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Linux Standard Base 2.0 released

Posted by CmdrTaco on from the standard-this-people dept.

prostoalex writes "Linux Standard Base 2.0 has been released by the Free Standards Group. The release will allow application developers to ensure their product works on multiple flavors of Linux. FSG keeps a list of compliant distributions on its Web site."

18 of 242 comments (clear)

  1. SCO... by Nos. · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Has two products listed on the compliancy page. Caldera set to expire near the end of this week, and SCO Linux Server set to expire next month. I wonder if they'll try to get renewed.

  2. All your base by hhg · · Score: 5, Funny

    All your standard-base are belong to us!

  3. Re:0 comments and already slashdotted... by Izago909 · · Score: 4, Informative

    Try the Google cache.

  4. Compliant Distributions by adam+mcmaster · · Score: 4, Insightful

    I'm kind of disappointed looking at the list of compliant distributions - there aren't many on there, especially when you consider how many distributions there are out there.

    With that in mind, how much can this "allow application developers to ensure their product works"?

  5. then again... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny
    >>ANOTHER PLUS. "This would make life easier. Anything that allows us to move to the different flavors more easily is a good thing,"

    Easy? Bah! I want spend 30 hours searching for HOWTO's! I want to type "apropos -k" until my fingers are numb! I want to scan scripts until I hallucinate ascii!

    Bah! Bah I say!

  6. slackware and debian by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Insightful

    If they're not on this list, I have a hard time taking this list serioulsy

    1. Re:slackware and debian by Arker · · Score: 4, Funny

      Debian, god only knows why, is attempting to support this stuff. Doesn't seem to fit their social contract at all, and the LSB folks have thumbed their nose at Debian repeatedly, but for some reason they keep trying.

      Slackware doesn't and has no interest in it. Another case, I think, where Volkerding gets it.

      Given the background and goals of the LSB, I'll be using their certified list as a list of distros to avoid at all costs.

      --
      =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-
      Friends don't let friends enable ecmascript.
  7. Where's the community? by nadamsieee · · Score: 4, Insightful

    FSG keeps a list of compliant distributions on its Web site.

    All of the certified distros are commercial products. Where are the community distros in all of this?

    Could it have something to do with the Fee Schedule? The fees don't seem that steep.

    1. Re:Where's the community? by iabervon · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Ideally, they'd have a test suite for systems available, and a distribution could claim to be compliant if it passed. Or, better, end users who are concerned could run the test suite themselves to find out.

      For that matter, install scripts could include the test suite and check before installing whether your system seems plausible, with sufficient information to complain to your distro if it's not right.

  8. Patching Questions/Comments by Eberlin · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Interoperability is a great goal, but is anyone addressing patching/updating? Currently, it seems that these updates are handled as follows: download new packages, remove old packages, install new packages.

    That seems fine for smaller bits of software but for a KDE bug fix or an OO.o update, downloads can go to the 100MBs or more. Fine on a DSL line, but dial-up users are still going to get hit hard.

    I understand that OSS is better at fixing bugs and that's great -- but between Mandrake 10CE and now, it feels like I've downloaded another distro worth of updates. Is there something being done (maybe the whole binary diffs thing mentioned before) to decrease the size of update files?

    I'm posting this as part of an LSB thread in the speculation that binary compatibility may one day lead to (smaller) patches that can be applied to LSB-compliant distros...so a KDE bug stays a KDE bug and not a MDK bug, SUSE bug, RH bug, Debian bug, etc.

  9. This is nonsense by mpcooke3 · · Score: 5, Funny

    I mean what are they going to come up with next, a standard packaging format?

    Jesus, they're just taking all the fun out linux.

    1. Re:This is nonsense by nadamsieee · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Actually, RPM is the standard packaging format for LSB. Thank God for gentoo...

    2. Re:This is nonsense by Nailer · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Actually, RPM is the standard packaging format for LSB. Thank God for gentoo...

      Why do you need a different packaging system to download and compile software and its dependencies based on your preferred compiler options?

      Last time I checked, you don't. up2date can download source packages, rpmbuild can rebuild them, and you can use cflags with RPM just like anything else.

      Sure, Gentoo automates that, but there's no reason they need a seperate packaging system to di it.

      Additonally Suse, Red Hat and everyone else already use optimized bianries where it matters, automatically installing the right kernel and c libaries based on processor type. Multimedia sites for Fedora / RHEL and Suse also include optimized packages for totem / mplayer etc to, and up2date / yast automatically picks them out.

  10. Re:Good, though already outdated by Carewolf · · Score: 4, Informative

    You can specify to g++ that it should use the old ABI (-fabi=102). The bigger problem is that it uses a different version of libstdc++, and the versioning in there has not yet been solved as well as it has been in libc.

  11. Free Standards by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Insightful

    On sale this week for only $3000.

  12. Actually... by yoshi_mon · · Score: 4, Informative

    Debian is listed as a "Silver Member" on their group member page.

    --

    Really, I know what I'm doing...Ohhhh, look at the shiny buttons!
  13. Gentoo... maybe kinda... by temojen · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Certification of gentoo is almost certainly out of the picture, as you can't know from one system to annother which libraries are installed.

    This might be an interesting use for slots though. Someone could build a series of ebuilds that require the specific library versions that the LSB specifies, and keeps them in slots (so they're not unmerged when they're upgraded). Then a Gentoo user who has emerged "LSB-Base" would have a decent chance to be able to run any LSB 2.0 requiring binary package.

  14. quote by dtfinch · · Score: 5, Insightful

    "For payment terms please contact The Free Standards Group"