Why Aren't More Distros Becoming LSB Certified?

mydoghasworms asks: "I have done much thinking lately about Linux Standards Base. The idea makes lots of sense: Adopt a standard which will ensure that if some piece of software is compiled on one LSB-compliant system, it will run on any other LSB-compliant system. This would be great for members of the general public who are looking for an alternative to Windows, don't want to pay for Mac, but are looking for a platform where installing and running software is as easy as on the platform they are used to. Seen in that light, if LSB lives up to its promise, it could be the step in Linux's evolution that could see it adopted by the general public. That leaves the question: Why is LSB not seeing greater adoption?" "Is it because it is not marketed well enough? Is the certification process too difficult? Are there perhaps technical challenges to LSB certification not often discussed? If people agree that LSB is in fact what Linux needs right now to ensure widespread adoption, what should be done to create awareness of LSB? Should communities developing Open Source/Free Software projects be encouraged to provide LSB binaries? Your input would be most welcome here."

Comments

Cost

[gordon_schumway]

In case anyone else is curious, from this 2002 article:

The cost for LSB certification testing is $3,000 for a Linux distribution. Certification testing for applications is only $1,200. The Open Group conducts the certification testing.

I didn't find this info on the Open Group's website...

Re:What role does LSB play?

[mooingyak]

It helps that if you use distro A, and I use distro B, and I write some software on my distro, we already know that it'll work on yours if they're both certified.

Re:Linux needs a standard container

[override11]

We use the LTSP project with about 45 users network booting to a XFCE desktop right now. They browse the web, access our exchange 5.5 server using Thunderbird and have a LDAP directory with auto-name completion as they type email addresses. They access our 5250 iSeries system, and use OpenOffice for word / excel needs on a Windows NT shared drive. We love it, works great. Some more 'advanced' end users chafe some because they cant download their own screen savers or games, but frankly we LOVE that part of LTSP!

LSB isn't the answer

[sofar]

DISLCAIMER: IAADM (I Am A Distro Maintainer)

put simply, LSB doesn't solve the desktop problem. It wasn't meant for that.

The LSB was written to make sure that all those booming distros back in the days they were booming, were somehow unified by a comming file system structure, library setups etc.

They really only mean to cover the (B)ase. This base was since then widely adopted and almost any distro conforms to this (B)ase more than 95%. Only outliers like slackware diverge, and often only minimally.

This puts the burden on distro maintainers to get a certification on something that is completely obvious, and non-beneficial. It's like getting a prep school diploma when you're in high scool already.

Also, the LSB is needlessly strict on some rules that hinder progress (init handling - chkconfig etc), where we should have moved to completely new solutions already (I loved that Makefile approach).

so, expect more from freedesktop.org than from LSB...

Re:Reality check... Bounced.

[civilizedINTENSITY]

apt-cache search grass
gpx2shp - convert GPS or GPX file to ESRI Shape file
grass - Geographic Resources Analysis Support System
grass-doc - Geographic Resources Analysis Support System documentation
libgrass - GRASS GIS development libraries
libgrass-dev - GRASS GIS library development files