Slashdot Mirror
Red Hat Backlash?
FolkWolf sent us a link
to CNET which as an article
on Red Hat Backlash
speculated on by the The Gartner Group. Basically
revolves around the recent investment announcements.
They talk about RH walking a line between
boasting their successes, and alienating themselves from
the community.
Clearly we may see some people getting pissed off by exploitative corporations. But Red Hat is far from that. Instead they've been supporting GNOME, enlightenment, etc. (you may not like the tools but that's a seperate matter). Unlike SUSE their tools are GPL'd (think rpm versus SUSE's installer.)
So far they've been honnest, and playing fairly. If they didn't and just embraced and extended, sure people would hate their guts.
Finally... I hope more companies do an IBM: support for multiple Linux Vendors is the better idea. It'd also be nice seeing some more donations to Debian to keep the garantee of a truely free distribution alive whatever.
Just as Netscape has demonstrated, a portal strategy is the dying gasp of a company that obtained huge market share and is trying to hold onto it in the face of superior competition.
I see RedHat's "portal" strategy as evidence that RedHat is outclassed - it has an outdated distro, SuSe and even Debian are much better.
There's a segment of Linux users who, I'm sure, will resent any company that's sucessful with Linux. RedHat's just the first, or one of the first.
I think the remedy is for those people that are part of the backlash to go out and get good paying jobs working on Linux. Then maybe they can feel a part of the success, rather than like they've been left behind.
I feel that some amount of backlash towards Red Hat is enevitable (if not necessary).
While the "best of breed" paradigm is very evident here in the Linux community, the "attitude" emanating from Red Hat these days reminds me of the early (albeit VERY EARLY) Microsoft.
The unwillingness to join the LSG has me more than a bit concerned. It appears that RH is taking the "...we don't need to adhere to any standards..." mantra that is so deeply rooted in the MS mentality.
While I will not for one second be ungrateful to RH, as they have (and continue to do) GREAT things for us in the Linux community. And while I still personally use the RH version, I am becoming increasing leary of staying with a distribution that, as a "leader", isn't leading.
Actually, Gartner are sorta getting better at the Linux stuff these days. If you look at the absolutely latest stuff they appear to have gotten an influx of clues. Trying to convince my boss we absolutely need to have a Linux / OSS strategy due to the cost savings and power of the OSS development paradigm, I could actually present a number of new Gartner reports to support it. There was even a nice one by (ehm) Mr O'Reilly of a familiar company...
Red Baron is gone, along with Metro X and BRU.
CDE is not sold be Red Hat anymore.
Red Hat and Debian are the only distributions
that actually care about free software.
I already dislike RedHat and I will not recommend it to anybody for two reasons:
1. They produce buggy distributions. (People who say it's not so haven't tried oter distros). I have discovered it from my experience.
2. Every newbie now associates Linux with RedHat, as if other distributions do not exist at all.
The Gartner Group sucks as hard as Zdnet and Jon Katz suck (Actually Katz blows, but that's a fine distinction.)
You'd get a much better signal to noise ratio if you'd simply remove all references to these three sucking things from your pages.
Redhat also sucks, but it's good for newbie users.
Newbie users suck.
Actually, Redhat doesnt even charge $50 for their product. They give it away free. They charge $50 for the 'Official, Brand Recognized, Nice Manual, Call us for Installation Help' CD. And just like I buy Heinz Ketchup because, well, uhm, it's Heinz Ketchup, I'll buy Redhat Linux because, um, it's Redhat Linux (well, not every release, but the major ones).
It's brand recognition and commodity buisness. Redhat releases their tools and helps with OSS programs because they arent in the proprietary software buisness, they're in the commodity buisness. And in the commodity buisness, market size (total linux market size, including other distributions) and a strong positive brand recognition are what matters.
Redhat knows very well that if they ever fall to the temptation of proprietarizing and turning into that path they have virtually invalidated their entire buisness model and their customers will dump them faster than they can say GPL. So they wont.
>>While I will not for one second be ungrateful
...to Microsoft...
...as they created order out of chaos in the
...for us in the PC community . . .
While I will not for one second be ungrateful...
>>to RH,
>> as they have (and continue to do) GREAT things
early PC days...
>> for us in the Linux community.
J*sus Ch*st, you sound like one of those
supplicants to Microsoft--the little lacky
boys who testify before Congress about what
a swell job Windows did creating market
opportunities for small software companies
(like that wouldn't happen already).
Look. Red Hat is a threat. Pure and simple.
Sure, Gnome is great. Thanks. But right
now Red Hat is VERY CLOSE to becoming the
new MS of Linux. Look at what IBM did--
it didn't want to settle on one company
and crown it "CZAR of the PCs" like it did
with MS in the 1980s.
As far as I'm concerned, it's Debian all
the way, until Debian gets too corporate.
And then it's off to some other model.
They're welcome to contribute to the free
source initiative all they want. (Hey,
Red Hat, FUCKING JOIN IN ON STANDARDS,
why doncha?) But I don't trust them just
because they're kewl and sold Linux back
in the old days.
Stick to core principles: Trust no one
but yourselves.
1.) Add Free Software zealots. I don't mean the average free software, I mean extremists like Richard Stallman, who utterly demand everything be free or shunned. Very few fanatics win their cause. There needs to be a middle ground.
2.) It's inevitable that these zealots will bash any successful commercial venture having to do with Linux. The idea of making money from Linux is preposterous. This hurts those of us who don't mind cooperating with commercial vendors. Cooperating means increased capabilities.
3.) Those of us willing to deal with commercial vendors must speak out with our opinions to let everyone know we'd be glad to work with commercial vendors. Don't let the vocal minority stop Linux from succeeding in the marketplace.
As a side note: I'm all for completely free software. I even share RMS's view to some extent that ALL software should be free. I also feel this way about books and other forms of inromation. I just think it should be free. And to be honest, I don't care too much about copyright laws, they only hinder innovation.
BUT, I don't force my beliefs onto others, I'm ok with their beliefs. I don't think I'd personally myself write a non_GPL piece of software, as I'm completely for the free, open-source model of software design. But I'm not going to demand that Jimmy-Joe Bob release the source his new mp3 player, or I'll black list him.
When I occasionally buy a piece of software, I don't buy it to get it, I buy it to support the company's efforts when I feel they have really done a good job and helped me out (among my purchases Red Hat Commercial Version, Quake (yay id), OS/2 2.1 & 3.0, and prolly Star Office, soon).
RMS, in you're listening, you've done a lot for this movement, done the work of at least 10 average lifetimes, but stop FUDing the birthing Linux movement, leave it alone. If you want to spread your rather extreme ideals, go finish up GNU Hurd, and get out of Linuxville...we don't need rifts developing, you're only hurting us right now.
The $%#&ing Gartner Group, purveyors of bad advice for directionless IS departments around the globe.
Here's my analysis:
The Gartner Group are a bunch of jackasses (0.9 probability).
Well yet again the Gartner Group makes news with quotes that are hardly newsworthy. It's just FUD, when will the Gartner group ever shut up? Is this their way of generating business/reputation?
Sure, Redhat may be gaining success, but why shouldn't they? Few people would argue success is a bad thing and as long as they don't take up Microsoft-like tactics (strangling the competition). I will use my choice, Debian and be content with Redhat spreading it's vines.
Who would backlash Linux success? People who are not true fans of Linux I would assume.
Yes, I am. But I am not here to bash RedHat.
I think many things that RedHat does benefit the whole Linux community and even *BSD camps to some degree. I use Debian, it works, I like it. My friends use Debian, they like it. There is a whole user and developer community who use it and like it. In which way IBM, Compaq, etc will hurt Debian by using RedHat? There will always be Debian developers and community out there.
In fact, RedHat does not hurt the other distributions but only benefits them by drawing attention to Linux. More attention to linux, means more applications (which will run on all distributions of course) and it laso means there will be more Linux ready systems available (again this is your choice what to install on them).
Debian (and others) benefit from RedHat the same way FreeBSD community benefits from Linux. e.g. All those software projects inspired by Linux actually produce software that runs on BSD. KDE, GNOME, GIMP, etc and all your beloved Linux applcations are all available to FreeBSD community at no cost .
I think in OSS community we all benefit each other.
Red Hat supports Linux and free software more
than any other distribution. The only other
distribution that is as free as Red Hat, Debian,
is unable to really support Linux.
The others are full of proprietary crap, including
shareware and half-assed Open Source. If you want
to write an open letter of complaint, try SuSE,
Slackware, EasyLinux, or Mandrake. All of those
are far worse behaved than Red Hat is.
I've noticed that many non techies think that Red Hat IS Linux. I mention Linux around my Physics teacher, and he says, "Oh, you mean Red Hat Linux?"
When RedHat distros control 50% of the PC market I will care. Until then it's just like the music biz, someone has a little success after actually working hard, then all the people who didn't really matter anyway start to whine, "Man, you guys are a bunch of sell outs...etc, etc."
Problems:
- SuSE
- Caldera
- EasyLinux
- Slackware
All of the above ship with shareware or other proprietary software. (such as xv) All of the above ship with half-assed Open Source software that doesn't allow you your right to distribute modified versions as you please. Considering popularity, I'd say SuSE is the biggest threat today.RedHat can't become a monopoly because of the GPL. And beside, anyone else noticed the number of new distros that are 99% redhat with a modified config and a few added packages? Must be making RedHat mad. And that's a good thing.
And they will no doubt encourage/force (whichever is your choice of words) its users to use Gnome and Enlightenment (the stuff it's putting money/time into) by making all of it's proprietory software Gnome compliant.
..
Since when RH made propietary software? Show me a single piece of RedHat Linux that was Developed by RH people and is not GPLed.
I understand your concenr about GNOME killing KDE, Wmaker, etc. I don't think this will happen to wmaker or other window managers because they have their own user and developer community. The fact that RedHat 6.0 shipps with E (just assuming) does not stop wmaker users and developers from using or developing wmaker. In fact Window Maker is already GNOME compliant
Even if they were to alienate the community it
should not make a big difference to them. The
Hackers will use whatever is shiek at the moment
(Appearently debian is the darling right now) and
businesses will use whatever is shiek in their
circles. Neither crowed will probably pay much
attention to what the other does and only the
loudmouths posting here will really know about
(and in fact be a breeding grround for) any sort of culture clash.
As long as RedHat does not directly cause the
pollution of Linux and the free software available
to me (And, in fact, they seem for the most part
to be contributing code to the world even if
their distro is a little out of whack) I don't
give a rat's ass what they do and I fail to see
why any hacker should.
The FSSTD (now FHS) did not require membership
in any special group. The FSSTD people produced
a specification and everybody agreed that it was
good to follow.
What if the LSG standard sucks? It is a good
idea, but I'd want to see results and community
acceptance before following it.
I suppose I must, grudgingly, agree; though I think RMS's paranoia is probably the healthiest perspective in the long term, seeing what has happened to the job of programming since it became a staple of the job market.
It is a good thing as long as programmers can be paid WELL to do Linux. As soon as Linux coding factories spring up, well, that's when tolerance of the corporate model for Linux stops serving the community that brought it into being.
Caveat, coder.
Phil
No, the more alike products, the greater the number of competitors. A small number of producers tends to occur when products are differentiated, and one producer tends to occur when there are barriers to entry. (impossible to copy, for example) Thanks to the GPL, barriers to entry are practically nonexistant for Linux - this guarantees competition. Now product differentiation does exist, and that has given us distributions focused on different things.
right on the nose dude!
Some guys are going with teh ALL license ala LGPL
(somewhere on www.ejboss.org)
regardds
matthew
I think most in the Linux community want Linux to be successful. Red Hat has maintained a pretty good stance regarding open source and I think most in the community know that. Besides, if Red Hat starts doing stuff that isn't cool, people will just switch to other distributions.
No, one distribution doesn't have to win. The GPL basically assures that, by eliminating barriers to entry. The KDE thing is funny - people who complaing about RedHat's market share I would think would be people who complain about the KDE license, which is RedHat's objection. Oh well.
The problem with that argument is that the people that they alienate are not the people that they will be making the majority of their income from. They might be sad if the hackers no longer use
RH but I doubt they would care.
It's actually nice to reserve /usr/local for /usr/local /home of course) and keep your user-installed programs and home directories, while upgrading all the standard programs supplied in the distro.
user-installed software. That way, if
is a separate partition, you can completely erase
and reinstall on your other partitions (except for
and post crappy msgs on /.
Finally someone actually feels the SAME way
I preach and I preach about how annoying it is.
to see newbies just think RedHat is the only linux distro out there.
its also sad when they don't even know who the hell linus is.
Debian is the odd distribution. It can never die.
It can never support developers like Alan Cox.
Since Debian is such a special case, ignore it
for now.
Compare Red Hat with SuSE, Caldera, and Slackware.
Only Red Hat supports the Alpha and SPARC.
Only Red Hat is 100% free software.
I'd love to see 90% Red Hat, with 10% Debian to
ensure competition and satisfy odd users. The
other distributions deserve to die. Freedom is
only supported well by Red Hat and Debian.
By definition, /usr/local is for local stuff; it's a good thing a distribution doessn't put stuff there and overwrite your own personal customizations.
RedHat should be supported for their promotion of Linux and scoring deals w/ major companies. But as a Linux distributor it should also keep an open ear to their users, which IMHO doesn't seem to be happening.
No kidding. We reserve that space for your own local use. That is, you should use /usr/local for things that you personally compile from raw source. Put your home-grown stuff there.
It is expected that a distribution upgrade won't touch anything you have put in /usr/local. It is your space.
If your distribution puts stuff in /usr/local, it is in violation of the most basic Linux standard. Shame on them.
Unlike SuSE and Caldera, Red Hat does not
include proprietary software. They don't
even include half-assed Open Source like Qt.
Having eliminated xv, Red Hat is 100% free.
Right on! I agree with this sentiment. I have been using Slackware since, well '94. I started using RH BECAUSE of their presence, business model, availability, support, etc. Even if I have to pay a nominal fee for the manual and support, I am still promoting Linux. Please realize that RH derives revenue from these activities because the are a commericial enterprise. If you look at their business plan, not that I have, but I'm sure that they have outlined their growth opportunities. Good for them for achieving their goals!
Of course, Debian was only officially released for the Alpha yesterday (along with Sparc). Until then, x86 and m68k were the only official Debian distributions.
Red Hat IS getting all the attention, but it's just HARMLESS marketing. Red Hat seems committed to open source... I'm sure they have chances to exploit loopholes in licensing, and they haven't (even with big suits investing...).
RMS, this asshole doesn't speak for most of us, just ignore the ignoramus. RMS is the free and the open in free software
I, for one, generally agree with the tone of the comments above, i.e., Red Hat has been good for Linux and a win for RH is a win for Linux in general.
/. is a high-enough profile website that I wouldn't be surprised if some of the FUD about the Linux community had its origins right here. Take one halfclued reporter/analyst, half-a-dozen noisy distribution/free software/etc bigots, and presto! Negative press coverage.
But: This isn't what I have been hearing around here lately. I have been hearing about "the Microsoft of Linux" for months now. If I were a Gartner Groupie hanging out on Slashdot, I would have certainly written the same article.
In fact,
Sometimes we need to think before we post.
I dont like debian OR redhat.. you babble FREEDOM and all this with your percentiles... then you have the nerve to say 'the other distributions deserve to die' ... just who the hell are you? what freedom is that if you shut out your choices? OH I KNOW.. I now have the freedom to chose to run Redhat or not to run linux at all.. WOW thank you.. the other distros dont deserve to die man.. get off it..
fred-er-ick
Forget the bloody Gartner Group. They're nothing more than high-priced purveyors of conventional wisdom, i.e., they have no vision and base their projections solely on what has gone before. Giant penguins could trample the Redmond campus and eat Bill Gates on national TV and they'd still say it was a fluke. Five years from now, they'll be writing analyses of how Linux's domination of the commercial server market was "inevitable".
You get the same kind of myopic crap from the software industry magazines. Ziff-Davis, fr'example, having been built around ad revenues from businesses that sell software, tends to see software only from that perspective, as if the reason users bought software was to enrich software companies.
Linus uses Red Hat Linux. He likes to install
stuff from binary RPMs. No joke.
You know who Linus is, right? I still consider
him a hacker.
Gnome is the right way to go. WM, KDE, and all our favorite WM's (i love wmaker) will benefit from Gnome. Dont bash it just because a comercial, popular company is so influential.
Debian is great, but it really isn't in the
same catagory as Red Hat, Slackware, Caldera,
SuSE, Pacific HiTech, etc.
Debian is a group effort. It is something very
different, and should not be compared so much
with all the other distributions. It is special.
Not counting Debian, Red Hat is clearly the
most free. If I were to count Debian, I would
have to lump it in with distributions that don't
support free software development. Well, duh.
Debian can't do that because they don't have
money.
C-net didn't make it up or not understand.
It's true.
People flame redhat all the time although they don't deserve it IMO.
Look at any Redhat thread in the last few months...
Whether such sentiments will ever amount to a "backlash"... I for one hope not (unless of course RH actually does do something dumb - but I'll wait for that to actually happen first).
What's the worst that could happen?
Nothing too bad at all, unless I'm missing something.
What if RH became the standard Linux for corporations? Maybe with some inroads made by Corel on the desktop, SuSE in Europe, TurboLinux in Asia or whatever.
RH GPLing everything.
Everything open. Windows installations eventually starting to look passé.
A small number of distros will have to take the lead (in a major market share sense) for world domination to happen.
If you don't want that to happen - flame redhat - they're *helping* it happen.
What would you rather have them ship? Arena?
Netscape is better than any other graphical browsers [see www.mozilla.org]
thank you.
The more companies that show that while theyre packaging and distributing free software theyre making money, the better. Other proprietary software companies will start to look to them, and think "free software...money...for us..." and boing, jump to suport, distribute all kinds of free software.
If I was a "suit", how couldnt I see the advantages on my side of free software? No need to make software, let others do it! Well then pick it up, package it under a cute box, and sell it. And give support to users, etc...
The software continues to be GPL, and available to all to modify, change, distribute.
Eduardo
Linux distributions deserve to die if:
- They include shareware
- They include half-assed Open Source
- They don't GPL or LGPL everything they write
- They fail to support free software developers
Poverty-stricken distributions like Debian get exempted from the need to support developers, but they must still satisfy the other requirements.Only Debian has a perfect record. Red Hat is very close though (they currently ship xv). Red Hat has written a replacement for xv, so that problem is temporary.
Linux is Linux, but if Red Hat wins.. what do we win?
I'll tell you what we win: thousands of buggy, rushed development _shareware_ programs all in RPM format. We will also get hardware support in the form of binary kernel modules. Another winning is a million users in your favorite IRC channels, news groups, mailing lists asking the same questions like "what is compile?" and "why does fsck come on when I reboot?". Looks like a hacker's dream come true! Now people can hack and help the technologically clueless on devel mailing lists.
Of course, I'm not saying it's Red Hat's fault. Any of the other distributions could cause this. But, since Red Hat is the one doing the pushing, I believe they should be responsible for educating soon-to-be Linux users. If they don't they ultimately sell out to the community.
Red Hat has given up on the Linux community in order to pursue future customers on the corporate desktop. Just try sending an email to Red Hat offering a suggestion. How many of you will get a response?
Same goes for the KDE mess. They were quick to come down on KDE but instead of contributing coders to Harmony (which I bet would be done by now) they had to go an dump all their eggs into Gnome and now KDE is left on the side of the road to die (fortunately for KDE, so many of us like it that it will continue). Red Hat just presses on doing their own thing and turning a deaf ear to the community.
Unfortunately for us Caldera seems to be almost completely without a clue. While Red Hat's funding of Gnome wasn't as good (IMO) as funding Harmony would have been, the end result is still a good one for the community. Caldera on the other hand seems to be a parasite intent on using Linux as a carrier for its proprietary closed-source products.
Slackware is an oddity. I'd like to see it continue because it is free. But it is safe to say it has almost entirely dropped out of the mainstream.
Debian and SuSE are the only strong contenders to go up against Red Hat it seems. I only wish more funding were sent in the way of donations to Debian but that just doesn't seem to be sensible to big business, unfortunately.
Surprisingly true, I actually never was a newbie. Not in this field anyway.
Who gives a damn what they say? They aren't even 50% accurate with their predictions.
Why would you say "it must really suck to be Caldera right now"?
/. before LinuxWorld; I think I'll stop holding my breath.)
According to all of my information, we're doing very, very well. We're perceived in the mainstream press as being #2 behind Red Hat, we have potential 7 figure investments in our company, we are going to be releasing a new distribution that has features the rest of the distributions will most likely be emulating eventually... We're kicking butt, folks. Plain and simple. (You'll probably have to go to Linux Weekly News or LinuxToday to read about it, though. I'm still waiting for the two MTI investment press releases to show up here that I sent
Erik Ratcliffe
Caldera Systems, Inc.
SuSE - YaST or Linuxconf, Sax (easy X setup), KDE, Star Office
Caldera OpenLinux 2.0 - Easy Qt graphical install, KDE, Star Office
Why would anyone recomment RedHat to a newbie desktop user over SuSE or OpenLinux?
KDE is simply better than Gnome. Gnome needs to rethink or recode major parts of its file manager and panel before the damn thing is stable.
Odd that you mention linuxconf.
/var/mail, RedHat has the best layout IMHO).
Redhat wrote their own stuff (usertool,netcfg,etc,control-panel), and abandoned it to switch to the growing interest in linuxconf as a standard for all distributions in configuration. Of course everyone else decided to not back the standard and started writing THEIR own.
linuxconf is a very nice tool IMO. And because of the way it is written, you can still use it and use a different directory structure (even though, with the exception of
-- Keith
Kernels must be renamed because some of the tools can't tell them apart otherwise. I think the modules stuff has problems.
Red Hat does not promote itself as the Linux.
Marketing is good. Excessive QA lets the software get obsolete. Red Hat generally ships with the most recent kernel they can find, and then some.
Well, all the contribs also install in usr /usr changes when I install a contrib piece.
following Red Hats example. I dont like it when
my
So then I'd have to build it myself, or relocatable. Trouble is too many packages need a location at compile time, and many people dont know how to make relocatable rpm's.
The second problem with such rpm's arise when you want to deal with multiple versions. Witness the gtk 1.0 and 1.1 disasters that GNOME had
Right on the money.
So for the "me too" but you just summed up my opinion exactly.
I have used xv many times, but I would like to try the GPL'ed replacement.
What is it called ? where can I get it ?
Thanks!
From what I saw on the original LSB mailing lists,
they were the ones that raised the most objections. They thing they are big enough in the market that the market will standardize around them. Since they GPL everything this in itself may not be a bad end, but the means are antithetical to the "community" feeling.
From the present LSB lists, I am not sure they are contributing at all, whereas they had made a commitment of contribution at the beginning.
Ya like I would believe anything these people had to say. It's just more of the same old FUD to make Redhat look bad. Betcha they run their corporation on NT......
I was rummaging through my Quill Office Supplies catalog, to order toner carts.
What do I see, but a half page spread touting RH 5.2! It's $38, and it gets more space than W98 ($90) or WinNT workstation ($290).
No better endorsement than Quill. Zillions depend on them, never had a prob in a dozen years. They wouldn't sell it unless they had absolute confidence in it.
Congratulations!
If freedom to hack doesn't matter, you might as
well just stick with Windows. You obviously don't
care about freedom (you support Qt), so why
bother installing Linux at all?
If you just hate Windows, try the MacOS.
Bob Young owned a bookstore, and was on the Slackware mailing list. At some point he bought a CD burner, started selling slackware disks at a cheaper price, and spammed everyone on the Slackware list about it. He then included glibc as a way to make other distros incompatible.
Redhat is getting name recognition monopoly. Once people just associate "Linux" with "Redhat," everyone will just buy Redhat even if someone else comes out with a better product (...Debian!). This is the sort of thing Microsoft did to DR-DOS.
(btw, I learned the info in the first paragraph of this post from someone closely involved in Slackware whom I met at LinuxWorld; any innacuracies are my fault.)
That's three--COUNT 'EM THREE--posts to my
troll. Pay up, John. And no weaseling outta
this one. The time stamps show it.
Plus, I'll bet the two you got were your
own aliases. Hehe..
Who's the Master Troller? Say it, John.
Oh--to the three suckers. Sorry to waste your
life for you. Now go away.
Yep, and the Slackware guy got threatened with
a lawsuit over copyright infringement of the
SLS install scripts.
The above happened around 1992 or early 1993.
Red Hat did not sell Slackware cheaper...
because Slackware was free. I downloaded a
copy myself onto about 50 floppy disks.
Either you are trolling or somebody played a
joke on you. If the latter, they must be
laughing thier ass off right now.
I'll tell you what we win: thousands of buggy, rushed development _shareware_ programs all in RPM format.
Rushed? Buggy? Fine. It's free software, you get the source with it, and you can fix it and thereby contribute back to the community. It's worked wonderfully for Linux so far.
Shareware? Not if it's free software. The day Red Hat abandons free software principles, they'll lose an enormous amount of their hacker mindshare.
We will also get hardware support in the form of binary kernel modules.
When has Red Hat ever done this? What evidence do you have which makes you suspect they will ever do this? Even if RH were to do such a thing, would it be their fault for doing it or Linus' fault for permitting it to occur? Even if RH were to do such a thing, Linus could revoke the permission for binary kernel modules and RH would be caught in a hell of a bind.
Another winning is a million users in your favorite IRC channels, news groups, mailing lists asking the same questions like "what is compile?" and "why does fsck come on when I reboot?"
Ah, so you sprang from the womb a full-blown UNIX guru?
When I was six (in 1981) I discovered the first IBM PCs. A family friend, Dave, was a college student in CompSci and he endured a hell of a lot of mind-bogglingly stupid questions from my six-year-old mind.
If you're unwilling to teach the Hacker Way to those who are just now embracing UNIX/Linux, then you are an arrogant, elitist ass who's unwilling to help other people out as you've been helped.
Looks like a hacker's dream come true!
It's this hacker's dream come true. I love seeing stupid questions from newbies. I have to stifle a chuckle every time I type "RTFM and check DejaNews". Newbies are Linux's absolute best resource.
Sooner or later, these newbies will either (a) abandon UNIX/Linux, or (b) become hackers.
One of the biggest responsibilities of hackers is to teach non-hackers. That's one of the reasons why free software is so important; free software is the best teaching and educational tool there is. It's professional-quality software with a big sign on it that says "Take me apart! Put me back together! Throw these pointers and references away and see what happens! But above all else, LEARN!"
Does Red Hat have an obligation to teach the newbies? Yes. So do I. So do you. Instead of complaining about Red Hat "dumbing down" the Linux community, do something to smart it up.
For God's sake, make a difference.
And grow up.
You are just a newbie.
Slackware is an SLS ripoff. Don't know about SLS?
SLS was the original Linux distribution, unless
MCC beats it. Yeah, Slackware was 3rd at best.
Have a little respect for Red Hat, a distribution
that didn't rip off SLS.
It might help you to understand that the posts you will see on these public forums represent a relativly tiny (but very vocal) segment of the population known as 'Knee Jerks'.
In older times they were also referred to as 'nay sayers' and it is these people who thrive on complaining, whining and critiziing each and every view presented. By definition, they enjoy taking up a contrary opinion and then loudly shouting out that position. This wouldn't be too bad except that those admitted into Clan Knee Jerk must take the solemn Clan Knee Jerk Vow: Never EVER support your claims. So naturally, if there have been past stories in which Red Hat was praised, you can be sure that the Knee Jerks were clamoring for the heads of those responsible for whatever Red Hat was up to now.
As a seasoned lurker here on Slashdot, I've learned to filter their drivel out but I am sure that the casual reporter could easily mistake the rants as representative of the community.
The good news is that they ARE a minority and, usually, information does flow despite their contrary efforts.
-Lurker #2019
Besides, this troll is uglier than most.
>Red Hat did not sell Slackware cheaper...
>because Slackware was free. I downloaded a
>copy myself onto about 50 floppy disks.
Yeah, but they sold the CDs. That's where RH undercut them, according to the dude I talked to.
I'm not trolling, the guy I talked to said what I posted. He was certainly pretty biased towards slackware though . . . who's SLS?
0.9 probability ? Man are you generous!
SUSE is the clear leader right now. Debian is
the most Gnu-like distro, but SUSE is the cd that
I'd give to a new user. Hell, even an old user, it
just makes everything easier.
I'd like to see them GPL *all* their tools though.
I started with Slack before there was a Red Hat.
I went to Red Hat for package management. If I had it to do again I might go debian, I might go SUSE, and I might roll my own. But RH is out of the running right now.
That said, I'd be delighted to see them make some real advances in usability etc. so that I could recommend them to new users again. Most of the ones I meet speak english as a default language.
You're fucking sad. Piss off yourself.
SLS was very buggy. The Slackware guy (Pat V.) installed SLS on dozens of machines for his friends and/or coworkers. He developed a set of fixes for SLS, since the SLS people were too slow about updates.
That set of fixes became Slackware. The SLS people threatened a lawsuit over the copyrighted install scripts. Slackware got it's own install scripts, and the SLS distribution died out in late 1993.
I don't think Slackware was really in business
at that time. Anyway, Cheapbytes undercuts
everybody now. Red Hat is about $2 or $3.
Red Hat had Rasterman write a GPL image viewer
called Electric Eyes. Maybe it comes with GNOME.
You can do the same sort of tricks with xv.
Red Hat had Rasterman write a GPL image viewer
called Electric Eyes. Maybe it comes with GNOME.
It does the same sort of stuff as xv.
Hackers generally recognize that Red Hat and Debian are the only two major distributions based on free software and free software principles, and tend to like the two (Linus runs Red Hat). Corporate types will see that Red Hat has 90% of the marketshare and support, and will tend to use it. That accounts for all of the software developers and major customers. The only place you're likely to see backlash is among immature teenagers (who, unfortunatly, form some 90% of posters on boards like this). Hopefully, no one of importance will care about them.
Practically, you'll only see backlash if a proprietary distribution like SuSE or Caldera starts moving out ahead.
Where else would you put mail?
/usr read-only, so you can't put mail there. /usr on a CD-ROM or read-only NFS.
The filesystem standard requires the ability to
mount
You might want
Yeah. I'd be wary of joining a group that would dictate how a distro must be set up. What if they start going too far and we end up with a "standard Linux user experience" type thing like Microsoft has for Windows. I want the distros to do what they think is best and I will choose which one I want to use. I do think that some standards are good. There has to be a certain level of standardization across all distros, but how does anyone know if the LSG or LSB, or whatever group starts calling the shots, will keep their decisions at that lowest-common-denominator level?
hmm.. need to login.. --Danse danse@satx.netSo you're saying that the quality or worthyness of a company depends on how cool their office tour is? What grade are you in?
Those VA Research bastards!! Hosting other people's sites, for free! What a bunch of leeches.
*CHOKES*
Netscape Communicator is shipped with RedHat...
The only 2 non-open packages I can think of in Slackware are xv (or whatever), which is a shareware image viewer, and Netscape Communicator...
Excatly what is the point of your post? What has RedHat lost sight of that's so important?
Who cares about who fucked who. Down with the evil empire and Long Live Linux! Does anyone have information about when Red Hat is going public? I would love to get stock in that company. :>
This is an old argument. RMS, Linus, and ESR all agree that the Qt licence is good. What's your mental problem?
Debian does not even produce Debian. There are
a bunch of nice people that produce Debian, and
some of them also produce free software. That is
great, but that doesn't mean Debian supports
free software development. The developers would
most likely write the same stuff without Debian.
Cosider Alan Cox. He would have to work at a
normal place if Red Hat didn't support him.
His free time to hack would be more limited.
Were he with Debian, he could only do half as
much as he does now. The rest of his time would
be spent doing boring non-Linux stuff for work.
On the contrary, all those guys making 99%-Redhat distros are just building up marketshare for Redhat. Think of it this way: it's a lot easier to upgrade from 99%-Redhat to Redhat, than from SuSe to Redhat, or even from Slackware to Redhat.
The GPL is the ultimate competitive weapon when you're trying to forge standards, as all the RedHat clones are demonstrating. In the long run, all roads lead to redhat.
The Linux community is a mix of people with the punk style mistrust of anything successful and people who acually want to see Linux distributions commercially successful so they can stop using fucking NT at work.
God dammit! The guy was a trustworty source, and that's what he said. If you have contradictory evidence, or have talked to someone like Bob Young or Paul V. about the early linux distros, then out with it. Or if you think the stuff this dude said Bob Young did were not bad things, then say that instead.
(And even if this were a troll, I've seen uglier ones! But I would like to know if what I was told was bullshit.)
Aha. How do we know that it wasn't like this:
1) the original post was sincere, and sharply
critical of Red Hat.
2) You did a good job of arguing your points,
but . . .
3) Some Red Hat employee/supported totally
defused the original post by MAKING IT SEEM
LIKE IT WAS A TROLL, and therefore not serious.
Thus, it is made to appear that the only
anti-red hat sentiment is (a) mostly overstated
(though I did think he/she had a point about
companies getting too big and scary--GPL won't
save us completely), and (b) just a kid's prank
anyway, to the extent there might have been
a kernel of truth in it.
Very clever, these Red Hat people. . . . Perhaps
too clever.
I'm not saying they did the "Troll Reveals Self"
post (how odd that a troll would stop at only 3?).
But I am saying that:
a) It's odd a troll would stop with three posts
b) I don't know Red Hat supports did NOT do this.
You should install rpm.
Sendmail, BIND, and Pine are all apps.
They can not infect other software.
Qt is a library. Red Hat does not ship libraries
that are restrictive.
The Qt decision is consistant with the libdb
decision. Red Hat ships an older BSD libdb
AFAIK, rather than a GPL or new (restricted)
BSD version. Red Hat clearly prefers the LGPL
for libraries, since it is fair to everyone.
The 2-clause BSD license is OK too.
Time for a new RH release because RedHat5.2 is aging. Of course, no new distro without a decent Desktop Environment (which has been "promised" by Mr. Young for a year now).
What a coincidence that Gnome1.0 is being released. Unfortunately, it is not as stable as you would expect of GNU software. This is very negative publicity for Linux , which is said to be
"far more stable then M$".
Why Gnome1.0 has been released too quickly ?
I didn't say anywhere that RH had an influence on the release Gnome1.0, but I tend to think so...
If so, commercial aspects have won over the quality of free software, and that concerns me...
Electric eyes looks good in snapshots. Actually
getting and using it is another matter. You have
to have gtk, imlib and gnome libraries installed
to even run this beast. So forget about getting
it if you are in a libc5 system.
{snicker}
"How DARE you tell me who bought me this beer!?!?"
I suppose you don't write free software. I do. I care about the right to fork development.
Without that right, OpenBSD would not exist.
Without that right, XEmacs would not exist.
Without that right, egcs would not exist.
The importance of the code-forking right must not be ignored. It is a critical part of normal free software.
Only an idiot would agree to follow a standard
that does not exist yet. Red Hat follows the
Linux filesystem standard better than most
Linux distributions, but they didn't agree to
do that before the standard existed.
The LSB might be good. Produce it! Until I see
the text, it is a bunch of hot air.
Being Vapor-compliant isn't useful.
you are the one still using FVWM or a buggy Gnome. I am using stable, easy to use, open-source software.
I think the reason for joining the LS* (be it B or G)is pretty straight forward.
As a consumer, I want to be able to know that when I buy Oracle 8x or Corel Draw, or whatever, that I am *NOT* locked into one particular release of Linux. The way things are headed right now pretty much dictate that.
How many new product releases have we heard about that support slackware or SuSE? (Aside from the obvious apps that ship with SuSE?)
No serious professional uses SUSE. Sure, a bunch of dorky students in LUGS install it, but they dont matter.
Serious, professional, users choose Red Hat. The use it because its better than anything else.
Period.
No serious professional uses SUSE. Sure, a bunch of dorky students in LUGS install it, but they dont matter.
Serious, professional, users choose Red Hat. They use it because its better than anything else.
Period.
What the hell are you talking about? How does
,why should RedHat care even if
this condradict my point? This only makes it
better for RedHat if they don't alienate Linus.
If they only alienate the hard core RMS
worshippers then the PHB's of the world will
probably take that as a sign in Red Hat's favor
and give them even more money.
So I ask again
there is a backlash? From the look of quite a few
of these posts there won't be a very big one
anyway.
Look, email Pat V., or find the old Slackware mailing list archives (if they're still around), either one of these would either verify what I was told.
As far as the libc thing, Slackware still carries libc instead of glibc.
Actually, yes, they can have a sort of "monopoly". Right now is a very touchy time for Linux distributions. They need to get their product to as many people as possible. When Joe Consumer goes to their favorite retail outlet, he'll see "RedHat" on the shelves instead of "Slackware" or any of the other distributions. Those that aren't backed by companies can't afford to pay for shelf space.
When you buy a computer with Linux pre-installed, which distribution will it be? The one that the consumer chooses, or the one that the company is willing to sell? How can a new distribution compete if the distribution channels are already locked down?
First of all, it wasn't released too quickly.
It is tradition to change the version numbers
in exactly the same way as GNOME did. The Linux
kernel did exactly the same thing in 1993.
Second of all, yes, somebody (Red Hat or Debian)
must ship a free desktop. It is very important
to provide an unquestionably free desktop NOW.
There is no time to waste. We have a parisitic
company to fight. If they get control of critical
libraries, Linux users will have lost their freedom.
OK. This speculation/cross speculation has
gone far enough. After some hacking, I'm
prepared to reveal the identity of the
original poster, and prove that he is in
fact, the same person who---
BANG!!!
Aaggnnnn........ (dies).
If you can't elaborate on why the title is accurate, then why is the body inaccurate? I'm curious to find evidence of this.
paranoia, paranoia, everybody's coming to get me...
You can maintain a CVS fork all you want.
You have a fork lodged in your brain.
The idea was for RedHat to contribute to make sure its not vapour, not the other way around.
Anyone out there prefer to use Linux cause of its unix-like features and they prefer that over the other choices? Too many of you seem to to just use Linux because it open source (so would you still use it if it sucked?). I use Linux cause it feeds my needs better, not because its open source (although, that is a cool benefit).
So a big 'smarten up' to you idiots who tell people to switch to Windows just because they don't care to much for open source. There are many other reasons to be using Linux/BSD in my opinion.
I prefer GNOME over KDE for a few reasons, but mostly because it is (and always has been) completely free, and has a few technical advantages, as well as more momentum. However, I'm also a bit worried that Red Hat has a bit too much control over it. I think that they're trying to rush GNOME out the door so that they can build a Red Hat 6 that integrates GNOME 1.0, kernel 2.2 and glibc 2.1 all at the same time.
I appreciate what Red Hat has done for the community, but I think that diversity creates more freedom than anything else, so I prefer Debian over Red Hat. (I also don't like way RPM works.) I've supported Red Hat by buying a retail copy of 5.2, but I don't want them to dominate the Linux industry. The fact is, I'd support any underdog distribution, as long as it is technically competetive.
I don't think Red Hat's motives are too bad, but I think that they need to watch out. All these companies supporting them are probably going to try to influence Red Hat into becoming more commercial.
Redhat only started using glibc with version 5.0.
On the other hand, RedHat CANNOT be Microsoft! Everything RedHat ever released is GPL.
;) I believe the argument about the code being GPL'd is irrelevant. Influence is all that really matters when it comes to monopoly powers. If everyone went thru RedHat for the software, it could be seen as monopolistic. This is regardless if the software could be obtained elsewhere or they are not even trying to become a monopoly.
Of course they can't, Microsoft is trademarked.
With all that said, I will state that I do not know if RedHat is or will be a monopoly in the future. I just wanted to point out that the GPL doesn't influence everything in the world. Even if all software was under the GPL, people would still be defenestrated.
One last thing: calm down.
Sean Farley
Trendy jeans come and go but the brands that stay are the brands that consistantly eliver. I see debian being around and doing well indefinately. Red Hat is doing well now, but eventually someone else will take their place as the trend of the month (or year or whatever).
That's 90% by gartner's stoopid scheme.
Gotta agree with everyone else here. The article called Redhat the only "Linux destributor" to ship for Alpha, and in particular they were talking about an investment from Compaq. Debian may be a distribution, but I don't know that you can call them a "distributor". And while you can donate hardware (Sun has, perhaps Compaq does as well), there's nothing there to invest in. About the closest you could come would be to hire a full-time Debian developer...
The only way that Linux will live in the boardrooms is if it is supported by the corporations.
Nobody buys NT because they want a lousy NOS, They do so because the corporate support is behind a recognized product.
Bravo to a Canadian done well as the RH chief.
I only hope that Intel kicks in a few bucks more.
Novell is still a smart partner, it actually works most times.
rrrooodddsttttaaaattllllrreeppoorrtt
Perhaps not the "result" of rpms, but proper packaging could have fixed it. Look at the Debian libs section, there are a dozen versions of libgtk there, both stable and unstable, and they all coexist quite nicely with each other. It's time to move some over to the oldlibs section though...
Red Hat, Debian, Caldera, and SuSE all have
normal UNIX-like init scripts. Slackware is
using some broken BSD thing.
Red Hat should not be expected to follow
a vapor standard.
Hey, I'm going to write a great standard.
Will you agree to follow it? You have to
agree now, before you see the results.
I agree. Most users care about the bottom line..ie
does the software actually work not "oh its not
free so I am not going to use it" Not to take
anything away from other distr but RH stuff works
really well for the most part. Its easier to install than solaris X86 thats for sure.
I ran a bbs years ago and one of my $members
(an older gentleman) turned me on to linux before
slackware ver 1.00 was out. And it worked ok from
what little I remember.
you damn worthless welfare queens! 'oh we need
linux free' blah blah blah, if you ever worked a day
in your worthless life instead of leeching off the
creation of the aryan race you wouldnt be such a bunch of lame ass whining
sissies! god damnit i didnt fight in vietnam to listen to a bunch of babies
cry about their stupid inability to get along in the world.
redhat is a bunch of flaming drag queen hippies,
i hope microsoft buys linux because then we can finally have a decent OS
and it will be rammed down your longhaired throat.
go whine to yer momma!
Most of all, that is not freedom at all. Why should I be forced to use CVS to pretend that I forked the tree? I don't want any need to reference some crummy old code.
I can't imagine OpenBSD being slave to NetBSD.
Open Source? Oh, I suppose. It barely scrapes by.
Some techies too. :/ Remember the announcement a few weeks ago about Creative Labs doing Linux drivers? Thier original announcement, looking for someone to hire, asked about which Linux version they should develop for. 5.2, or were enough people still using 4.x?
oh...redhat is evil.
/caldera is good ?
cause there are leader in dist
cause they support gpl/lgpl
cause they make rpm
cause they support gnome
cause they pay hackers to hack linux
cause they follow the standard
oh...then suse
they use yast (non gpl)
they use looking glass (non gpl, i think)
they support kde
they support qt(we will not gurantee we will not sue...)
they put many closed source stuff inside cd
Caldera is great. You don't have the media attention that Red Hat is getting, but you have NetWare for Linux.
My only complaint is the cost of upgrading from v1.2 to v1.3. I would prefer a price closer to $30. But that's just my preference.
Oh, and I'd REALLY like NDS ported to Linux NATIVELY. Along with the rights structure I get with Novell (multiple groups having differing rights to a directory and files within it).
And I'd like a pony, Santa.
:)
No KDE, no x11amp
RedHat has the share it does.
No kidding. Some of us value the freedom that got Linux to where it is today. I noticed Linux in 1993. Linux was crap back then, but we loved it anyway. Linux had freedom. Debian and Red Hat still give me that freedom.
Hey, anyone else remember using a Sun workstation to write Slackware floppies? How about using multiple Sun workstations to write floppies in parallel?
Minix suffered from a QPL-like restriction, and everybody hated it. There was a confusing mess of patches. Now we have our freedom with a GPL kernel called Linux.
Redhat did the right thing when they startded to help out the Gnome team. Gnome are going to be THE desktop of choice on Unixes in the future.
...)
...
Harmony was doomed to loose (remember Troll Tech treathed the harmony guys - "well maybe sue you when you are done whit the Harmony").
Gnome and GTK+ where the natural choice for a company that wants to work WITH the community not relaying on propetary software (which QT was then
Puuh
Youre right !
Im with you 100%
Myrridin
I recently worked on a product that included Red Hat with it. We wanted to use the name redhat on the box so we asked for permission. We got a contract from them. In addition to the standard mumbo jumbo, we werent' allowed to put any type of hat, of any color or shape on the box. They were worried about people getting confused with our package vs theirs.. They get alittle not-so-friendly when it comes to business dealings at times..
Hipp hipp hurra !!
... Nice install proggie, and then it stops - the dist is a sucker in my opinon.
...
:)
Finally someone thats understand,
REDHAT IS GOOD, they give a lot to the Linux community !
DEBIAN is GOOD, they are making a good distro all GPL (like redhat)
SUSE, well, it sucks
Mandrake - puuh
Easy Linux - puuh2
Redhat is the company that rellay helped putting Linux on the map - and they did it the RIGHT way.
All gpl, folloowing STANDARDS and are helping the community in many ways.
The, Gnome issue, well The Gnome team wanted to show their wonderful work at Linuxworld of course
(And gnome IS stable now - Gnome 1.02).
Myrridin
So much petty whining! There's some growing up that needs to occur for some people on this list.
It's time to douse with reality the leftist notions that many fresh-out-of-school types on this list have recently been conditioned to believe in at their beloved Alma Maters (or elementry/seconday schools).
Linux can become commercial without being spoiled - the license protects it from being compromised.
Keep the sharing of code concept, but also realise that you need money to pay the bills. What Redhat is doing is great and in sync with the pholosophy of the open-source movement.
Either Linux has some commercial success, and you'll be able to use Linux to earn money (because corporations want some sense of support - that's life) or it can be obscure, and you might get to tinker with it when you get home from work as a hobby (that's if you have the energy when you get home after after a long day of coding a bunch of boring windows crap).
What'll it be?
I will gladly watch Linux have some commercial success so my hobbie can also be my lively-hood.
Sometimes Linux software doesn't benefit the *BSD. When coders use things like:
:-(
#include
It's very bad for other Unix.
oops that was meant to say:
#include {linux/blah.h}
(./ strips the brackets)
Your use of "we" makes it sound like you represent Redhat. I don't believe you do, as Redhat cooperates directly with Debian developers on many compatibility issues, and wouldn't have the misconceptions you have.
_Probably_ others are too? fool.
Look, do you have any evidence to contradict what I said? Do you have a URL for the article you referenced? If so, I'd genuinely like to see them. If not, kindly fuck yourself.
GreyFauk (No... I can't remember my password, and the password e-mail service has been down lately)
I concur, however there's one technical inaccuracy in your comment:
tgz predates deb which predates rpm which predates slp...
deb was around in 94
rpp started in 95, and rpm started in 96
There was no need to reinvent a new package manager, dpkg/dselect was better at the time. Still is.
/* Anyone can make a pair of jeans. They're not frightfully hard to reverse-engineer, so people buy them based
on looks and by brand name.
Redhat may end up the "Levis" of Linux, but how many different profitalbe brands of jeans can you name? */
Actually, Levi-Strauss is in serious financial trouble. Loss of market share to numerous agressive small companies selling to GenXers has forced plant shutdowns and job losses.
Europe uses SuSe. Redhat is only big over here.
SuSe = German engineering.
yeh chris - how dare you try to help the linux community. you should be banished.
Face it, they need a bigger ad because not as many people know what Linux is. Everyone knows what Windows is. I'm a Linux advocate, but I just wish people would be realistic.
Ha! I think you've identified the anti-RedHat crowd exactly. They're wannabes who think that fighting with a badly managed distribution means they are more skilled as admins (thus the amazing popularity of Slackware). They are likely the same people who think "KDE sucks cos it looks too much like Windows" and "RedHat sucks cos they are just like Microsoft 'in the early days'". Who wants to bet not one of the self-proclaimed hackers (!) was even 5 years old in the early days of Microsoft.
bits are still broken (on RH5.2 OOTB)
You cant install the thing if you dont select a swap, what if Im sure i dont want one? Stupid RH.
Two, you cant have a swap larger than 127megs? why is that, if thats really a limit, why doesnt fdisk tell you? more bad code....
MORE: gcc linking C++ code fails with lots of
__throw undefined errors. I gave up and just used
the egcs that came with it and it worked fine.
MORE: its GUI background config program cant accept file names with spaces in it for a background, but its preview window will. You need
a "file\ file.xpm" , this is bad code practice, it should be smarter, whats a few lines of C
The RH cd itself should have an automatic SETUP.EXE on it for windows machines, that will run loadlin and use an image directof CD or something. Reading docs and doing a rawrite is easy, but still NOT automatic, OneClick action.
-CB
In retrospect I think we should be lucky that Redhat has appealed to standards and the Linux community to the degree it has. Sure, in its appeal to be all things to all people it may alienate the RMS's of the world, as well as the Microsoft Clones of the world. But those are extreme cases. Despite my doubts about purely technical aspects of the Redhat distribution, I feel compelled to make it clear that Redhat doesn't have to be as close to the Linux community as it is. As long as it can market the work of others, it can be successful, and screw the Linux community as a whole for the larger market share of the majority. And, if you note, the scary situation of the past sentence is exactly what Microsoft does. People who accuse Redhat of being the Microsofts of the Linux world -- It's only when they alienate developers and use only their well paid staff to steal the work of the Debian people (for example) and tack on proprietary standards that they become Microsofts.
Last I heard, all of the Redhat specific stuff is fairly open and GPL in and of itself. rpm, for instance, is a package on the BSD ports tree (rpm really is just a kludge of cpio). Knock Redhat for its technical merits and the like, but it can make more money than it does appealing to people who are not you , using your work! . That is a Bad Thing(tm). And it hasn't happened.
Not in australia where these imported levis cost $120AUD, forget that, we got our own aussie stores with as good as quality jeans for $39 to $59 range, why feed those fat americans with all the profits? They cant even import the damn things and sell at decent prices... just like DocMartens which are $150 to $300 here
Agreed, but it is still portable ..
As far as the libc thing, Slackware still carries libc instead of glibc.
Because it is ancient!
a guy like this is all the reason i need to be against RH.
suggestions? how about get rid of the damn RPM?
seriously stupid professional who don't care about spending and profits would use NT, and buy whatever they want when something cannot be solved.
stupid ass NT ppl why don't you step aside shut up bitch
SUSE is much much better,
serious admin use slackware, dude, don't be stupid.
Thanks :)
I was getting a tad bored reading through all these comments, yours was a breathe of fresh air.
They killed Kenny!
wahahahahahahahahah !!!
I fucked myself, and it was a good lay.
I believe what you say; someone else did tell you all that shit. They are yanking your third leg. You're anonymous, and your credible source is too... In legal terms, you got no case.
Did you hear the one about the exploding cactus?
- The last honest Anonymous Coward
Which parasitic company ?
If you mean TT : the new QPL1.0-license is Open Source. So they do control as much as RedHat controls. The goal of BOTH is to make money.By the way, I prefer that a number of smaller companies can live of Linux and OSS, than one
single company becoming a major player in Linuxland. That is exactly wat is happening... the goal of RH is to make $$$ !! This is of course their right, but don't take the right away from other companies (not only TT).
It's really funny to see that some of the so ultra-liberal Americans become software communists. I don't mean anything bad with that, but I think that the "best" solution is between closed source software and completely GPLed software... That's why OSS makes more sense to me than GPLed software ! Personal taste of course.
Actually, slackware ships with both - libc as it's default, and libc-2 installed so we can run all your other glibc-2 compiled programs...
Win - win - I can't loose!
a.
uh
Sorry about the hostility of that post -- flame wars get to me after a while. And the libc stuff does contradict what I was told (unless I am misremembering it). Again, do you have a URL for that PV interview?
I guess the guy may well have been yanking my chain on this. Normally I would take that kind of dirt-dishing with a grain of salt, but the guy I talked to was about as authoratative as they come in the Slackware camp. Jeez, I wish there were some mailing list archives somewhere.
>the fact is, redhat doesn't need the Linux "community" at all.
In short term, I agree, but to do so would be very short-sighted and suicidal. If they (Red Hat) did "go proprietary", I think they would be abandoned by the heavyweights faster than by the geeks. IBM for instance can make serious money from Linux with Red Hat being only a drain on finances. How? Big Iron. Supported. Bugs squashed by the free-loading hackers. $100,000 Linus installation (from $1.98 Cheapbytes CDs). Free != cheap.
Amen to already established standards, they are they are the most important.
Ask someone smarter than you for a dictionary and look up the word "pedantic"! There may well be a picture of you there...
Read:
sell=distro charge
Doesn't Red Hat now charge $50 or so for their still freely downloadable Distro...
Is it just me, or does anyone else out there think it's sad that commercialism is tearing apart the once unified Linux community?
I remember a time not so long ago that Linux users - regardless of which distro they used, were a proudly defiant, single unified voice against the commercialisation and capitalism that was raping users and holding back the IT industry! Linus must be turning over in his grave, and the poor guy isn't even dead!(Ford Fairlane,1990).
Each distro has it's own pro's and con's, but what frightens me is that I can see these being overshadowed by marketing hype, sound familiar to anyone?
I truly applaud the guys at Red Hat for their aggressive marketing and business accumen, they are geniuses, they have chosen a ripe market and are milking it brilliantly. I just hope that it will not be to the detriment of the wider Linux community.
Psychologists say that people who identify deficiencies in someone else's behavior are, in reality, unhappy with those same deficiencies in themselves. They point out the problem so as to detract attention from the way they behave hoping to blow a smoke screen to their own wretched behavior. Since you mentioned someone being a "Queen" twice in your diatribe I would have to say you might be harboring some latent homosexual tendencies. Not to mention a lot of anger, probably built up from all those years pent up in that confined closet you have hidden your sexuality in. You even go so far as to say that the people in the list have a problem with their "stupid inability to get along in the world" when it seems that YOU are the person who has the true problem "getting along in the world" You appear to be fixated with living in the past and it appears from you mentioning your pining for "Hippies" , "longhaired" people and Vietnam. Get a life dude. Hippies and Vietnam are over and hopefully the Linux movement and FREE Open Source software will relegate yourself and Bill Gates to the distant corners of history where you belong.
I'm not one of the "anti-Redhat types", so I can only guess as to what motivates them, but based on most of their posts, I'd say it comes down to this:
KDE vs. GNOME.
Most of the kids who bash RedHat are still angry over their initial refusal to ship KDE (even though it's been patiently, repeatedly explained to them why doing so would be illegal). As supporters of KDE, they want to see KDE become the standard desktop, and fear that if the biggest distro doesn't include it then it will lose out to the GNOME project (and they might be right).
For this reason, the KDE zealots will find any excuse for bashing Red Hat, in the hope that it will somehow help one of the KDE-friendly distros (Caldera, SuSE) to win. At the very least, their spiteful attacks allow them to vent their frustration, as momentum gradually shifts to the Gnome desktop.
It's just sour grapes, is all.
I agree that redhat is more free than some of the others. But redhat does ship non-free stuff on their cds. Netscape comes to mind. So debian is and probably always will be the most-free distribution there is. The Social Contract gaurantees that.
Uhh, I'm sorry, you mistakenly thought I cared. The point is, it is not "free" so therefore debian is more free than redhat.
Actually, for a troll it was better than average. The responses had at least some thought put into them.
And no, I don't consider myself a sucker for replying to a Troll. My posts are more to get my viewpoint out there, either directly or in response to an opposing viewpoint. The troll's viewpoint here was one that is common enough that I thought it should be rebutted regardless of whether or not it was the person's real opinion. It all goes to show that, even if you think you're playing petty games, there's a valid place for some trolls.
----
Open mind, insert foot.
Ignore it people...remember that this is a community, and anyone who recieves benefits, also benefits the community. As long as Red Hat stays a member of the Linux Community, we all benefit!
ttyl
Farrell
CAN-CON 2019 - Ottawa's only book oriented Science Fiction Convention! October 18-20, Sheraton Hotel, Ottawa, Canada h
Personally, I don't think you talked to anyone. You read an interview with Patrick Volkerding, in which he stated that there was omce an agreement with SuSE that would prevent them from selling in the U.S.
I've been thinking about writing an open letter to Red Hat containing constructive criticism about its practices, business dealings etc. (Disclaimer: I use Red Hat, and I like it, but there are a few concerns I and many other users have) Anyone with any input (URLs of other letters, for example) feel free to email me (will try to respond, but have been occupied lately--no guarantee. Credit will be given if quoted).
Netscape is free as in beer, not speech (and it was one of the first "commercial" software to run in Linux).
I hope you know that Slackware is a commercial distribution (like Red Hat, unlike Debian).
They're nothing but a bunch of sellouts. Here in North Carolina, everybody who wants to be cool talks about how they're so into redhat. It's disgusting.
The UNC computer science club toured their building a couple of weeks ago and it was the worst tour in the galaxy!! They had some former airforce cowboy lead us around, showing us empty cubes and let us watch a bunch of software developers play video games for 10 minutes. When we asked for some of their free software, they told us to go to the store and buy it! And one of our guys just happened to be wearing a faded red cap (which has been around longer than that lousy company), and that cowboy insulted him, trying to pawn off some really cheap, scsi blazing-red baseball cap on him.
I've only been using linux for about a year now, and setting up and administering slackware 3.6 by hand was tons more fun and informative than setting up a red hat box.
And RedHat SparcLinux especially sucks!
Posted by stu vanderhoffenstoffen:
Coward, if it weren't for Slackware, there'd be no RedHat. Slackware is old, but I'd take it over selling out to RedHat any day. Have a little respect for the original innovators.
Posted by stu vanderhoffenstoffen:
And you're just an anonymous coward. I know about SLS. I also know that Slackware is what originally brought Linux to the masses. And that's a good thing. What's bad is when self-righteous cowards like yourself decide to insult the very people you want learning about Linux (Linux, not RedHat, Linux).
And while I may not be a math major, I do know that if SLS was ripped off by Slackware, and Slackware was ripped off by RedHat, then RedHat is no better a distribution than Slackware. So get off your high horse and lick me.
Posted by stu vanderhoffenstoffen:
You missed my point. The tour is indicative of how RedHat treats the people who actually use their software. They'll suckle Netscape's and Oracle's teets and roll out the red carpet to get money and corporate prestige, but when faced with a bunch of college kids with no money but an earnest love for computing, they show us where the documentation people sit, where the gnome people sit, give us the honor to watch that rasterman dude play video games, and then boot us right out of the office after 20 minutes. And I'm not going to even talk about the effort that went into getting the tour in the first place. They won't send someone to come speak at our meetings, but they'll send someone to the local LUG meeting the next night. And they put off the tour for an entire semester!
I'm sorry, but I was under the impression that it was the users who counted, not the big bad corporations. To hell with all this corporate acceptance bullshit. Why must Linux be validated on whether or not it's helping IBM exploit users?
There's always going to be turncoats who deride their once-favorite indie band that signs on with a major label. Debian & slackware will be the cool distros, and the tragically-hip can always roll their own, riding the unstable branch of whatever packages they care to, on top of freebsd even (if linux is just too mainstream for their tastes). World domination is still inevitable. ;-)
The "cue the foo posts in 3, 2, 1..." posts will commence with no subsequent foo posts in 3, 2, 1...
I've heard the same rumblings here at /., but I have taken it to be a handful of anonymous trolls trying to start a flamewar. (Red Hat's GPL'd contributions to the source-pool are "proprietary"!? These trolls know not of what they speak, obviously.) True: if I were a Gartner Groupie hanging out on slashdot, I'd have written the same article, but that's only because if I were a Gartner Groupie I wouldn't have the sense to tell the difference between the pulse of the community and a few saber-rattling flame-mongers.
The "cue the foo posts in 3, 2, 1..." posts will commence with no subsequent foo posts in 3, 2, 1...
Red Hat is still favorite distro but one major
annoyance is that Red Hat sticks things in odd
directories -- they seem to totally ignore the
/usr/local directory and stick everything in
/usr instead.
Another RedHat-ism is this linuxconf tool --
I don't like the smell of it, so I disabled
it on all my boxes.
I hope Red Hat doesn't try to bully new "standards"
on Linux.
but it must really suck to be Caldera right now... :-|
TedC
Well, it's not that you have a bad distro, it's that people are showing a strong tendency to 'follow the herd', and Red Hat is getting most of the media attention. As Bob Young would say, they're good at marketing catsup. :-)
I happen to use OpenLinux as my main distro simply because it's stable and it came with KDE. I also use Red Hat 5.2, and I'm evaluating SuSE 6.0. I was disappointed with the 60 page getting started guide that came with 1.3; hopefully 2.0 will include a more extensive manual, and more than 30 days of installation support. I tentatively plan to buy OpenLinux 2.0 to get the 2.2 kernel and KDE 1.1.
I don't have any real complaints with Red Hat; they have a good product and market it well. But I am concerned that the LSB is going to get run over in this sudden Red Hat lovefest.
TedC
I use RH, and I recommend it to anyone who wants to see what Linux is about. It's a way in for newbies - fella at work installed 5.0 last night on his 98 machine (dual-boot), and was excited as hell about it. Thing is, once anyone who is using RH starts playing around and then participates in the community, he/she/it will realize there are always more choices. Don't like RH, roll yr own! Try Suse, Debian, Slack, Mandrake, Caldera, PacHiTech, Trinux, MkLinux, LinuxPPC, did I leave anyone out? Is Yggdrasil still around? Anyway, RH is leading the way for the exposure of Linux to alot of folks. Get 'em in the door; that's the first step. Once inside, they can figure out what's best for thier uses - this includes corps w/ IT depts that are slow to move. Hell, once folks realize they have control over their boxen, they might even realize that they are basically smart people who can figure things out for themselves - unlike what a certain large-but-unnamed-here company on the west coast would have them believe.
"shop smart:shop s-mart" ash
Michael Johnson, a Red Hat developer, came and gave a speech to my LUG as soon as Red Hat heard about us -- one of their marketing people, Lisa, apparently searches the LUG databases and contacts their founders. Well, she wrote me, said she and Michael were coming to Minneapolis, and would we like to hear him give a talk? And what's your address so we can send you 100 free Power Tools CD sets?
In his talk, Michael stressed numerous times that everything coded at Red Hat is released under the GPL, and that they are committed to free software. Red Hat Linux is a quality product that is free-as-in-speech. That's all that matters, and I wish them well.
And the Power Tools CDs? Into the hands of more than a few people who had never heard of Linux before. I defy any of you to say that introducing people to free software is a bad thing.
Infact I've been witness to it already, and am part of it. I began with Slackware, then switched to RH and used it for a considerable amount of time, but now I'm moving to Stampede. Other than RPM being a terrible package format, my primary reasons are that it feels like RH is getting branded with Linux. They can make all the money they want, but these days it seems like I can't visit a Linux/OSS related site without being hit by several mentions of the company (not to mention VA Research banners being everywhere as well, which I'm also quite sick of. Every site is hosted by VAR now.)
Every GNU/Linux "review" now is really just a review of what RH has done lately, and how it compares to NT this week. Maybe if you're lucky you'll see SuSE or Debian mentioned, or a reference to slackware being "the true hacker's" distribution, but that's rare. They're definitely starting to alienate people, and they better start paying attention to that, otherwise they *will* be the next slackware.
Apparently lots of people are misunderstanding what debian is all about. It's not about only GPL, it's about DFSG free software (In other words, the stuff that gets OpenSource [tm] branding).
... I've been using Linux for 3 years, so I guess I would be old, or at least middle aged. I don't find GUI all-in-one-place config tools to make things any easier, though. If I'm doing system administration remotely (which is usually), those are a distinct hinderance. I forward the notion that debian makes it easier for those 'old' users, by providing a well-tested stable distribution, by setting up sane defaults (rotating log files nightly, for instance), by gearing itself toward administration-from-anywhere, and by providing an all-encompassing upgrade between distributions.
... Part of it stems from each package being responsible for any special cases that might occur between releases, and part from the fact that there *are* so many packages, that everything most people would have installed is packaged. And, the only time I've needed a reboot as part of an upgrade was when the utmp format changed between libc5 and libc6 in the Debian 1.3 -> 2.0 upgrade.
And, wrt to 'ease', I saw someone mention SuSE as making things easier for the 'old user'
So far, nothing else I've seen has been as easily upgradable as debian
To put my comments in perspective, I've used Slackware and Redhat, and still use Debian, FreeBSD, OpenBSD and Solaris.
Mail might otherwise go in /var/spool/mail
or directly to the user's home directory.
I find that hard to believe... were you born with all the knowledge you have now?
Bob Young owned a bookstore, and was on the Slackware mailing list. At some point he bought a CD burner, started selling slackware disks at a cheaper price, and spammed everyone on the Slackware list about it. He then included glibc as a way to make other distros incompatible.
(btw, I learned the info in the first paragraph of this post from someone closely involved in Slackware whom I met at LinuxWorld; any innacuracies are my fault.)
Uh huh. Tell me another one. I'm sorry, but I've been in the Linux community for a very long time (since Slackware 1.0 in fall of '93), and I remember nothing of the sort.
Red Hat's been its own distribution as long as it's been around; it was never based on Slackware. (Anybody else remember *.rpp files?) Red Hat's package management scheme has always been better than the rather lame way Slackware handles things. The glibc claim is ludicrous, given that that's the direction the libc architects (including H.J. Lu) are encouraging people to go.
Your acquaintance may be horribly misremembering how Slackware got started. Slackware was originally a set of patches for the SLS distribution, which was the very first commercial Linux distro on floppy and CDROM ('92-'93). Everything in SLS was freely available, but the media was extremely pricey, even for the time. Pat Volkerding made Slackware originally as a patched version of SLS, but then the SLS guy (whose name escapes me) threatened to sue Pat for using the SLS install scripts, which the SLS guy saw as his proprietary property. This was widely seen (or at least seen by me) as an attempt to keep Slackware from cutting into SLS sales, but it failed miserably. Pat wrote his own install scripts and SLS died a slow death over the following year or so. By mid-'94, Slackware was in the position that Red Hat is in now in terms of percentage mindshare.
Care to name your source? Didn't think so.
"My life's work has been to prompt others... and be forgotten." --Cyrano de Bergerac
Look, email Pat V., or find the old Slackware mailing list archives (if they're still around), either one of these would either verify what I was told.
You made the claim. It's your responsibility to back it up.
I was there, and I remember nothing of the sort. Slackware doesn't maintain any sort of mail archive that I can find. A Deja News power search for "bob young slackware" in comp.os.linux.* over 1/1/1994 - 1/1/1996 confirms my memory, as it turns up zero hits.
As far as the libc thing, Slackware still carries libc instead of glibc.
So? This proves what, other than the fact that Slackware's libc is horribly dated, not thread-safe, and no longer maintained by the libc developers? Debian ships with glibc too, ya know.
"My life's work has been to prompt others... and be forgotten." --Cyrano de Bergerac
Chris DiBona
VA Research Linux Outreach Guy
--
Grant Chair, Linux Int.
VP, SVLUG
Co-Editor, Open Sources
Open Source Program Manager, Google, Inc.
Humm, I use ee on my Debian 1.3 system. Guess I am just special.
/mill
Red Hat's rise to Linux power is a perfect example of modern day Darwinian Selection. Eventually one
distribution *has* to win. Just as Microsoft Windows won the DOS/OS2/Mac/Amiga race of the
80's/90's, Red Hat is winning the Linux race of today. One team comes up with a solution that's better
than the rest, and then everyone start standardizing on them, and then anyone who doesn't is left up the
creek without a paddle. Is this a bad thing?
Yes. I don't want to be forced to use something that I consider to be technically inferior. If Red Hat abuses its power (which it hasn't yet) we could very well see other distros being forced to adopt their way of doing things. I already have enough trouble with stuff that's only distributed in RPM form (alien helps, but it can only do so much)
Daniel
Hurry up and jump on the individualist bandwagon!
Debian uses glibc. :-)
Daniel
[ neither Gnome nor KDE is the 'official' Debian 'desktop environment' AFAIK. I suspect Potato will have a choice between them in installation if a kosher version of Qt is released by then. But what do I know..? ]
Hurry up and jump on the individualist bandwagon!
Personally, I love all the distributions. I myself chose Debian, and I'm planning on sending them a big fat donation in SCSI adapters and cash. However, I think the Linux movement is the coolest thing to happen in the computer industry since porn. Anyone who is contribution in any way, however minor, is my friend. Red Hat hasn't bitten us yet, so let's give them the benefit of the doubt. If they betray the community, well, we have ways of dealing with traitors. If they don't, then we haven't alienated anyone now have we?
--Defiler.
Wait a second, on all my RedHat 5.1 and 5.2 boxes it _is_ /var/spool/mail . In fact, I think it has been since 4.0 (I would have to check to find out).
If there is one thing that ticks me off about KDE, it is the Harmony project. Geez, you would think that after all this time the Free Software Community would get it through their heads that they needed a widget set of their own. The Harmony Project will almost assuredly end up like Lesstif perpetually close but not done. GTK, on the other hand, is clearly Free Software. It can't be co-opted, embraced and extended, and it doesn't have to spend eternity trying to mimic some other toolkit's bugs.
This is not to say that KDE isn't good software. I was impressed, and I am sure that Harmony has some talented people working on it as well. It just pains me to see talent being wasted on a toolkit when it could just as easily be used on a widget set that it already free software. The fact of the matter is that GTK development (and Gnome development as well) is moving along at a frightening pace. Troll Tech had better look lively if they don't want to get completely outmaneuvered.
In the world of computers (especially in Unix) the most open standards tend to win out, and there is no more open standard than GTK.
--
As far as I can see, Red Hat has always been a Pro Linux anti-proprietary type of company. As long as whatever they produce is still GPL people will back them. OF COURSE this could be a low power scare tactic for suits. (beware!)
... Help Them!
Don't shun Red Hat
Have any suggestions on how they could make Linux better, easier, cooler? Write them!
Linux is only free if your time has no value. Windows is only free if you threaten to use Linux.
The others are full of proprietary crap, including shareware and half-assed Open Source. If you want to write an open letter of complaint, try SuSE, Slackware, EasyLinux, or Mandrake. All of those are far worse behaved than Red Hat is.
Disclaimer: I may be considered a bit biased. But whatever.
Explain thyself? How is Slackware, for instance, worse than a distro (Red Hat) that renames their libraries and kernels so that they appear to be full releases when in actuality they're pre-releases? How is it worse than a distro whose install often ignores the user's wishes, and which actively presents and promotes itself as the Linux? How is it worse than a distro that is far, far more marketing and hype than QA and careful testing?
This is a wee bit inaccurate, save for the title.
And no, I do not care to elaborate.
Apache, like pretty much everything else in Slackware, is installed according to the author's defaults.
The problem with this is mainly on the corporate side. As companies begin to develop on and invest in Linux, it becomes increasingly important to ensure that a distribution does not grab all the support and run away with it. Think about it: for many people, the sole reason for not running Linux right now is that certain programs are not supported. Now suppose the current trend of "Red Hat as corporate Linux" continues, accelerated by their presence in the corporate world and the support of commercial software companies. Now suppose they decide to rename some pre-release library, and badness ensues. Do people say "Red Hat fooked up on me?" or do they say "Linux fooked up on me?"
Maybe it sounds paranoid, but then again maybe it deserves some consideration. Because the first half of that scenario is already occurring, and the second half (based on observations of Red Hat's past behavior) seems not at all unlikely.
Slackware, besides being obsolete shit, is not completely free software. Worse yet, there are no plans to change this. Slackware does nothing to help develop Linux. Slackware is a parasite.
What in Slackware is not "completely free"? Patrick Volkerding himself has written a fair amount of Linux software, some of it without credit, and provided us with a traditional unix-like distribution at the same time. How can you say Slackware contributes nothing?
Kernels must be renamed because some of the tools can't tell them apart otherwise. I think the modules stuff has problems.
Kernel packages do not need to be renamed, under any circumstances. I am not talking about your vmlinuz image, I'm talking about the actual package it originally comes in. If you download and install a tarball named 2.2.3, it damn well should be a 2.2.3 kernel, and not a 2.2.3-pre2 or some such thing. (Note: this is an example. I am not accusing Red Hat of distributing 2.2.3-pre2 and passing it off as 2.2.3, specifically.) Such practices have also been noted in the realm of libraries.
Marketing is good. Excessive QA lets the software get obsolete. Red Hat generally ships with the most recent kernel they can find, and then some.
Marketing is all well and good, yes. But your point about "excessive QA" puzzles me. You would rather have a system slapped together the day before yesterday from whatever was lying around than one that was put together and tested over a period of the last couple of months? There's a reason it's called "bleeding edge."
You've made an unsafe assumption when you say that applications will "of course" run on all distributions. This is not so. Because Red Hat is sometimes a bit funky with the placement of directories, any application which hard-codes a filesystem structure may only work on Red Hat. Of course, applications shouldn't do that, but they do and they will continue to do so for some time.
The single biggest problem with the dominance and commercial acceptance of Red Hat is that support deals are only being announced for Red Hat installations. There may be exceptions, but in most cases these new support contracts don't cover Debian at all, so from that point of view Red Hat will become the de facto Linux standard.
Whilst I wish Red Hat all the luck in the world, and acknowledge that they've done a huge amount for the Linux scene, this recent turn of events is dangerous.
Reminds me of the type of economy that exists with the cigarette makers (I wish my friend who told me about this had remembered what it's called): Many vendors competing, not on price or features, but mostly on "imaginary differences in quality."
Of course I won't say the differences between, say, Redhat and Debian, are imaginary, like say the difference between Marlboro and Camel (if that were the case, I wouldn't have recently switched from RedHat to Debian on both of my boxes), but from the average corporation (or even software developer) point of view, all of your software should work on any distro anyway, so they might as well be imaginary differences.
Don't worry if RedHat becomes the preferred distro of PHB's, you'll always be free to choose what works for you.
-Jake
--
Jake
As long as Red Hat uses their power for good, I don't begrudge them their success.
IIRC, redhat can be credited for:
The first Alpha distrubution (no longer the only one)
Championing E and Gnome (And employing Carsten the Rasterman)
RPM (though I like dpkg and apt better)
Kind of a swank set of installation systems that have been adopted by several other distro's.
Once they stop creating and start leeching, then I will have good cause to hate them.
--
As long as each individual is facing the TV tube alone, formal freedom poses no threat to privilege.
"Reactionaries must be deprived of the right to voice their opinions; only the people have that right." - Mao
Anyone can make a pair of jeans. They're not frightfully hard to reverse-engineer, so people buy them based on looks and by brand name.
Redhat may end up the "Levis" of Linux, but how many different profitalbe brands of jeans can you name?
--
As long as each individual is facing the TV tube alone, formal freedom poses no threat to privilege.
"Reactionaries must be deprived of the right to voice their opinions; only the people have that right." - Mao
i also have beefs with redhat's installation procedures and also alot of the defaults suck but i still think they're good for the linux "industry". i think they will be the "for dummies" version of linux while people like us move to suse, debian, stampede or tom's.
"The lie, Mr. Mulder, is most convincingly hidden between two truths."
--
And Justice for None
Red Hat's IS.
I am not merely a "consumer" or a "taxpayer". I am a Citizen of the State of Texas
>They're nothing but a bunch of sellouts.
Making $$==selling out? If you've ever written code for money, then I guess you sold out too. If you haven't, then maybe no one would hire you?
>Here in North Carolina, everybody who wants
>to be cool talks about how they're so into >redhat. It's disgusting.
So being popular means it "sucks". By that logic, you yourself are either "popular and suck", or are "unpopular and don't suck". Wonder which it is.
> The UNC computer science club toured their
> building a couple of weeks ago a
> was the worst tour in the galaxy!!
Well hell! I would NEVER use a product from a company that gives BAD TOURS!!
> I've only been using linux for about a year now,
> and setting up and administering
> slackware 3.6 by hand was tons more fun and
> informative than setting up a red hat box.
I think thats great that you use and enjoy slackware. I did at one time too. Please don't dog on us who use red hat now, though. To each their own, I say.
- They don't GPL or LGPL everything they write
[...] Only Debian has a perfect record.You sound like a case of "more catholic than the pope".
Perhaps you should read the Debian Social Contract and the Debian Free Software Guidelines it contains.
There are more free licenses than GPL and LGPL. (And if you refer to e.g. BSD-licensed code as "half-assed Open Source", you should include LGPL in that as it could encourage development of non-GPL-ed software).
In my book, there are valid reasons to use a different DFSG-free license than (L)GPL:
I happily put changes I made to public domain crypto code in the public domain and happily used the BSD license for a manpage I contributed to a BSD-licensed project, because that was the way in which I could improve that free software (more so than GPL-ing my modifications, and cutting them of from many in the development community involved. I used the FSF documentation notice (which is not GPL) for manpages I contributed to a GPLed project.
I use (L)GPL on new code I write myself, as I don't want to encourage proprietary software development too much.
I believe in respecting the license an author chooses for her code. When I believe an author should have chosen another license (e.g. because of lack of sufficient understanding of licensing issues (as is often the case with "non-commercial use only" licenses)), I don't think she should die, I try to reason with her.
If you don't like the license an author chose for his code, reason with him. It's going to get you much further than telling them to die. And if he doesn't change the license, you still have the freedom not to use his code.
The only other distribution that is as free as Red Hat, Debian, is unable to really support Linux.
Would you care to explain what you mean by "support Linux"?
If you're referring to support Linux users, I'd strongly suggest you check out Debian's support options. If you're referring to having an unsurpressable urge to pay for support, check out the Debian consultants page.
If you're referring to supporting the development of Linux, I'd ask you to reflect on what a fellow Debian developer said: Debian supports free software development the old-fashioned way, by writing it. And of course there's the license lobbying/politics that got ncftp free, got Rocks'n'Diamonds free etc. And let's not forget
where the first donation to GNOME development came from.
QPL 1.0, the license under which Troll Tech will release Qt Free Edition 2.0, is a DFSG-free license.
But the problem with KDE's licensing is more subtle than that. Debian can't at the moment distribute KDE at all (not even as part of "contrib"), because Qt's license isn't GPL-compatible. (See the news item for details)
Even when we have a DFSG-free Qt, there is still the issue whether its license is GPL-compatible. If it is (I haven't seen an analysis of QPL 1.0's GPL-compatibility status, so I really don't know), KDE can be included in Debian's main. If it isn't, the licensing issue continues until KDE's licensing changes (e.g. by an explicit exception clause to the GPL allowing redistribution of KDE binaries linked against a QPLed Qt [1]), or the QPL is made GPL-compatible.
[1] A similar exception clause for non-free Qt would have made KDE suitable for contrib. Unfortunately, the KDE project refused to take the licensing issue seriously, and did not chose to fix it this way, unlike for instance the LyX developers. With LyX, there was a similar situation of GPL-ed software linked against a GPL-incompatibly licensed (binary-only non-system) library (xforms). The LyX developers explicitly added an exception to the GPL's requirements wrt. libraries, making it possible for Debian to distribute it in "contrib".
I can't speak for all of us, but in my case, I'd strongly doubt I'd have learned anywhere near as much about UN*X systems and free software development if I hadn't become involved in Debian development.
Cosider Alan Cox. He would have to work at a normal place if Red Hat didn't support him. His free time to hack would be more limited. Were he with Debian, he could only do half as much as he does now.
Being employed by a Linux distributor that's dedicated to free software is hardly the only way to spend a large amount of your work time developing free software. Consider Linus' position at TransMeta, independent free software consultants like Jim Pick, people working for companies like Cygnus, Cyclic and Signum, sysadmins and programmers in certain university and ISP environments etc.
Working for a commercial Linux distributor is but one way to pay a free software developer's bills.
Discussing the differences between distributions is difficult enough, without getting into which is better (or even if "better" means something in general).
In any case, if you're genuinely interested, there's a lot of material from debian users' perspective(s) in one of this months threads on the debian-user@lists.debian.org mailing list; see the archives.
Debian's dedication to free software, the openness of it's development model, the responsiveness of the developers, the flexibility of the package management system, the stability and integratedness of releases, the finishing touches (automatic menu updates for all window managers, automatic mailcap updates, handling of the slight incompatibilities between some Athena-using binaries and the various enhanced Athena libraries (e.g. neXtaw) through xaw-wrappers) etc. are what make it the right distribution for me to use and to work on, but choice of distribution is a case of YMMV.
Debian 2.1 ships GNOME (albeit a prerelease, as there was no release available before the start of the code freeze); Red Hat does so too (GNOME is in RH 5.2, right?).
It is very important to provide an unquestionably free desktop NOW. There is no time to waste. We have a parisitic company to fight. If they get control of critical libraries, Linux users will have lost their freedom.
I've been critical of Troll in the past, and I've been extremely annoyed by their dismissal of the importance of freedom. But since then, Troll have made what I think is a sincere effort at improvement in this area. They've worked on a DFSG-free license to be used for the forthcoming Qt 2.0, the QPL 1.0, and they've been quite responsive with regard to the input they've received from Debian's Joseph Carter.
Whatever Troll's failings in the past, in my opinion they deserve at least the benefit of the doubt for this change.
Let's worry over the remaining issue wrt KDE: is QPL 1.0 GPL-compatible, and if not, how do we get KDE to take licensing issues seriously, and get them to put in an exemption clause in their license to allow binaries of their code linked against Qt 2 to be redistributed (similar to how the LyX folks fixed the LyX license.
Do you tell an artist who has spent months of his or her life engaged in the creation of a work of art that he cannot sell his work to a museum without losing the artistic dignity and pride? Certainly not. The artist is offering a valuable service to the community by creating beauty and enlightenment through hours of hard work. As long as the money does not dictate the art, then the artistic integrity is maintained.
And so with RedHat. While what they do is not necessarily art, there is still the respect of the community at stake in this discussion. While they may not have completely designed and coded Linux, they do a valuable service to the community by promoting, supporting, and distributing Linux, and if they can get paid for it, more power to them. As long as they don't attempt to change Linux in an attempt to take control of it, or in any other way violate the agreements which our community is founded around, then they are right to make a living selling Linux.
Listen, as a developer in an ever changing software world, I am glad to see that the open source community has a place for people like me to survive. I don't want to have to develop Windows software to do what I love- and I don't want to do what I love for free! I have to pay my rent and so do the people at RedHat. If there is such a problem, then don't buy RedHat. If Caldera is struggling because of RedHat's support, then Caldera needs to get on the ball and get some support of it's own.
Just make sure that RedHat doesn't get like Microsoft (especially with licensing deals). Other than that- leave them alone!
Bruce
Bruce Perens.
Sweeping comments like that don't alienate me from Red Hat... Just the Gartner Group.
Sorry no dice, success dosn't automaticly make someone suck.
Novel theory: Modern Man evolved from psychopath
The Debian project is part of the Software in the Public Interest (SPI). SPI participates in several projects including:
Berlin
Debian
GNOME
LSB
Open Source
Open Hardware
These volunteers are supporting Linux and related software by donating the time to organizing projects to write software and writing said software.
Have you ever heard the saying, "Time is Money". You don't think all the time these people have spent in contributing time counts for nothing, do you?
Please think before you type.
Troy
Would some of the anti-Redhat types please explain your concerns? As I see it, a product that by legal license cannot be owned by Redhat is in no danger of being co-opted by them. It can't be embraced and extended, patented, claimed to be theirs, etc. All they can do is package a version, support it and make the source of that version freely available. Is this about dislike of corporate power in general (certainly understandable, given history), or is there some more direct reason for worry?
Kythe
(Remove "x"'s from
Kythe
Sooner or later, the IT industry will realize that this firm produces more fluff than anything else. Take a look at their stock and earnings the past two years? You get the picture. They are a bloated and arrogant organization and rarely publish anything of deep substance. They are still regarded as tops in the industry, but (hopefully) that will change. As in most IT consulting firms (I work for one, whose boss has Gartner envy ever since they fired him 15 years ago...), there's more mental masturbation going on than anything. Funny thing is, people pay a lot for it....
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No serious professional uses Linux. Sure, a bunch of dorky students in LUGS install it, but they dont matter.
Serious, professional, users choose NT. The use it because its better than anything else.
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I hope you can see now why your "argument" is pretty worthless.
:: It is indeed an old argument. Good arguments live forever and crappy ones die out.
Go spend a few months on alt.atheism or talk.origins and you'll see just how wrong you are. The crappiest arguments are not only the longest-lived, they're also the ones most often cited.
Don't worry about the LSB, Red Hat is a participant and I'm sure they'll try to abide by it. Red Hat is actually one of the most FSSTND/FHS compliant distributions which is why they rebuild packages to install in what some people consider "the wrong place" (which in their opinion is anywhere other than where a package's make install shoves stuff). Basically, some people get pissed off whatever you do...
I think Linux really does "level the playing field" in the OS realm. I suspect that Caldera will do just fine.
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Sorry, I don't buy it - Redhat is still pretty cool. And with the GPL, there's simply NO WAY they can ever "dominate" linux. they might be the de facto standard, even have majority market share - but unless they invent some proprietary "redhat-only" software, they can't ever have a monopoly.
And to redhat: If I see anything "redhat-only".. your distribution will go the way of the dodo.. and I'll rm -fr / faster than you can say "what was your username again?".
--
As far as I can see, Red Hat has always been a Pro Linux anti-proprietary type of company.
Hmph. Never saw source code for the Red Baron browser. Would sure like to see more openness in Applixware, for instance.
-fb Everything not expressly forbidden is now mandatory.
People need to live, ok?
right. But I was calling foul to the
argument that RH is "ANTI-proprietary"
That's Debian's role.
RH has bundled more proprietary stuff
with their distro than anybody. Not that's
a bad thing, just not deserving of "anti-proprietary" appellations.
-fb Everything not expressly forbidden is now mandatory.
You should understand that trademark law forces them to act that way. If you don't enforce your trademarks, they get declared public domain and you lose them.
Also, by putting Red Hat's name on the box you may damage their reputation if you screw up. Why should they put up with that?
SuSE actually does GPL the tools they develop, like SaX, which is a really neat program. And their distribution is based on rpm's too.
YaST - SuSE's installer - is just a powerful frontend for rpm and other things. You don't have to use it when you are running SuSE Linux.
Gee, sounds kinda like what's happening to poor 'ole KDE.
Speakinsawhich, I'm installing Linux Mandrake 5.3 tonight, all of the bonuses of RedHat, none of the problems.(No KDE, no x11amp, no xemacs)
I am presently using RH5.2 and have downloded and installed all of the above, but lets face it, that's a pain.
Honestly, with distros like SuSE, I'm supprised that RedHat has the share it does.
Ben
Well, every package in SuSE 5.3 worked, which can't be said by RedHat (Try tkmc)
SuSE has more WindowManagers (FVWM, KDE, GNOME, WindowMaker, CDEsim (FVWM, I know) and a whole slew of others like TWM)
SuSE is easier for the new user
(YaST, SaX, easy WM selection, easy PPPsetup, you name it...)
SuSE doesn't "Look" like a cheap Win95 out of the box, like RedHat 5.2 does (I know you can change it, but you have to admit that redhat is ugly by default)
SuSE has More (5CD's with everything under the sun, like JDK, XEmacs, WINE, x11amp, StarOffice, jx, xcdroast, vnc, and all those other programs we all download)
Now, what RedHat has going for it is its leanness and marketshare. Everything comes out for RedHat first, that's why I use it.
If Linux is about choice, then I think that RedHat limits that choice.
Ben
In any market where the products are very similar, two products eventually domintate the market, with other getting only a small percentage. It may take three or four years for it to shake out, but it eventually will happen.
First they said Linux would never enter the Fortune 1000 space BECAUSE it had no support from top software vendors.
Now they are saying Linux inroads into Fortune 1000 space will backslash BECAUSE of the top software vendors support.
The problem is that Fortune 1000 PHBs really listen to these guys (they listen because Gartner reports are very expensive, so they must be true).
not that I really blame them for it, it's a specialized thing and it takes 10 minutes to rebuild an Apache w/ mod_perl once you've done it once and written down the config options.
eggs-actly! that's why it's called "local", duh. distros should put their stuff under /usr. and why the fsck do some packages get special treatment and go into /opt? it's not because Sun came up with a dumb idea that Linux actually needs to copy it...
There are alot of things about RedHat that should be applauded. They have greatly advanced the development of GNOME with RHAD labs, and they have brought corporate support to Linux by way of a company to back up the free software. However, some things about their distribution could be changed. For instance, their implementation of X (in the form of AnotherLevel) is rather byzantine, and alot of things they do come close to breaking the Linux File System Standard. However, they do put out pretty solid code. I'm not a RedHat user (I'm partial to Debian, being a developer myself) but I do believe that they are remaining true to the Free Software model. Otherwise, the community will turn against them faster than you can say restrictive license.
-Andrew
Actually, Debian filters bug reports, packages software for distribution, contributes fixes back upstream. It supports free software the old fashion way, it writes it, debugs it, and distributes it.
Debian: We do free software the old-fashioned way, we write it.
craig
i had a video card that didn't work with redhat so they told me to use suse instead.
could you imagine microshaft doing that?
if it weren't for redhat, linux would have half the users it has now, if that.
Red Hat's rise to Linux power is a perfect example of modern day Darwinian Selection. Eventually one distribution *has* to win. Just as Microsoft Windows won the DOS/OS2/Mac/Amiga race of the 80's/90's, Red Hat is winning the Linux race of today. One team comes up with a solution that's better than the rest, and then everyone start standardizing on them, and then anyone who doesn't is left up the creek without a paddle. Is this a bad thing? Maybe. But it's something that we have to accept if we want Linux in the corporate/commercial arena.
I've already been experiencing "Red Hat Monopoly Syndrome", albeit minor, when a very large program (that I'm not willing to compile on my slow computer) is distributed only in Redhat binary packages, and for some reason or other the rpm's won't install under any other distribution except Red Hat. I'm pretty sure all the packages on Red Hat's CD's were purposely built this way to discourage installing them in other distributions.
Red Hat also appears to be using it's weight to kill KDE. We all know the Qt story. Redhat wants to control the desktop. And they will no doubt encourage/force (whichever is your choice of words) its users to use Gnome and Enlightenment (the stuff it's putting money/time into) by making all of it's proprietory software Gnome compliant. And since most people will probably standardize on whatever Red Hat uses we will be stuck in a world full of mostly Gnome and E. Not to speak harshly about Gnome or E though, they're kinda cool. I can live with that but I don't want KDE, WindowMaker and others to shrivel up and die.
These issues should concern us. We can learn what not to do by observing Microsoft. They have a monopoly, and eventually all monoplies must come crashing down. We can already see the walls holding up Microsoft starting to buckle. And I certainly don't want RedHat to become the next Microsoft.
Well propriety wasn't what I meant - rather the software that it produced. Yes any GPL'd software is open source and such. But by using it for all their software, we'll have to install Gnome and such to take advantage of RedHat's software (I like linuxconf/netcfg etc, which were by RedHat were they not?). It's just a simple example of how a big company can influence everyone. Good thing for the GPL though it will help moderate this influence.
Could you please elaborate a bit? What practices (business or otherwise) are you concerned about - everything RedHat does is GPL'ed, this is a very very good thing. In fact, RedHat is a wonderful example of how corporations should make money off of OSS, they give their software away and sell the services (sure, a CD from them is US$50, but it's legal to copy that CD as many times you wish). I for one am tired of people complaining about RedHat. So I ask again, give me a good reason to fear or dislike RedHat and I'll shut-up. So far, all the complaints I've heard seem to be from those that think RH is getting too popular (and the popularity of Linux is a *bad* thing?) or from those that feel RH is making Linux too easy to use and thus they don't feel elite enough - to these people I say get a life. I use RH and I *really* appreciate what they have done for Linux. I used to use Slackware, Power Linux, and FreeBSD. They all worked great, but it took so much longer to set them up than my RH box and the RH installer is so much easier to use. So unless someone can present some very convincing arguments I will continue to believe that RH bashers are working against the open source movement.
BTW - I've heard LT say, more than once, that he is pleased with what RH is doing for Linux.
\forall code \in C, \frac{\Delta readability(code)}{\Delta t} < 0
What the hell's wrong with xemacs?
Let's say that you've convinced your skeptical IS manager to put some boxes on Linux, but only if you have a support contract, just so everyone feels better.
Here's your options:
(1) SuSe (Who?)
(2) Some local consultant that will vouch for Debian or Slackware (Right.)
(3) Red Hat (evil)
(4) Caldera (more evil)
(5) All of the above (bzzz. Not an option.)
--
Business. Numbers. Money. People. Computer World.
Red hat putting out 5.2 and a bunch of patches the same day. 5.1 was worse and should never have been released. The fact that many older apps will not compile under red-hat but will fine under slackware. Red-hat is great for the home user.. Slackware is best for Servers and deban rules all the way around.
Red-hat is fine for a newbie, I give redhat copies out to newbies all the time. It's just that Slackware has more "compatability".
Do not look at laser with remaining good eye.
Did you folks notice a couple of blatant lies. Like the fact that R00tH4t is the only Alpha distributions (what about Debian then...)
I do not like this... Seeing is believing... And I see what actually a lot of people see:
I see that all BIG GUYS are trying to team behind a single distribution in order to tame us.
And I strongly dislike this...
Baker's Law: Misery no longer loves company. Nowadays it insists on it
http://www.sigsegv.cx/
Read debian site. I am getting tired of people that do not read. Supported are:
x86, Sparc, Alpha, m68k.
In between I am buring the Sparc CD's at the moment...
Baker's Law: Misery no longer loves company. Nowadays it insists on it
http://www.sigsegv.cx/
My thoughts, exactly!
How can people here that should know better pay any heed to that sort of "report"?
The message thses people are trying to convey is that the Linux community is intrinsically anti-business and will shy away from any commercial effort involving Linux.
If you scream loud enough, you will just prove them right.
I am all for free software, and Redhat has done nothing so far to spoil their image of a free software supporter. That is good enough for me?
Is it good enough for you?
Information wants to be beer, or something like that.
Anyone else notice how news.com / C|Net, etc are all jumping on the Linux bandwagon? There seems to be article after article coming out of these places that have either nothing important to say or are totaly wrong but mention Linux once or twice. I think these news mags are just trying to take some of Slashdot's many hits.. I imagine that a fair amount of regular readers to those older "tech" sites now check here far more often (or exclusively). They probably are starting to see some ad revenue losses and they want them back. So, what do they do? They pump out a ton of articles on Linux so that they might get posted on Slashdot (or other community sites) so they can make more money. Seems fishy to me.
Hexy - a strategy game for iPhone/iPod Touch
Really? He included glibc in slackware to make it incompatible w/ other dists? Funny up until 5.0 I think it was RedHat used libc5. glibc2 was released sometime around 4.xx, RedHat simply migrated as soon as it had stabalized because glibc2 is better than libc5, and many other dists did the same thing. Get a clue.
-matt
I figured out the RH install program my first time through in no time at all. Solaris x86, I had to install about 5 times before I gave up and half of the questions made no sense, or I just had no clue what the answer. RH is really nice for easy installs. Also, w/ autorpm it makes upgrading beyond simple. I just have my box check every day at 2am for any new updates. It automatically installes updated rpms and sends me an email about new rpms. Not a bad trick. It's really nice to read an email about a new security hole only to find out that your system updated itself 3 days ago.
I personally can't find any problems with RH's bussiness practises. They have a dist that's almost 100% GPL (Netscape and xv are the only exceptions I can think of off hand). They are paying people to code stuff for linux which is being released as GPL. I like redhat.
-matt
This will probally change once mozilla has staballized. I think the final goal is to have a free mozilla, and a non-free netscape w/ code that they aren't allowed to release. It's still not gonna be GPL, but it's pretty damned good.
-matt
He said "excessive Q and A"
not Q and A.
"Computers will never truly be free until the last windows user is strangled with the entrails of the last mac user."
IMO, both of you need grow the fuck up.
Sometimes using a other distro to help boost your production speed is not a bad thing.
While RH might (i donno) have ripped from slack, RH is not a clone of slack.
Mandrake is an example of a distro clone.
Be nice to each other.
"Computers will never truly be free until the last windows user is strangled with the entrails of the last mac user."
I definitely agree, Mr. Wookie. I think that Redhat still has the confidence of the community, and if it can do things right, will maintain that trust.
But Redhat is enterint a new relationship -- a relationship with businesses -- that both parties have to adapt to. I think there are some good people at the helm, and so I'm not worried.
Thanks to the FSF, we don't lose out on the success of a brand name Linux distribution company.
-- Duane
The unwillingness to join the LSG has me more than a bit concerned. It appears that RH is taking the "...we don't need to adhere to any standards..." mantra that is so deeply rooted in the MS mentality.
I'm not sure about that. The critical standards are things like Posix, X11, the various RFCs, the FSSTND, things like that that are already there and RedHat seems to follow those either deliberately or by default. The LSB seems to be going in the direction of "This is the standard window manager and desktop, this is the standard X11 widget set, and so on.", and RedHat seems to be saying that that's not useful. I agree with Redhat: there should not be a standard window manager as such. There should be one like twm that you can expect to have on all distros, but you select the window managers, widget sets and such depending on what software you want and what it needs and then select a distro based on which one provides what you need with the least fuss. And if you like the rest of Redhat but want KDE, you just buy RedHat and install KDE, confident that RedHat follows all the standards KDE needs it to follow.
So what about that software and the distribution would lock you in to a particular distribution? What precisely is it that would be incompatible between distributions? Maybe this would help clarify what the problem is that needs solved.
I admit I was a little surprised to see that Novell had invested in RedHat, not Caldera. Even if they're your future investors, this doesn't look too good since you add the most integration for them.
Anyway, I bought the retail (big $$) 1.3 distro for the Netware integration and was more than a bit disappointed. No glibc, netware utils keeping me at 2.0.35, and all mostly oldversions of software and rather useless documention. Trying to upgrade any of the pieces (such as netatalk to a recent asun version) led to total dependency hell.
I ended up reinstalling my Cheap Bytes CD from #1. Sure, I'm back to using ncpfs and no admin utils--but at least I'm happy now.
I sure hope the next distro is better....I will say, though, that it was well done (lisa is nice; the OpenDos Dosemu was great--and everything worked unlike the average redhat install); it just seemed to be a year out-of-date.
Why are we talking this crap? RedHat may not be your favorite distro but come on.
I can't help but think that because of RedHat's presence, Linux is closer to becoming a Windoze killer. Before RedHat we didn't even have a package manager (tgz were it), now we have several, but Redhat was first. RedHat was the first to shrink wrap Linux and put it on the store shelves across the country. But most of all, Redhat has put a face on Linux, a presence. Did they write Linux, no and I don't think they are saying that. All they are doing is packaging Linux in a way that is more useful to the consumer. I can't help but think that if it weren't for Redhat pushing Linux, Linux wouldn't be nearly as far as it is. Maybe someone else would have stepped up.
Also commercial vendors like IBM, Oracle, Sybase, etc want a "corporation" to work with. Right now it's Redhat, next year it may be Caldera, who knows. You can't expect Linux to succeed at gaining massive market share without it, I'm sure some do.
-dubbs
I think it needs to be remembered that Redhat is trying to bridge the gap b/n Commercial and Open Source software. We all know Redhat is only as strong as the users of its distro, but I think they're simply selling it to the suits, which _can_ be a good thing.
/. http://www.ci.vista.ca.us
Help me
So nice to hear from someone who's never been a newbie...
Weblogging Considered Harmful:
Even though I don't agree with a lot of what RMS says, I have a great deal of repect for him, and am glad that he (end extremists like him) are out there. Thoughtful extremists contribute new ideas, encourage debate, and keep the movement from becoming stagnant. I do, however, get tired of the "RMS said it, I believe it, that settles it" types who are more interested in fanning the flames than contributing anything new.
Weblogging Considered Harmful:
I run RedHat on my boxes and if I install it for someone else I install RedHat. Why? One concern with Slack is libc, it's dated...lets move. Also, I like RedHat, back when I installed 4 I had no problems so I saw no reason to switch. I have a few CDs of other dists but I dont need them.
I think we've all been scared with what happened with Microsloth. I'll admit that once in a while I get a little worried about RedHat, but then I realize that there is always rm -rf /
If there ever escapes a line of code that is RedHat *ONLY* I think that the Linux community will unite to fight the problem. Who cares if one distribution is hitting it big. Remember, if it gets it into the corporate/education/goverment world who cares? It's still Linus's kernel, it's still all GPL, it's still Donald Beckers ethernet driver and it's still every other hacker that has contributed's distribution. Whether or not there are 100 RedHat boxes and 10 other.
My 2 cents, sorry for wasting your time.
RMS may have an extreme view, but he's basically right (if not pragmatic). What he says, needs to be said. To remind us all that there are things more important than working code (ie. freedom).
---
"A society that will trade a little liberty for a little order will deserve neither and lose both."
"It is better to die on one's feet than to live on one's knees." - Albert Camus
It gives me the warm fuzzies to know that whatever happens with my Software job, and even if I sustain major brain damage in a car accident, or playing Rugby. I can always go to work for the Gartner Group.
This guy SO doesn't get the difference between the GNU/Linux/Open Source community and the software industry at large, and he clearly doesn't have any understanding of the Linux community.
G
Let's get things clear.
I don't care what Bob Young did.
If it means more apps, more hardware compatibility, more support, more Linux hardware vendors, then it's ok with me!
On the other hand, RedHat CANNOT be Microsoft!
Everything RedHat ever released is GPL.
Damn it man, you can ven buy a RedHat CD for 1.89$ at Linux Mall, try to do that with a WIN95 CD.
You would get sued and put in jail faster than you could say DUH.
So stop that crazy whining about RedHat supposed monopoly. Stop being afraid of big time. GET OUT OF THAT RAT HOLE you are living in.
The kernel needs a Gtk/Gnome-based post-install device configuration tools "a la" make xconfig. (Better sig coming soon
This is bad people. I know RedHat only. I have never tried any other distribution because I have been satisfied.
On the other hand, I believe Linux before any dist is good.
I think Debian, Slackware, SuSe, etc... are all trying in different ways to give good Linux stuff to their users.
Attacks and flames against ANY Linux distribution is ridiculous and will only help Microsoft against us.
It's big time for us now. I want a world full of Linux, but not only Linux. If we start flaming each other just for the sake of it or because of some paranoia, then we are helping MScrap.
Like it or not, there isn't anyone out there except them to give consistent stuff. Yes it's crappy but consistent.
If we start doing stupid we will have excellent but inconsistent stuff.
Now RedHat is GPL, probably others are too! Each has a niche, and each has a goal. Some commercial other technical, and yet other elitist. It's ok with me because we need them all.
If RedHat is going to be #1 in US consumer Linux market. OK with me!
If Average Joe consumer is going to think Linux is RedHat. So be it. After a year at most Joe would discover any other distribution.
The goal of Linux should be to become the OS of people the OS that teaches real power. After that, believe me, they will poke at Debian, Slack, or anything else.
KEEP THEM COMPATIBLE. Linux MUST WIN!
The kernel needs a Gtk/Gnome-based post-install device configuration tools "a la" make xconfig. (Better sig coming soon
All software can't be open source man!
It's a good thing OSes are for now like Linux.
People need to live, ok?
Now Applix is not RedHat, and you can still use emacs right?
The kernel needs a Gtk/Gnome-based post-install device configuration tools "a la" make xconfig. (Better sig coming soon
So far, everything redhat offers is GPL'ed, even the linuxconf tool. The source can be found on the CD. That means anybody can use it.
.rpm where those files go, not redhat.
Also, if you think redhat has some weird directory defaults, try slackware. Apache is spread from hell to breakfast! (BTW I like slackware much better then rh)
Anyway, if all you're doing is RPMing stuff onto your machine, it's the decision of the people that made the
I can't see how the "disasters" of GNOME was the result of rpms. You're talking about lib conflicts, which would occur even if you'd compiled every tarball yourself. Besides, those conflicts were in versions 1.0, and that sort of thing is to be expected. I say that getting software to work properly with libs is part of the debug process, which GNOME has now fixed.
perl ate the &...; code for my less then character; forgot to post as html
I see RedHat's "portal" strategy as evidence that RedHat is outclassed - it has an outdated distro, SuSe and even Debian are much better.
--
Until you start citing reasons why Red Hat isn't as good as SuSe or Debian, I'll continue thinking that you are an idiot.
-B
Ash and Hickory, straight-grained and true, make excellent bludgeons, dandy for the cudgeling of vegetarians.
couldn't agree more!
I tend to think that you are an idiot.
Redhat has domstraited a willingness to support open source software and principals.
They pay for development of Open Source software that benefits the community and they use their reputation and position to garner Linux support from other companies. This may not pay off in terms of open source code immediately, but often, it will in time.
The way I see it, a rising tide floats all boats. There will be more options in Linux and open source software with Redhat, or someone like them, than there will be without them.
Give us all a break... Their stuff is GPL'd and they are paying programmers to do it... I can't think of anything better... We need to show that GPL and Open Source do not mean poverty, and Red Hat is doing exactly that, and more. IBM will now start supplying drivers for Netfinity servers... because of a couple of odd hackers? No way. Because of companies like Red Hat.
Stop stressing, take their code, and code yourself if you are too worried. But you'll find you don't have the resources to move as quickly as they have on so many fronts...
Haven't we heard enough sour grapes from the Gartner Group? Can someone please just go smack them?
-- "In order to have power, I must be taken seriously." -Mojo Jojo
Many of the big names in the computing world have poured a LOT of money into RedHat. Now this isn't like they gave big donations to the Debian project. No, they are expecting to get this money back and then some. So now what does RedHat have to do? Go out and make a whole pile of money before their investors start getting worried. So now they have a lot of pressure to perform. Not only do they have to succeed as a company with free software ideals, but as a company that can bring in some good profits.
Remember that a lot of these investors probably aren't thrilled with RedHat's business model. They just don't get free software. However they want horse in the race, just in case Linux takes off in a huge way. RedHat is making money, and is the leader in tangible things like brand recognition. So the heavy hitters wrote some big checks, and proudly handed out press releases.
RedHat is in a bind. They have an aging distro that needs to be replaced. However they cant afford to put out a buggy mess. The free software community is looking at the money pouring in and expressing rumblings of distrust. Not only is RedHat starting to piss off their major market, but also the people who wrote a lot of the software. They need to benefit from the growth of the Linux market, but that brings them into greater competiton with the fountain of FUD: Microsoft. Place yourself in the role of a RedHat exec. What would you do now?
With this set of circumstances I have a bit of compassion for RedHat. Its sort of like they have a wife and a mistress. Each one wants to hear about different things, and its up to RedHat to keep them straight. Complicating matters is that a lot of this communication is done in the press, so everybody gets to read the love letters. Even worse is that the promises that RedHat makes to one can't damage their relationship with the other. Talk about a fine line to walk.
I think that it is an important time for the free software community to be a good 'wife' to RedHat. Cheer them on in their successes, help them through failures, and kill them if they run away with their mistress.
well. I'm no fan of RedHat, but they've built a system, which, at this moment in time, is the closest thing to an Operating System that an ordinary user can install and use the Linux kernel.
For this, I take my Slackware Hat off to them.
I don't think there will be a backlash, I don't entirely like RedHat, but it has a place in the Linux community, specifically as an entry point.
I think that a healthy core of users will install other distributions and move away from RedHat once they know their way round Linux. Some will also be happy with RedHat as is.
We also have to ask what motivates the other distributions to continue, they emerged from the dark ages of Linux where there were only a few users per distribution and they have had their piece of cake and growth.
Again these distributions are esentially free, sure some make money through packaging and documentation, but the system itself is essentially free, I just can't see how RedHat can position themselves into a monopoly given this fact. There is no direct analogy with corporations such as Microsoft in this respect.
Every once in a while, I'll hear the accusation that RedHat is too much like Windows, and that one should use a 'true' Linux like *** or ***. It always makes me laugh.
Take a linux box, any linux box. Without the tell-tale messages or logs, how would anyone know what distro they're using? It's very hard, and the differences they'd find as clues are very minor.
What it comes down to is Linux is Linux is Linux. If RedHat wins, all win.
A Government Is a Body of People, Usually Notably Ungoverned
About time somebody realised these people are absolute frauds. Now, if only we could tell the moron managers driving trucks of money up to their doorstep.
I think I shall write a report on the amount of money that can be made from pulling statistics out of my arse.
Hey I agree with the first AC. Grow up.
I don't think all Linux developers are elitist jerks, you shouldn't assume all Windows developers glorify the "proprietary" wary of programming.
Since when did Linux/Unix/BeOS etc corner the market on Open Source software? Just because I don't have access to the Win32/95/98/NT source code doesn't mean I don't like to write free (as in speech, not neccesarily beer) software. Even the great and glorious GIMP is Open source on Win32! I write Windows because I have to (its my job) - I write Linux because I LIKE to. I may like Linux as a better operating system but programming is programming - if you're good at it, it doesn't take long to learn a new system...
Unless of course some elitist jerk doesn't want to teach me. I which case I'll stick with Windows...Not as good an operating system but the people are a lot friendlier (be honest, for most people it's not even that bad an operating system ("CAST!!!!"))
Here's a wacky idea - if Linux gets popular enough, MS may have no choice but to move to Open Source as well and we'll all finally get to see the source for those undocumented APIs..Ah, I can dream can't I?
Now before you flame me, think back to when you were learning...who was that guy/girl that finally made you realize what a pointer was and how to use it? What if they had your attitude? You could be working at McDonalds right now...
Never by hatred has hatred been appeased, only by kindness - the Buddha
The community should applaud companies that are successful and making money from Linux.
While applauding, the community needs to serve as a watchdog to make sure they follow the goals of the open source and open linux enhancements.
But be nice about it. Disparaging a successful company serves no purpose whatsoever.
We should all look for ways to make money on Linux. Why? Because the number one thing preventing Linux development from going balistic and totally leaping years ahead of Microsoft's technology is that the smartest people can't work on it full time. And why can't we? Because we don't have a business model (yet) that will allow us to.
But imagine a world where we are all working full time enhancing Linux and getting paid. That is a good world, and the Linux community should try to create ideas that enhance the possibility of doing this. Red Hat is successful. Let's help other companies to be successful. Let's help other people to create very strong Linux brands.
Other distributors are doing a great job at this.
The community should be a friendly watchdog. Companies should want to turn to the community for advice on things.
The community should not alienate the business stars of the Linux movement. What the community should do is help create many business stars.
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The thing that is cool about Linux, is we can always switch distributions.
It needs to be ingrained in every executives mind that if you fail the community, you will fail as a company. If you help the community, you will be spectacularly successful. Red Hat has been doing this to date, and is successful. Let us make clear to RH that if they keep supporting the community in good faith, they will have the community behind them. And we all know that this is very valuable.
The cost of failing the community needs to be so prohibitively high that no business would dare risk losing the communities support or risk damaging the relationship.
The power center needs to be the community.
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Which Library does each Distributions use? KDE, Gnome, or something else?
Red Hat - Gnome right?
Debian - Gnome?
Mandrake - KDE?
Slackware - ?
Open Linux - ?
Stampede - ?
SuSE - ?
Corel - ?
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I quite agree, a strangehold isn't possible. And any real backlash against one would come in a very simple form - ${OTHER_DISTRIBUTION}'s ftp site would be under siege, as vital stuff is backed up and the boot floppies come out.
:-)
I guess CNET don't quite understand that monopolising and open source don't mix very well
Hello? Alienating the community?
As far as I see it, the investments in RedHat are only going to bring greater attention to Linux as a viable alternative to Winblows... sure, RedHat are a commercial company. Sure, they charge $50 to get the product on CD. But in the last decade-and-a-bit, who else has managed to bring such attention to Linux?
This kind of petty crap is exactly what counts against the Linux community, because it's perceived by the rest of the world as geeks trying to keep something inside their own little world.
Truth is, if IBM et al are jumping on the Linux bandwagon, that's about the best thing that could happen. The reason that they're jumping on RedHat's flavour of the bandwagon is that RedHat present a viable business model. It's only monopolies can afford to give software away and still expect to make a profit.
I think that Red hat's just going with the flow. As long as RedHat's staying with the GPL their not going against the community, and even if IBM only wants to boost profit the worst thing that could happen is it being a one time thing.
And if RedHat decides to be stupid by going all comercial then they'll fail because they won't have the communities trust anymore.
The only reason that crap companies like microsoft succeed, is because the average Joe Shmoe doesn't know any better, so they confide in the "leading brand".
TeeN GeeK
It is true that GPL'd projects makes it difficult for any single organization to control the project. However, with the Gnome project, Red Hat is showing how to do it.
Here's how to do it:
o Hire as many of the project leaders as possible
o Control the code repository
While these measures don't make it theoretically impossible to take the project over, the size of the Gnome project makes it practically impossible for most people or organizations.
As long as the power isn't used inappropriately there isn't a problem. However, here are a few places where non-technical or technically poor decisions were made for the benefit of Red Hat:
o It should be clear to everyone that Gnome was not 1.0 material. Why release it so soon? Was the fact that the release was made during LinuxWorld just a coincidence? Nope.
o The reasons for starting another ORB project are weak. The only technical reason was that MICO took too much memory to compile and marshalling was a bit too slow. I don't know what the complaints were with OmniORB. It is obvious that improving an existing ORB would have been a better technical desicion that creating a new probject.
o The reasons for not using KDE as the default environment for the Red Hat distribution before Gnome is ready aren't consistent with other decisions they make. The argument is that QT is not GPL'd and that they couldn't track every different license. Have they looked at the Sendmail, BIND, or Pine licenses? QT's previous license was no more restrictive than these licenses the current QT license is much better than these.
Ah, this makes a little more sense. Thanks for the clarification!
Look,
If it was not for RedHat, do you honestly think that the Big Players,eg..Oracle,HP,Compaq, would have invested in Slackware ot Caldera. Please!!
If it were not for REDHAT there would ne more shareware and less Inovation in Linux and we would ALL be using Slackware and still be using OPENLOOK or FVWM
WAKE UP
Yeah and lets all follow that loser Steve Jobs who gives false hope of putting OSX server out for Intel boxes and then changes his mind at the End because he thinks he can sell more G3 boxes.
He deserves to get it from behind again from the Intel users world.
LINUX RULES
Well said
Good Luck with your LUG
BUT Alpha support only came out with 2.1, which only came out on the 9th. The same day this was published.
So at the time of writing they were not an Alpha Linux distributor.
"Our scientific power has outrun our spiritual power. We have guided missiles and misguided men"