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Red Hat Linux Project Merges With Fedora
An anonymous reader writes "Red Hat has announced a merger of its Red Hat Linux Project with Fedora Linux, a group that has specialized in providing high-quality RPM packages for Red Hat. According to Red Hat, 'The Fedora Project is a Red-Hat-sponsored and community-supported open source project. It is also a proving ground for new technology that may eventually make its way into Red Hat products.' From the FAQ: 'Rather than being run through product management as something that has to appear on retail shelves on a certain date, Fedora Core will be released based on schedules, set by a steering committee, that will be open and accessible to the community, as well as influenced by the community.'"
Sounds like RedHat is trying to achieve some of the advantages of Debian. I'll welcome this, although I won't switch any machines over right away.
It'll be nice to get new software packages and rpms. I think apt-rpm has illustrated the need and the market for this. RedHat also has several great advantages over Debian, notably the installation process and more up to date software, so this could really revitalize them.
With projects like Linux From Scratch and Gentoo, distribution-building has gone fomr being an arcane art of wizards to something the community can do, and I'm glad RedHat wants to partner with the community in doing this.
Secession is the right of all sentient beings.
I think it's interesting that there is what appears to be a "core" part of the Fedora team focused on artwork.
This, alone, is an excellent move by RedHat to compete with Microsoft in a space they clearly lead the market - desktop UI.
As the Fedora site says, "Making things look pretty is the name of the game."
Unfortunately what needs improvement is the GUIs of the programs, not the desktop itself. Even the best desktop is no use if 2/3 of programs have awful GUI or are commandline only.
I know this doesn't sound ideal, but you're really in the same boat with any other OS, even Windows. (Some hardware works only with NT/2000 or 9x, not both, plus old hardware often loses support.) Buying hardware without checking driver status leads to pain.
I don't think Fedora can make this better, only the hardware vendors can.
As for documentation, try checking out the RedHat manuals. That and a good introduction to the Unix command line and vi/emacs should cover you.
Grr... Don't feed the trolls...
...
Let's see -
JPEG - Joint Photographics Experts Group
They have standardized it, and it's royalty free, AFAIK, but they still own it.
MPEG - Moving Picture Experts Group
They have standardized it, but it IS NOT royalty free, including
MP3 - Moving Picture Experts Group (MPEG-1 Layer 3, to be exact.)
While involved with MPEG, Fraunhofer IIS-A and Thomson worked on and patented crucial parts of the MP3 format, AND THEY DO LICENCE IT.
REDHAT CANNOT LET YOU DOWNLOAD IT WITHOUT BREAKING THE LAW! What about this can't you idiots understand???
Read this...
http://www.mp3licensing.com/index.html
Grr... I won't feed the trolls, I won't feed the trolls... next time...
Your rant is nice and all, but it's largely irrelevant. This new project exists _exactly_ to cover these concerns -- well #3 and #1, at least. #2 is a matter of style.
The goal of the project is to be current and up to date. That should actually make updating easier since much of the time people tracking current updates will find they basically have the next release when a release point is declared and 'official' .iso images created.
.. upgrading is no big deal. I've taken boxes from 7.1 to 9 without rebooting.
Even with current Red Hat 8, 9,
Supporting old releases is expensive and gets vastly more expensive over time. Its why nobody does it in detail for old releases except in the enterprise space, Debian included.
Various non Red Hat folks have talked about doing unofficial RH 7.3 errata, I guess it depends if enough people willing to pay them to make it cost effective.
Really? When I right-click on something, nothing happens (Pre-1995 Windows).
Jesus, that was over eight years ago.
Single-clicking opens something (Post-IE4 Windows).
No, it doesn't. Only if you turn that option on.
Keyboard shortcuts vary with the application and are subject to the whim of the application developer; CTRL-N is a new email in Outlook, but a new database in Lotus Notes.
90% of applications follow standard shortcut procedure, but there are always the exceptions, which aren't the fault of Windows consistency.
MS's devkits include standard icon sets
Icons are also subject to the whims of the developer. In the 90s, I could always tell when a new version of Visual Basic had been released, because Windows shareware would have new and inexplicable icons.
Um...huh? What does the changing of some default dev icon have to do with the interface consistency? Most apps use their own custom icons.
Microsoft's user interface is not consistent over time. It is not consistent between applications, except those from the same vendor (and even then it's questionable). What seems like consistency and logic in the UI is really a huge installed base and a decade of acclimatization.
Completely false. Windows is considered a bastion of homogenized consistency (good or bad), especially compared to the hell that is the Linux desktop attempt.
"Sufferin' succotash."