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Dag Wieers Scoffs at Coordinated Linux Release Proposal
Nic Doye writes "Dag Wieers responds to Mark Shuttleworth's recent request to ask major Enterprise Linux distributions to synchronise releases, claiming that it 'is no more than a wish to benefit from a lot of work that Novell and Red Hat are already doing in the Enterprise space.' He's confessing to playing Devil's Advocate here, but it is an interesting view from someone with a large amount of experience in the Red Hat/Fedora/CentOS space."
Who is Wieers?
What did Shuttleworth propose?
Why he would propose it is sort of the point. RTFA.
I don't think it is a big stink. In fact it seems a rather well thought out bit of analysis.
It's hard to believe that's how Micronians are made. Why don't we see it right now by having you both kiss one another?
Dag Wieers is known to just about every user of RedHat Enterprise Linux and CentOS, because he and a few other people provide a ton of 3rd part packages that make life more bearable. See:http://dag.wieers.com/rpm/packages.php
He's also one of the people behind rpmforge, which tries to make a unified repo of 3rd party add-on packages. Previously there were a number of incompatible (dependencies and so forth) repositories like atrpms. Dag's work benefits all of us who use RHEL on a regular basis.
I'm assuming that Shuttleworth proposed that every enterprise distro synchronize the release versions of certain core packages like glibc, mysql, gcc, etc, so that it will be easier for vendors to target linux distros with their software releases. In theory it's a good idea, but not everyone has the same idea of what's important and what the right version to release is.
In fact, RHEL + rpmforge (or Dag rpms) kicks ass of any other desktop Linux distribution.
No, this is not a monolithic vs micro kernel argument at all, this is about upgrading drivers and what that requires in Linux. The Linux kernel already has the architecture for adding drivers at runtime as modules, just like OS X, just like Windows, etc. The difference is, on Linux you can't install new drivers easily if at all without backporting large amounts of code, like Red Hat apparently does for their customers.
Your only options are to try to compile new driver code against the running kernel headers, which doesn't usually work because whole subsystems have changed or are entirely missing, or you can rip out the entire kernel for a new one, which doesn't happen unless you do it yourself, by compiling mainline from source, something IT shops aren't likely to do.
Look at the example i quoted, they are saying new drivers got added to the newest kernel but because of the way the kernel works, large amounts of developer time are needed to get new drivers working on existing systems.
This is quite obviously a problem, but the kernel devs seem opposed to the idea of a stable module ABI, there is even a file in the source tree which says something like "you think you want a stable module ABI, but you really don't" its like a jedi mind trick. I understand perfectly well the implications of supporting a stable module ABI, but its necessary in some cases.
"From what I've seen, hardware vendors only target Novell and Red Hat right now, and Ubuntu and Debian are afterthoughts."
Which is of course why Dell ships Ubuntu en masse, why Asus (eeePC) ships Xandros (a Debian derivative), and Shuttle is shipping Foresight. As far as consumers are concerned (which is where Linux has the most room to grow), Novell and Redhat don't exist.
Facts are fun.
He's also one of the people behind rpmforge, which tries to make a unified repo of 3rd party add-on packages. Previously there were a number of incompatible (dependencies and so forth) repositories like atrpms. Dag's work benefits all of us who use RHEL on a regular basis.
You forgot to mention that the whole reason that there is an rpmforge is that Dag and co. refuse to operate under EPEL / Fedora's rule: Don't introduce packages that are already in the main repository. As a result, Dag's archive and rpmforge will conflict with the base distribution or EPEL on some packages. Once in a while, I'll grab a spec from Dag and rebuild packages for RHEL/CentOS, but as a matter of policy I don't allow rpmforge repositories to be added to any of my systems. His work does make my life easier. Technically. From time to time. However, suggesting that there are no longer incompatible repositories gives him too much credit, I think.
This abandoning the desktop talk really annoys me. Desktop is just a buzzword all the while redhat maintains and writes half of gnome and desktop software, where you think network manager came from or pulse audio, the suspend features in gdm, UI, who funds and built freedesktop.org? Just cause they dont have a sticker that says "desktop linux" doesn't mean they abandoned it. look up redhats contributions http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/RedHatContributions sometime.
It's quite simple really they dont want fresh OSS software to be associated with the red hat brand. Fedora will have bugs and be considered "unstable" to many who are looking for no noticeable bugs in thier OS. If fedora was called redhat desktop people would be going around saying i tried to install "red hat" and the instal failed.. they wont differentiate redhat desktop from redhat server in mindshare, it will redhat will lose its brand as a stable serious company. This way I get my fast moving OS and i know what it is, yet newbies wont start branding redhat as a P.O.S cause it didn't install on their emachine.
-- "of course thats just my opinion, I could be wrong." --Dennis Miller
Novells SLES and SLED are released every 18 months. openSUSE is released every 8 months.
Also SLES and SLED are maintained 7 years.
Does this mean manpower? Yes, especialy for the parts of the distribution where no updates are provided anymore. e.g. where the production has completely halted. This has to be maintained by Novell themselves. Just download the source if you so desire and you can copy and paste it into your own code.
How do they do it, except for editing the code? https://build.opensuse.org/. Hey Mark, if you like, you can download it and put your distributions on it, letting the community handle the security updates. It is able to build complete distributions, so you can then build them as often as you desire. Yes, it handles Ubuntu as well.
Don't fight for your country, if your country does not fight for you.
well ... as one of the lead developers for CentOS, let me tell you that Dag is MUCH more CentOS friendly than EPEL.
Users are free to choose which repositories to use ... BUT ... don't confuse Red Hat's corporate interest with good policy. EPEL does not put conflicting packages in EPEL because Red Hat will not allow it and not for any other reason. This isn't bad, CentOS would not exist without Red Hat ... you mischaracterize this issue. Also, RPMFOrge and ATRPMS existed for years before EPEL started, and in fact the reason Dag and other are not members are because EPEL demanded that all the current groups in this space stop what they were doing and instead do what Fedora determined was the proper course.
Also ... there is a package called yum-priorities that allows you to prevent having core packages updated if you want to take that approach.
The CentOS Project supports Dag's (and ATRPMS as well) in their forming of a new 3rd party repo called rpmrepo .
What you fail to mention is that RPMforge predates Fedora and EPEL by a few years. Between 2002 and 2007 (EPEL) I attracted millions of users using my RPM packages. Packages that existed *before* Fedora came into play. Repositories did not exist back then in the RHEL/Fedora world as they exist today.
When Fedora started I was very interested to help out (read those lists), but nobody within Fedora cared about the millions of Fedora/CentOS/RHEL users I provide packages to and Fedora Extras did not want to support the RHEL/CentOS users at the conception.
Only in 2007 they started to care about RHEL/CentOS users, mostly because Fedora itself is using CentOS for their infrastructure. At that time the Fedora packages were already incompatible with RPMforge packages.
So tell me, what did *I* do wrong here, except caring for my userbase where Fedora didn't.
If the Fedora project wants compatibility, why are they expecting the work to be done by 2 individuals ? I certainly cannot spend that extra effort.
You mean like this?
Granted, RedHat's list is vastly larger, but they have been on bussiness (and on top) for much longer than Canonical/Ubuntu.
Oh, and please tell me when I can get a Dell laptop with Fedora installed on it.
Anyway...
I don't understand Dag Wieers' problem? He's upset that Ubuntu may be benefitting from Red Hat's work on a piece of GPL software that allows for the free distribution of derivative works? It was this attitude that caused backlash toward RedHat which forced them to introduce Fedora in the first place. Am I the only person who remembers Red Hat as trying to be the Microsoft of the Linux realm?
Did you actually read the opinion piece. I am not saying that Ubuntu cannot take Red Hat's work (in fact, they can and do). I am saying there is an ulterior motive for Canonical to synchronise their releases with other Enterprise distributions.Canonical does not have the workforce to do what Novell and Red Hat are doing and by aligning releases they can much easier just take that work instead of having to re-apply it to their own frozen releases of software. So for Canonical that would be a huge plus, while there is little or no value to Novell and Red Hat to do so.
Besides, there is nothing stopping Canonical from doing so already (follow Red Hat's release cycle) except maybe the perception they create and the fact they won't be leading engineering.
There are some other false statements (and emotions) in your comment, but they are a very good source for another opinion piece