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Russia's Operating System May Be Fedora Based
Glyn Moody writes "Last month, a story about Russia producing its own national operating system based on GNU/Linux started circulating. Now there's some confirmation, and details of how the plan might be put into practice. Red Hat had a meeting with the Russian communications ministry, which announced that the development of free software in Russia was one of its priorities. One concrete idea they talked about was using the Russian Fedora project as a step towards creating a national operating system."
Russia's Operating System May Be Fedora Based
An upside down fedora will represent a zero and a right side up fedora will represent a one ... we will use state of the art Soviet technology to flip (or "flop") each hat as the program runs ...
I hope it's just /. being wonked that made the title red.
Well, Duh, it's Red. :D
Here's a cookie... *psst* it's MAGIC
Source opens you ...
sorry I couldn't resist it.
But why Fedora? Is it because they'd rather be "Dead than Red(Hat)"?
Don't know why they'd pick the unstable beta distro to do it, though. Ought to use the Russian version of CentOS or Ubuntu LTS.
Hail Eris, full of mischief...
E pluribus sanguinem
Consider that Raskolnikov was only an outlaw because he believed himself to be such. If he hadn't had the guilty conscience, the authorities never would have caught up with him. They believed that the painters had done the crime, and had the confession to prove it.
But all men who are good at heart love honesty, and though Raskolnikov was able to commit murder, he was unable to maintain the lie which he had constructed.
In much the same vein, Javert was able to break his case against Jean Valjean because though a criminal, Valjean was never the hardened criminal he was portrayed to be.
In short, Russian Linux is likely to suck.
"Red ushanka"?
I can imagine the Linux community would welcome the opportunity to improve internationalization and localization, especially if the Russian government is going to fund the efforts, but why would Russia need a "national operating system"? What other country does this?
Are you saying that this linux can run on a computer without windows underneath it, at all ? As in, without a boot disk, without any drivers, and without any services?
That sounds preposterous to me.
If it were true (and I doubt it), then companies would be selling computers without a windows. This clearly is not happening, so there must be some error in your calculations. I hope you realise that windows is more than just Office ? Its a whole system that runs the computer from start to finish, and that is a very difficult thing to acheive. A lot of people dont realise this.
Microsoft just spent $9 billion and many years to create Vista, so it does not sound reasonable that some new alternative could just snap into existence overnight like that. It would take billions of dollars and a massive effort to achieve. IBM tried, and spent a huge amount of money developing OS/2 but could never keep up with Windows. Apple tried to create their own system for years, but finally gave up recently and moved to Intel and Microsoft.
Its just not possible that a freeware like the Linux could be extended to the point where it runs the entire computer fron start to finish, without using some of the more critical parts of windows. Not possible.
I think you need to re-examine your assumptions.
Great, Linux was doing so well until it caused the 2nd rise of the USSR.
"They who can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety" Franklin
I am using Fedora from the start and I like it very much, but I don't think its philosophy is suitable for a "national" distribution.
Fedora is created for testing, not for everyday usage for normal people (not neerds). I think even using Fedora qualify you as a nerd. OK, it gets even worse if you are using alpha's.
Using Fedora will cripple their productivity and they will start to hate Linux.
If they want to use Linux for serious stuff, like "national distribution", then they should chose another distro.
Original content? No, I don't think there will be any of that for this story. There really isn't anything insightful or informative to say. Leaving everyone to come up with some misguided attempt at creating a joke that isn't completely expected.
You know something like
Q: Why did the chicken cross the road
A: Because Russia, a formerly communist nation, has decided to go with a national operating system that forms the basis for a different operating system called Red Hat. And Red is the main color associated with Communism in general. Which makes this joke funny. Also, chickens are in a constant state of motion. They don't really have a set destination in mind, and just wander aimlessly most of the time. So its more of a question of why it wasn't in its coop and what lazy farmer couldn't be bothered to care for his farm animals, than why it an animal with no cognitive power of its own to speak of crossed any kind of a road.
See, not the least bit funny. There should be an editor level feature that only allows for negative moderation on stories. So then the competition amongst the attention seekers would be to see who could write the most bland, non attempt at any horrible run on jokes/memes comments.
Well.. maybe. Or Maybe not. But Definitely not sort of.
Ushanka.
One of our competitors trademarked the term "hypothesis". From now on, we will call them "boneheaded ideas".
Its not a Russian OS, its a Russian Distribution...
"Ahh! Arrogance and stupidity in the same package, how efficient of you!" --Londo Molari
I was hoping Russia's OS would be based on not having files :(
except that it kills journalists, right?
Okay, as a more accurate translation of the first story:
part one:
The IT community is asking the president to support the idea of a national operating system. Future developers of the can receive this support in the form of a federal goal program . In any case, this is what the authors of the letter, which is being written in [government [?]], to President Medvedev are counting on //I assume by a federal goal program they want the government to control the project.
part two:
In addition to the request to initiate the preparation of the federal program, it will contain a justified benefit from the creation of a Ânational OSÂ. While it is understood that the basis for the OS will be existing systems with [open code]. The question of this openness, in the letter will Âremain open so as not to overload the president technical details // the basis will be off open code, but the level of it's use will be arguable. //the last statement means that the letter will not be too technical
three:
The point of creating of Russia's Ânational OS is for military services and government[buildings] was commented on by the director of ALT Linux Alexei Smirnov: Âoperating systems can be called national if the state has the right to distribute and modify, and, as a customer, influence its development. There are no Systems that meet these requirements, neither in free, nor in proprietary software Â. Smirnov believes that the project ÂNational OS in the first phase will be [basic - based off something]: ÂWithout it, for example, there can be no talk of "National Iron " in it's timeÂ. We should not forget, Smirnov recalled, that if the system will adopt a Âfree model, then, Âthe more Russia will invest in the global movement of the ACT, the more it will have an impact on itÂ. //he considers the basis for the OP, // "national iron" is likely not related, used for comparison //last statement means that the more russia invests in the changing [cpu?], the more of an influence it will have
if anyone has a better translation, go ahead.
Thank you, I'll be here all week!
Populus vult decipi, ergo decipiatur...
"Force shits upon Reason's back." - Poor Richard's Almanac
Computer programs you!
As is often the case, the key advantage that would flow from the creation of such a "national OS" is the control that it would give the Russian government - something it doesn't have with Windows, say, or even generalised free software produced elsewhere:
Not only is ALT Linux already around, but ASPLinux has been certified by the government. Are we re-inventing the wheel here?
Original content? No, I don't think there will be any of that for this story. There really isn't anything insightful or informative to say. Leaving everyone to come up with some misguided attempt at creating a joke that isn't completely expected. You know something like Q: Why did the chicken cross the road A: Because Russia, a formerly communist nation, has decided to go with a national operating system that forms the basis for a different operating system called Red Hat. And Red is the main color associated with Communism in general. Which makes this joke funny. Also, chickens are in a constant state of motion. They don't really have a set destination in mind, and just wander aimlessly most of the time. So its more of a question of why it wasn't in its coop and what lazy farmer couldn't be bothered to care for his farm animals, than why it an animal with no cognitive power of its own to speak of crossed any kind of a road. See, not the least bit funny. There should be an editor level feature that only allows for negative moderation on stories. So then the competition amongst the attention seekers would be to see who could write the most bland, non attempt at any horrible run on jokes/memes comments.
Actually, chickens exhibit Brownian motion. This was discovered in 1997, when I was in high school. I had chickens at the time, so I went about proving this for extra credit in class.
My conclusion: Given a bounded area crossed by exactly one road, the chicken has approximately a 100% chance of crossing the road at least once as time goes to infinity. The jury is still out as to why, but several theories posit quantum chicken physics being involved.
Disclaimer: The opinions and actions of the US Gov't are in no way representative of those held by this author or its ci
Guys, there is a dozen of Linux distros is Russia. AltLinux is the most known, but there are also ASPLinux, Linux XP and a military classified . All the distro developers and lots of system integrators are in the battle for the state funding right now, so do not expect to know now what will the Russian national OS be tomorrow.
Thank you, I'll be here all week!
Trust me. Don't try the borsch.
sudo eat my shorts
First, I would like to see comments on Slashdot cease referring to "the Reds" as if the USSR was still in existence. Are some Slashdotters actually young enough to have no memory of 1989-1990??? However and that being said, if Russia goes ahead with this project, it would be clever to agitate for a Sputnik-like panic and suggest that America must beat them to the goal of free software, as the thing that will propel humanity into the future.
Fedor is an unstoppable killing machine I guess the Russians figure Fedora must be an unstoppable OS. What's next? A USA national operating system named Chuck Norris?
For some reason I refuse to use either spell check or the spacebar properly.
Why would they base their OS on somebody else's distribution? I thought Russia didn't need help, weren't invalids and didn't have limited mental capacity? I figured that a bare chested, gun totin' Putin would write the OS from scratch himself after using his mad Judo skills to teach a bear why nobody should talk wise to the past and future President of Russia.
Actually, I think there are some interesting points about this: An entire country of some import has finally said "enough, fuck proprietary software, lets write our own!" Yes, I know there is RedFlag Linux and others, but this is still quite significant.
I have wondered for years why governments have trusted foreign companies to run their IT systems. On many levels it just doesn't make sense. Then you have things like the Russian school teacher who was prosecuted for OS software in the school. It allows little business boyers of commerce to come in your country and tell you what to do. Most sovereign nations are a bit touchy about such things.
Personally, I think that this and other recent events regarding Linux are solid signs that Linux will neither disappear nor lose to MS/Apple. If you want to frame things in terms of Linux on the Desktop I'd say Ubuntu is your answer, and lots of folk are following suit, including big names like Sun et al. When an entire country says it, we should probably listen closely.
No, FedoraRusso OS is not the answer for everything, but it sets a trend, an attitude. Imagine how many Russians would pirate MS Windows if they can get THE "Russian OS" for free? In the end, BSA will get what they want; no piracy of MS products in Russia. Unfortunately for MS Russians will be buying less of their products too. Whether it was meant as such or not, there is no larger way to say fsck you. If they actually follow through and demand that trading partners meet their demands for data interchange..... well hello! ODF. It could have some far reaching impacts. Look at problems caused by using metric and imperial measurements in the space program. I'm willing to be that government and business requirements for data interchange will demand changes even outside of Russia, and that is where it truly becomes interesting for me.
Support NYCountryLawyer RIAA vs People
The End. Pack your bags and go home boys. Sell some stock while it's still there. It was nice to meet you.
Only another few hundred In Soviet Russia jokes to scroll through before you start to get to original content.
I thought Windows was the free OS in Russia.
If you want news from today, you have to come back tomorrow.
In Soviet Russia... but does it run Linux? Russian overlords... MEME OVERLOAD*(&$*(%&*#$*(%&NO CARRIER
Dear Slashdot: next time you want to mess with the site, add a rich-text editor for comments.
I wonder if they'll honor the open source license requirements and publish derivative code. Isn't Fedora GPL?
And yes, the almighty FSM does use Debian.
Anonymous Coward posted the same comment to another recent article.
rm -rf /political_dissidents
THL phish sticks
There are lots of young adults in Russia (and other former Soviet Republics) who aren't old enough to remember Communism.
In quantum chicken physics, the two states are :-
1) About to cross the road
2) Groaning at the awful punchline
The trick is to try and observe the former state, thus collapsing the waveform so that the latter state cannot happen.
Ahhh...but will Vladimir Putin obey the GPL and submit changes back to the worldwide community....
I would say probably NOT
Does that mean they are about to be bugged by more than just M$? BTW the level of "in Soviet Russia" jokes in this thread is awful come on guys
Build a Man a Fire, and He'll Be Warm for a Day. Set a Man on Fire, and He'll Be Warm for the Rest of His Life.
Slackware...
I hear it is big in antarctica, too!
p.s. I use it, too!
makes me feel vindicated. Either he's a regular human being like the rest of us, or even GODS think it's ridiculous that it takes 30 minutes of Google searches to figure out how to create a desktop icon...
Maxim: People cannot follow directions.
Increases in truth directly with the length of time spent explaining them
Imagine how many Russians would pirate MS Windows if they can get THE "Russian OS" for free?
The overwhelming majority of them.
"You can either have software quality or you can have pointer arithmetic, but you cannot have both at the same time."
Coreboot. The NSA would still be able to spy on them if they had custom BIOSes.
I can't help but think that the U.S. dependence on Microsoft is ever more dangerous.
We have a lot of great computer scientists in the U.S.A. but there is no capitial investment to make companies that compete with Microsoft.
How many have tried and fallen because of Microsoft's dirty tricks? How many "Go Computing" scenarios have there been?
The only alternative the computing world has for commodity computers is Free and Open source software. Don't get me wrong, I use Linux, I have done so exclusively since 1995, but it is rediculous that there is only one commercial OS vendor for the PC line of computers.
The economic failing of this is exampled by Russia's OS. There's Microsoft or nothing in the commercial world. Then there is some variation of Linux or BSD in the free software environment.
Because there is no viable alternative to Microsoft in the commercial world, Russia is going to write their own. If there were a thriving environment with multiple viable commercial operating systems, there would be no need for Russia to write their own.
More to the point, in an analogy to the HUGE banks like AIG, they were considered "too big to fail." Which was, of course, disastrously wrong.
Microsoft is a similar sort of problem for us. Since we CAN NOT compete with Microsoft because people won't fund you if you do, we can't create companies that will provide products and services for people who no longer want to deal with Microsoft.
So, outside of the U.S. there is a potential market for non-MS products and services, but in the US VC and employers are afraid of creating products that compete with Microsoft. Thus, moving forward, the US will be losing its software industry and basically giving it away out of fear.
The U.S. IT and software industry HAS to move away from the microsoft monopoly monoculture if it wants to survive in the long term. Linux and BSD are good, but we need lots of profitable software companies competing across the board on applications and operating systems. We need variety and standards. If we don't do this in the U.S.A. we will lose the edge we once had i the software industry.
My Fedora router/server has 81 days uptime with lots of services running, no memory leaks, no crashes.
Hey guys, here is my point of view from Russia:
I've been waiting for India, China, and Russia to take charge and really develop linux/Open Source for their own markets. Each country could cripple us if they could just cheaply get the bulk of their population online and using their language on the net.
What if we had to learn Russian, Chinese, or Indian, to really use the nice/good version of Linux? It'll happen. The question is when.
Fedora is the basis for Redhat Enterprise Linux and CentOS, both widely-used operating systems. It's a great choice as a starting point, not necessarily an end product.
... that is what I wanted to say with my post. That Fedora is only useful as a testing platform.
Why not use CentOS or RedHat then
Developing a national distribution will cripple their productivity.
I agree with you. In my country the government also tried to sponsor some kind of a national distribution. It was based on RedHat and it was very average, but very localised distribution. It didn't manage to achieve big acceptance. It lasted only for some years, probably so long as the money kept flowing from the government. It is dead since 2005.
R.I.P.: http://www.pingo.org/
To be good, Linux distributions should have a financial model behind it.
Maybe they associate Fedora with http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fedor_Emelianenko/.
"Anything tastes good if you deep fry it."
That was the first thing that ran through my mind. I guess you can say, Fedora defeats Windows by Arm bar.
"Anything tastes good if you deep fry it."
The point being that Fedora is geared toward home and small-business desktop machines. Redhat/CentOS is geared toward Enterprise customers. What would be the point of Redhat testing Enterprise-targeted features in a SOHO-targeted operating sysytem? They aren't going to get any useful feedback on most of those features because SOHO users won't need those features. If they do (perhaps for telecommuting or some such), they'll just use the same version of Redhat their employer has deployed in the production environment. So, please, stop spreading the myth that Fedora is Redhat's testbed because even Redhat has said that Fedora is not their testbed!
In the West, you use operating systems. In Soviet Russia, system operates you!
Or as they say - In Soviet Linux, disk fscks you!
Our national OS should be written in Cyrillic letters. Not a single Latin letter or word should be present in the code.
Certainly there should be a possibility to switch to a Latin keyboard, if necessary, but the OS should be in our letters, in our language.
If I would be an average "home and small-business desktop" user, then I certainly wouldn't want to use Fedora as my distro ...
;), bugs after upgrades are frequent, processor runs frequently on 100%, so I have to kill processes (npviewer.bin and others ...). For example, a month ago my mouse was totally dead after upgrade of Fedora 10. I know how to file a bug in bugzilla and we managed to fix it till next upgrade.
... maybe a week or two. Will the average Joe (or Vladimir) be able to start command prompt and type 'yum update' with mouse not working ??? I am not the only one that thinks this way:
...
I think I am an experienced Linux user and I have used around 15 distributions till now. RedHat can claim what it wants, but Fedora is very problematic for average users that want to use it in a reliable way.
In Fedora 10, you have got KDE 4 in raw version (without KDE 3.5, but gnome working nice), updates are in the range of 100MB (almost weakly
How many office users can live with such bugs ? They need to work, to earn money in their offices. And the mouse sleeps ?? Wait till yum update makes something
http://news.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=1122595&cid=26797959
As I said before. I love Fedora, it is my first distro, but I wouldn't recommend it to a friend that is not experienced in Linux to use it for work - in a small office
Dammit, why do they always pick one of the big name crappy inflexible binary distros that is stuck half way between been a full blown desktop and a half configurable disaster. Why not really build a customized system... from scratch, or using something much more customizable such as Gentoo!
Yes, the article is interesting. But no comments can be. I learned nothing from your post. It spurred no new threads of thought, nor did it give haste to any pre-existing ones.
Well.. maybe. Or Maybe not. But Definitely not sort of.
I see. So, three people is a consensus. I'll keep that in mind. Thanks for reminding me why I usually lurk instead of posting. I'll go back to lurking now.
What is wrong with you ... did I wrote that I am absolutely right ? I said only, that other people are also complaining ... that doesn't' make me right ...
... maybe you should stay with lurking indeed ...
I have also expressed some serious arguments (facts) and I am still waiting for yours
I think every country realise the web is the most important. This is a good graduating.
ZedTeknoloji.com.TR
Second photo down... Russin Linux int the wild!
Experience teaches only the teachable. -AH
Lenix.
You're welcome.
What?
make os
@
steal money
Checkbox humour? I'm glad you asked, you know what I mean like:
Slashdot Posting Form
...
...
[ ] TFA is a troll
[ ] Get off grass
[ ] Did anyone else read that as...
[ ] _______ ^H^H^H^H^H ________
[x] In soviet russia
[ ] IANAL, but...
Somehow we got on to Quantum Poultridynamics, Chicken entrail entanglement is interesting however, may lead to a method of predicting future.
Seriously, this article is a masterful slashdot troll!
After logging in slashdot still does not take you back to the page you were on. It's been that way for 20 years.
Sorry Fedora is a solid distro and can be used for anything. I am tired of the continuation of some old worn out perception that its a bad unstable distro only for testing et al. That is the wrong message to send to new linux users. Whats important is youre using UNIX and not that other OS. If you prefer a particular linux distro over another thats great, even if it is Un00btu :)
people on ludes should not drive
Microsoft should steal a copy and post it on torrents for all Americans to enjoy, just like Russians have done for decades :) and I'm one of them.
So many better (but still dumb) jokes were available...
"Now there's some confirmation, and details of how the plan might be put into practice"
Plans put *you into practice!
"One concrete idea they talked about.. ."
Concrete ideas talk about *you!
and so on
My turnips listen for the soft cry of your love
I understand people getting all nervous at the thought of a traditionally iron-fisted government having control of an operating system, but I really can't see it as anything but a good thing.
Free software's best argument has always been that, while with proprietary software you're reliant on a third party for support and development, with FOSS you can always just dig in and support it yourself. If you're a government, in theory answerable only to your citizens, it makes perfect sense that you'd want your software to be under your direct control. For a government to hand control of their computer network over to foreign corporations seems like a breach of trust to the public- and thats applicable to the corporations behind Linux distros just as much as it is to Microsoft. Obama seems to be having the same idea in the US, and the debate is quietly simmering in the UK, so Russia isn't exactly alone.
Having another group pouring cash into Linux development is a good thing for FOSS, and having a dedicated localized OS for Cyrillic seems good for average folks. Assuming the Russian government sticks to the GPL, all that tasty goodness can be fed back into the open-source eco-system. And assuming they stick to the GPL, they can't exactly try any funny business; open-source means nowhere to hide.
Then they wouldn't have to release their changes back into the world due to GPL restrictions.. Oh wait, this is Russia.. never-mind.
---- Booth was a patriot ----
Okay, as a more accurate translation of the first story:
part one:
The IT community is asking the president to support the idea of a national operating system. Future developers of the can receive this support in the form of a federal goal program . In any case, this is what the authors of the letter, which is being written in [government [?]], to President Medvedev are counting on. //I assume by a federal goal program they want the government to control the project.
part two:
In addition to the request to initiate the preparation of the federal program, it will contain a justified benefit from the creation of a Ânational OSÂ. While it is understood that the basis for the OS will be existing systems with [open code]. The question of this openness, in the letter will Âremain open so as not to overload the president technical detailsÂ. // the basis will be off open code, but the level of it's use will be arguable. //the last statement means that the letter will not be too technical
three:
The point of creating of Russia's Ânational OS is for military services and government[buildings] was commented on by the director of ALT Linux Alexei Smirnov: Âoperating systems can be called national if the state has the right to distribute and modify, and, as a customer, influence its development. There are no Systems that meet these requirements, neither in free, nor in proprietary software Â. Smirnov believes that the project ÂNational OS in the first phase will be [basic - based off something]: ÂWithout it, for example, there can be no talk of "National Iron " in it's timeÂ. We should not forget, Smirnov recalled, that if the system will adopt a Âfree model, then, Âthe more Russia will invest in the global movement of the ACT, the more it will have an impact on itÂ. //he considers the basis for the OP, // "national iron" is likely not related, used for comparison //last statement means that the more russia invests in the changing [cpu?], the more of an influence it will have
this was done in about 15 minutes by a very inexperienced guy, if anyone has a better translation, please add it.
See:
http://www.mandriva.com/archives/en/company/press/pr/russian_public_agencies_choose_mandriva.html
The Russians probably want something they know is fully (or at least more) under their control/oversight. By the way, there's a Linux for Asia www.asianlinux.net/ So now there may be a Linux for Russians and those in their "domain".
So what about Linux-XP, it's Russian.