Red Hat 7.2 Released

Spirit writes "Red Hat has anounced the release of Version 7.2 distribution with Gnome 1.4 and Nautilus, default ext3 fliesystem and according to ZDnet migration from LILO to GRUB" Updated by HeUnique:There are some issues to note before upgrading: The kernel that comes with the RH 7.2 is heavily patched 2.4.7 and has been tested quite heavily on fully loaded Linux boxes - so the recommendation is to use it

If you're upgrading from the previous Red Hat 7.1 and you're using Ximian GNOME, then you might want to erase all Ximian GNOME RPMS (use the command: rpm -e `rpm -qa | grep -i ximian` --nodeps to erase the RPMS). Red Hat's GNOME RPMS has been more tested then Ximian's one and there is a conflict between them. You cannot use Red-Carpet on Redhat 7.2 as it will fail with the RPM libraries.

These are the most critical notes about Redhat 7.2. You might want to read the README & the Release-notes which appears on the 1st ISO image.

Oh, and if you already installed it - then have some fun with the new un-official RPMS from Enigma's section of FreshRPMS

Comments

First impression

[geirt]

I have been playing with the 7.2 betas (roswell) since it came out, and with the 7.2 release for about a week now.

I am very pleased with Redhat 7.2, it has given me very few problems, and it was the first Linux distribution that installed into my laptop without any tweaks.

The main enhancements (as visible by the user):

Grub instead of lilo (but you can still use lilo if you want to ..). Grub is a great boot loader, similar to the "boot monitor" of real Unix hardware. Grub understands the file system, so you do not need to reinstall Grub every time you update your kernel (like you have to with lilo). Once you are in the grub boot promt, you can boot any OS on your system (eg. from a floppy)

Mozilla and Nautilus: (I am a gnome user)

Mozilla 0.9.2.1 is a rather old release, but it was the release chosen by Netscape for NS6.1 so it is quite good. Nautilus is 1.0.4 + a lot of patches from RH (Alan Cox ?) to speed things up. Natilus is still somewhat slow, but I don't use file managers so much, so I don't care. I think that you should have at least 128 MB ram to run it, is was slow on one of my test machines with 64MB ram and a sub optimal disk system. Seeing the speed and stability improvements of Mozilla in the last 6 months, I am quite confident that Nutilus will be a great file manager (++) in a short time frame. It is a very good "eye candy", and impresses every Windows user seeing it. If you for one reason or another, don't like Nautilus, use the good old GNU Midnight Commander instead (yes it is on the CD).

Kernel, gcc, ptyhon, etc

The kernel is 2.4.7 + a lot of patches. Since RedHat 7.1 is at kernel 2.4.9-6 already, I believe that we will see an updated kernel soon. The main compiler is RedHats own 2.96 + modifications, and python is at 1.5.2-35. You will find gcc 3.01 and python 2.1.1 on the CD which can be installed separately. RedHat 8.0 will probably use these as default.

Postfix, Apache:

Redhat has dropped support for Postfix (a sendmail replacement), which used to be on the Powertools CD. I really don't know why, but I hope that the next RedHat release will fix this major bug. Apache is the rock solid 1.3.20.

Executive Summary:

RH7.2 is a polished good distribution. Since it is a .2 version, RedHat is going to support it for a looong time, and it will become the first choice for many system administrators for serious linux servers (that is, until 8.2 is released).

Re:Nicking arteries

[Rogerborg]

• Red Hat 7.2 isn't quite a knife in the heart of Windows yet. However, we can't help but feel that it will certainly nick a major artery.

Uh, wait. Without wishing to troll, have you read the list of "things you should know" above? At the retail / desktop/ even OEM level, this is not what people want to hear. They want to hear "Put the CD in the drive. Switch on the machine. Select your language and time zone. Wait."

I think that WinXP has goofed big time with its registration requirements. Now is a great opportunity for GNU/Linux distros to make a big play for the desktop, but they'll gain share only by being idiot proof, because (let's be honest) if we're talking about "knifing the heart" of the Windows market, we're really talking about people who are terrified of anything that comes with a README.

The usability of Linux (is pretty good by now)

[RNG]

I just upgraded my home machine to Mandrake 8.1, which comes with the same general software packages that RedHat ships. While I (of course) haven't tried the new RH yet, I'll make a general observation based on KDE, Gnome and all the other little goodies which ship on a modern Linux distribution: Usability of Linux (on a well-setup machine) is no longer an argument against it's use.

Let me explain: when people talk about usabuility, they typically mean "it is (or it isn't) like on Windows" and maybe "it is (or it isn't) like on a Mac". This is not what I would call usability, but rather something like "environment inertia"; people don't like change even if it is for the (long term) better.

After seeing my mom (aged 60+, bought her first computer 1 year ago, never used a computer before that) struggle with Windows when needing to do rather simple/basic things, I've grown convinced that a (well set up) KDE desktop is just as usable as Windows and that the so often touted Windows usability is nothing more than a myth. Windows is usable once you're used to it; otherwise is't as difficult (or easy) than any other decent windowing system (yes, KDE certainly fits this description, GNOME probably does; this is *not* meant as flamebait but just an abservation of the way these Desktops are configured in the newest Mandrake 8.1 release; your milage may vary). These don't work quite the same way as Windows, but it basically do the same things, provides you with menus, with end-user friendly software (KOffice is pretty cool & looks nice, KMail is quite user friendly, etc) and nice GUI configuration tools. If you have a chance sometime, watch someone who's never used a computer try to figure out Windows; it's very instructive to see that Windows itself is not more or less intuitive than any other windowing
system; once you've mastered the concepts and abstractions, it becomes easy. The so called usability advantange of Windows is mostly imprinting, inertia and FUD; the functional differences are starting to disappear or become neglegible.

The biggest obstacle at this point is device/drive support and the need to recompile kernels to get some stuff to work. Usability is (generally speaking) just fine, provided you're working on a well-setup & installed box ...

Comments on ISO files and cheap cd sets

[MartinG]

Why do people not gzip the iso files before they put them on the ftp sites? It's something I have never understood. Even with a great deal of the content already compressed, I have got a typical saving of ~10-15% on various distro install disks. Saving 80 odd megabytes of download per disk, per user is a lot. And how hard is it to type "zcat blah.iso | cdrecord" when you have it?

Never mind that anyway - don't download it, buy it from Redhat instead. But does anyone else wish RH would sell cheap disk sets like mdk do? I bet it would only improve their profits. They would be bought mostly by ppl who currently download the isos (like me), not the ppl who currently buy the boxed sets ('cos they all want manuals etc otherwise they would download also)

MartinG.