
   
   

   Ubuntu 12.04

   
   
   

   $ gcc --version
   
   gcc (Ubuntu/Linaro 4.6.3-1ubuntu5) 4.6.3
   
   Copyright (C) 2011 Free Software Foundation, Inc.
   
   

   
   
   

   Ubuntu 14.04

   
   
   

   $ gcc --version
   
   gcc (Ubuntu 4.8.2-19ubuntu1) 4.8.2
   
   Copyright (C) 2013 Free Software Foundation, Inc.
   
   This is free software; see the source for copying conditions.  There is NO
   
   warranty; not even for MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE.
   
   

This has basically been directly copied from @slm's great answer to my question here.