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Red Hat Network for the Masses
Outland Traveller writes: "A few months ago I sent some feedback to RedHat concerning their then $30/month RHN subscription service. I asked them to consider offering a $5/month low end version more suitable for home users with multiple computers. I'm sure that a plenty of other people offered the same suggestion, but I was still surprised when I opened my email this morning and found that the exact service I asked for is not only being offered, but that fast access to iso images has been added as well, among other improvements. I guess I now have to put my money where my mouth is :) Seriously though, this should be good news for people who download RedHat's .iso images but want to financially support RedHat in a way that makes sense."
I have to disagree with you. Do you think a "pay-per-download/view" model would really work? On a voluntary basis? I think the offering that RH makes to you adds a lot of value and is really affordable. It is like hushmail.com, a nice secure email package I simply pay for because I like it. And I can help them support OpenPGP and other open standards. And this is exactly what RH is trying to achieve and what, IMHO, makes a lot of business sense.
But these are only my $5/month worth of comments.
I wonder when someone will reverse enigeer up2date and make an open source up2date server. So you could just pay $60 to redhat to download the update full speed, then turn around and at as a server to your lan to update all the others. The source is avaiable for rhn_register and up2date, both GPL, so it wouldn't be that hard.
Havoc Penington, the bane of my Linux desktop.
Looking at the big picture, I think I'd rather have the option to pay $5/month than pay $30/month.
;)
After using Redhat linux for a couple of years, I decided to buy the upgrade to 7.0 last summer instead of just downloading it. For one thing it was simpler to get the CDs in the mail than to figure out what to download and roll my own. I also felt good supporting a company that's treated me well (RHAT +150.00 in two weeks...) in the past. But I never did activate my support, because it was only good for X number of days and after that I'd have to pay almost as much monthly as I'd paid for the bundle. I decided to save my code until I absolutely needed the support.
I'd feel more comfortable activating my support today, knowing that I'd only have to pay $5/month upkeep for a bit less service, than I'd have felt activating the support when I got the 7.0 CDs. I've always been in favor of choices, end-user empowerment, the idea that the person using software should be able to make the decisions. In that light I think Redhat has made a good move here. The more expensive option is still available to those who can afford it and would like the "VIP" treatment, but the cheaper option probably appeals to more people.
Remember that Redhat is a corporation, and needs to make money. I'm willing to bet that there are at least six times as many people willing to pay $5/month as there are people who are willing to pay $30/month. Offering the lower grade of RH Network will likely be a profitable decision as well as one that pleases consumers. Maybe I'll buy stock again
Of course, I still ain't subscribing to the support unless I really need it! But when that day comes I'll be much happier that there's a less expensive option.
Shaun
Thanks to the War on Drugs, it's easier to buy meth than it is to buy cold medicine!
I don't think that selling boxed copies in stores is Red Hat's primary motivation. I think their going after the enterprise. That's why they want to sell subscriptions at $30/mo/machine. You buy, or download, one copy of RH and install it on as many machines as you want. But if you want enterprise level support to keep those machines "up2date" then you can pay the monthly fee.
If you're big enough, you can buy the soon to be released "Red Hat Network in a Box" where you can run you're own completely autonomous Red Hat Network w/in your own corporation. (Info from a Red Hat guy who recently visited our LUG.)
Box sales in stores is likely to always be part of their market. But IMHO, it's not their primary target.
Key to financial independence: Spend less than you earn. Save and invest the difference. Do it for a long time.
If you don't believe in paying for the products you use, you're either communist or a terrorist (maybe both).
You obviously have no idea of what you're talking about. Here's a hint: buy a dictionary, look up communism, L-E-A-R-N.
There's nothing un-American about wanting something for free or not paying for what you do get. If anything, it's probably more American to not want to pay for things that you get, hence this whole discussion. After all, people weren't willing to pay $30 to RedHat, so how is $5 any better?
I won't even touch your terrorist reference...honestly, if you wanted to be a troll, you could've done much better with your choice of words...
Anyway, who's to say that only Americans are on Slashdot? :-)
Open source is not about being anti-Microsoft (OK, for some people it is). I have no love of Microsoft but Open Source is more than that, it's a whole new way of doing things. I expect to see Microsoft and Open Source co-existing for quite some time yet. They are not direct competitors.
Suck figs.
Done
350 machines. Need to track the package status of 350 machines. How exactly, are you going to tell me the status of 350 machines using that technique without going to each of the individual machines? Right now, you either:
The point is that the red hat network (allegedly) manages large numbers of machines better than debian. Of course, this is untested by me, right now. But it's an attractive feature.
Key to financial independence: Spend less than you earn. Save and invest the difference. Do it for a long time.
Okay, besides the cost, and maybe not even that, what's the difference between this kind of subscription and M$'s ?
3000 dead over past 2 years, still no free Palestinians, still
Where do I submit the "stable is taking forever to release, why don't you guys just give up" bug report on bugs.debian.org? Seriously, Debian isn't a viable alternative for an up to date linux server which many people need. If a stable release comes out every 5 years what is the point? I like running Debian unstable on my laptop but stable on servers? No way...
You're going to run a 10 machine lab of Windows machines for less than $240 including upgrades to their latest OS, or are you talking about just buying one copy of Windows for all 10 machines?
I've used both Ximian's redcarpet updater and RHN. Ximian's client is very slick looking, and I like how you can subscribe to different channels. I also like you there's an option to install RPMs from a directory- this makes Redcarpet useful as a general RPM frontend.
Red Hat Network doesn't look as elegent, but it has more functionality overall. RHN gives you emails of critical updates and errata tailored to your actual systems. It gives you a single point of management for multiple computers. One thing that I tried yesterday was to schedule the install of new RPM packages on one of my tower systems from my laptop. It worked great! Also, I love how you can exclude packages from being upgraded. It's very annoying to have to click on every individual update manually in red carpet just because if you hit "update all" it will update a package you want left alone (usually replacing a more up to date version with a downgraded ximian version).
I'm used to periodically checking for updates manually, and then pushing them down to each system as needed. This saves a lot of time if you can spare 60$ a year for each additional system (you get one system free).
1) RHN would NOT store my machine configuration on their servers. I see no reason this can't be stored on my machine.
2) Red Hat would coordinate with Ximian so that their releases coincide. Let's say $9/mo for Red Carpet and RHN combined. This would cover all system and basic desktop updates; both RH and Ximian might want to keep a level or two of premium service beyond this basic service.
Maybe even offer different desktop subscriptions, so that $9 might get you RH+GNOME, or RH+KDE.
pr0n - keeping monitor glass spotless since 1981.
Have 350 Deb machines to manage? Check out FAI. We're using it with about 20 machines, and it works OK. Initial setup is a pain, but once that's done, it's quite powerful and flexible.
...is their insistence on making FAM and sunrpc portmap *ABSOLUTELY MANDATORY* to run KDE. FAM (File Alteration Monitor) is a daemon that monitors files for changes. I guess that the "logic" behind it is that it's less cpu-intensive to have one daemon constantly strobing files on your harddrive than half-a-dozen programs doing it simultaneously.
/etc/fam.conf, and have it readable by any programs that want to talk to FAM. Or howsabout a sunrpc clone and FAM that bind to interface lo, rather than eth0 ? Make it secure and closed to the outside world out-of-the-box, and force people to port-forward via ssh if they *REALLY* want the rest of the planet to be able to monitor their file activity.
Since FAM is not a "well known service", the only way for the system to work is to...
1) fire up ye olde sunrpc portmap on port 111 listening to the whole world (ARRRGH!!! Hello Lion/Ramen) and have FAM register itself with portmap.
2) FAM is then assigned a random port (could be above or below 1024) and listens to the whole world (ARRRGH!!!) on that port. Other programs can query portmap to find out which port to talk to FAM on. Oh yeah, the "-L" (local listen only) commandline option *IS IGNORED IN THE DEFAULT LAUNCH MODE* (i.e. xinetd). So *OTHER COMPUTERS CAN MONITOR YOUR FILE CHANGES*. ARRRGH!!!
Linux users have long laughed at Windows where *DESKTOP CLIENT PROGRAMS* are security holes. But here comes Redhat with a "feature" that, out-of-the-box, makes your filesystem activity viewable by the entire internet as well as exposing two open ports. WTF were they thinking when they did that ? More succinctly... were they thinking when they did that ? Planet earth calling Micro^H^H^H^H^H Redhat; isn't it time your boss man sent out a memo telling his programmers to put security ahead of features ?
How many newbie end-users are going to know how to properly update portmap and hosts.deny and hosts.allow and iptables to protect themselves? Redhat should've set the port number in
I'm not repeating myself
I'm an X window user; I'm an ex-Windows user