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Red Flag Linux Distributor Joins OSDL

Posted by Zonk on from the welcome-your-communist-brethren dept.

segphault writes "Ars Technica reports that Red Flag Linux has joined the OSDL." From the article: "Founded in 2000 through the Chinese Academy of Sciences, Red Flag's Linux software line includes desktop, server, and embedded Linux distributions. Red Flag's products are extremely popular in China, where their desktop Linux distribution is favored by many developers. Red Flag frequently collaborates with other Linux distributors in the region, like Korea's Haansoft and Japan's Miracle Linux."

10 of 82 comments (clear)

  1. What I'm curious about is... by mmThe1 · · Score: 3, Insightful

    .... by joining OSDL, are they going to "commit" some of their resources for research/development *online* only? What difference does it then make if the company is in China, or any other country then? The article focussed much on growth of Linux in China, rather than 'Red Flag', OSDL, and whatever they are planning to do.

    1. Re:What I'm curious about is... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Insightful

      The more Chinese taking up Linux, the better as it will only increase marketshare for the OS and encourage more developers to port/write programs for it.

      The rate of consumer growth in the major Chinese cities is astounding and likley the reason why the article focuses more on that.

  2. Link by Life700MB · · Score: 3, Insightful


    Here's the link to the official red-flag linux web.


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    Superb hosting 20GB Storage, 1_TB_ bandwidth, ssh, $7.95

  3. Red Flag's products are extremely popular in China by dajobi · · Score: 2, Insightful

    If by "popular" you mean the government attempts to force people to use their state-sponsored Linux distro to reduce dependence on American software, only to find that people respond by formatting their hard disks and installing pirate copies of Windows.

    It's kinda fitting really. I probably wouldn't want to use Linux anymore if the government were trying to force it on me. Especially if it were the Chinese government.

  4. Re:Warning!! by miffo.swe · · Score: 2, Insightful

    What do you talk about, "we"?

    Im not any part of that so called "we" and i have no problem with their current ruling. Can you even imagine what would happen to the region if China was to dissolve? If you think the middle east is a mess now thats NOTHING compared to the demise of China. Id rather sit back and let democracy come in slowly than watch the US wreck havoc in yet another area throwing the whole region into full blown civil war. Both saddam and bin laden was put in place by the US, ring any bells?

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  5. Re:A disturbing development by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Insightful
    Think about it: With MySQL, the People's Army will now be able to do multiple queries on their tables of democratic activists in Olog(n) time instead of lengthy searches in card catalogs. The bureaucratic overhead previously allowed activists enough time to flee the country. How about building cheap firewalls so the people can't get the unbiased reporting that CNN provides? Or using Apache to publish lists of Falun Gong people to their police forces instantly? I doubt that never crossed your minds when you were coding away in your parents' basements. Consider putting that little thought in your mental resolv.conf file.
    Now, let's turn that sentence around shall we? just for fun...

    Think about it: With MySQL, the [FBI] will now be able to do multiple queries on their tables of [communist] activists in Olog(n) time instead of lengthy searches in card catalogs. The bureaucratic overhead previously allowed activists enough time to flee the country. How about [pressuring CNN] so the people can't get the unbiased reporting that CNN [could] provide? Or using Apache to publish lists of [un-american] people to their police forces instantly? I doubt that never crossed your minds when you were [in school]. Consider putting that little thought in your mental resolv.conf file.
    As the NRA say, it's not the tool, but the person holding it.
  6. Re:A disturbing development by Neo-Rio-101 · · Score: 4, Insightful

    YES! Next time YOU buy a kitchen knife - you're telling companies that it's OK to make knives which may be used to KILL OTHER PEOPLE! THE BLOOD WILL BE ALL OVER YOUR HANDS!

    Next time YOU buy a car, you are voting with your purse strings and ENCOURAGING people to smash their cars into pedestrians in hit and run accidents? Is this the country we fought to win?

    WHEN YOU BUY ALCOHOL, you are signalling to the rest of the country that YOU ACCEPT a DRUNK SOCIETY. Let's ban ALL ALCOHOL so that will never.... oh,..... what that? They tried that already and it didn't work?

    *whistles and twiddles thumbs*

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  7. Re:A disturbing development by afa · · Score: 2, Insightful

    Because of your using of 'Fa_lun#Gong', the http connection is cut down by the Great Fire Wall, and only after using some https proxy, can I reply to you from China! Plz never ever ever ever use such dangerous word publicly! It's damned evil!

  8. GPL Violation? Pfft. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Insightful

    HELLO. Ubuntu doesn't put any sources on their disks. None. Zilch. Nyet. It's not worth the space; this isn't Gentoo. If you want the source to something, you have to apt-get source it, which could very well be how it works in Red Flag. *smack*

  9. Upstream patches? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Insightful

    Has anyone ever seen an upstream kernel patch from the Red Flag people?

    They have absolutely no concept of patch management (tending to keep all their changes as one huge patch against the mainline), and are frequently tasked with projects such as kernel improvements to make individual software load faster (where the kernel is of course the best place for application-specific optimisations).

    While there are without a doubt many skilled people working with them, their technical leadership is a bit of a joke. It is by sheer political force that Red Flag manages to survive. The free software philosophy is very popular in China, and they are willing to throw a lot of time, money, and effort behind it, but they've been largely approaching it with a short-term mindset - odd for a country known for it's 50+ year plans.

    Hopefully they will not consider OSDL membership an achievement in itself (quite likely), and will get involved with the other members and learn a few things from them. China has a lot of people, and therefore a lot of smart people, many of who would love the opportunity to work on Linux and other free software, given the opportunity.