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Red Hat Linux 6.1 vs Caldera OpenLinux 2.3
joe_s writes "CNET recently posted and update to their shootout between Red Hat Linux and OpenLinux, which has some pretty interesting points of view...and could be pretty useful for a newbie. "
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First off, who was it a week or two ago here saying that Caldera didn't get any press, and so "was dead"? Care to re-think that position?
Not that this press is anything to write to Mars about, but it's still attention. C|Net is covering the same old ground here, albeit with new products. Ease of installation, sheesh--that's the last thing one should be worried about in an OS. But in today's world, you lock your doors, you burn your credit-card receipts, and you judge operating systems on, among other criteria, how easy they are to install. Sigh.
The article did have a couple of notable passages, bowever. I liked the opening comment--"Nothing moves faster than the Linux world". Hah! What was your first clue? They hurt because they can barely put their electronic stories to bed, forget about print, before they're laughably obsolete. But in today's news-hungry world, fast is good. Expect a lot more attention from a starving press, and hope that at least some of it doesn't suck.
Another item of interest--I happen to be one of the "old-school Linux users" who "appreciate [Caldera's] graphical installer". I appreciated it right up until it bit me in the gatcher. No non-DHCP NFS install? Where's my LILO? Ahem. It didn't take me long to drop back to using their old-style LISA installer, which is no worse than it's ever been. Don't get me wrong--despite the flaws in Caldera's Lizard, it is as much of an advance over the current state of the Linux installation art as Slackware's color installer was over SLS, if not moreso. A few more iterations, and it will set a new standard of excellence. I love it when vendors fight to see who can make my life easier!
And with any luck, once Caldera gets it right (or RedHat or SuSE or whoever gets a polished Lizard-alike on CD first), maybe C|Net will have an article about it, and will get the kernel version right in that one. We can only hope.
Quote "Red Hat doesn't include software to partition your" .. Checkout the /dosutils dir on the redhat cd. "kernel 2.3" sorry. (Unattended mode Caldera) (RedHat kickstart Floppy)
Do a little more reading.
Get a free ipod.
Installing from Windows can be incredibly useful.
That's one less piece to write for the trojan/worm that finds Windows machines, and replaces it with Linux.
Is it just me, or did that article sound like there were no other dists in the game?
Yea, how hard could it have been to drop in a couple links. Of course I did like the M$ backhands. Talking about how RH was close in price to the *upgrade* for Windoze. Not to mention NTServer or even BackOffice. As a fairly new convert I like articles like this, a comparison, not a flame-war, at least then you get some facts, not wild opinion and emotion.
C|Net has been pretty hip to the whole thing. Although wasn't that a mistake saying they were based on the 2.3 kernel, isn't that just for developement and masochists?
+&x
a decent article in general, but there are a couple things that should be mentioned.
round 1
Red Hat offers several new installation options, including Custom, Workstation, and Server.
this isnt new to 6.1, i know 5.2 had them, possibly earlier versions as well. they also fail to mention kickstart, which allows you to create a file specifying an installation procedure and then use that file to do unattended installs. as they later point out, unattended installs are a new feature of openlinux 2.3.
Red Hat doesn't include software to partition your hard drive.
last time i checked, fdisk, cfdisk, and sfdisk were all included. as is fips, which will allow you to repartition without destroying data. granted these arent "graphical" in the way a newbie would prefer, but they are included.
round 2
Yes, email tech support (offered by Caldera) or postings on Usenet deliver somewhat speedy answers, but there's nothing like a bit of human contact when you feel stumped, frustrated, and ready to crawl back to Windows.
they apparently dont know about irc ("chat rooms" for the less informed). its fairly easy to find at least one person who can, if nothing else, offer insight to a problem. the major irc networks all have linux channels, afaik.
round 4
not so much a critisism, but there are tools out there that can be downloaded and installed with little hassle to facilitate remote administration. check out Webmin for one...
anyone else catch anything (other than the reference to the development kernel, 2.3.x)?
--Siva
Keyboard not found.
Keyboard not found.
Press F1 to continue.
There are some major problems with Caldera that other distros don't have.
For a newbie or someone who "Just wants to get work done", I suggest RedHat 6.1 or Mandrake 6.1. For someone who's more adventurous and wants to learn Slackware or Debian. For someone who wants eithor european language support or a lot of packages SuSE.
Note: I've actually run each of these distros for a sufficient length of time to be able to make basic judgements about them. Caldera is the one that I've run for the least amount of time, but that's because after my first 8 hours with it, I never wanted to see it again, and after my second 8 hours with it, I almost broke my CD in half. So, even if this may be flamebait, it's *informed* flamebait.
-- The act of censorship is always worse than whatever is being censored. Always.
Isn't it interesting that C/Net concluded that Red Hat was of more use to corporate customers and server environments while Caldera had the advantage as an easily installed personal desktop? Not even two years ago Red Hat's primary advantage was its relatively simple installation and maintenance, while Caldera emphasized its commercial ties and networking (i.e. Netware) support.
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John 3:16 - God's Public License
We all know that the install is the part that each distro spends most effort customising. But what other parts really matter?
Much of it simply comes down to deciding what app to make the default - as in the case of Gnome vs KDE. Here the distro maker is simply giving a vote of confidence to a particular app, rather than doing anything very innovative.
Package management is an area where distros can stand apart from each other, but unlike the install process, it introduces the possibility of incompatibilities, so there is more incentive to be cautious rather than innovative. After all, if ACME Linux decide to write a better RPM, will it be worth their trouble fighting off the cries of 'incompatible' and 'embrace and extinguish'? Money that could be better spent on an ad campaign.
Multilingual support is one area where distros have a chance to shine, not least because there seems to be little support for it in the existing foundation of GNU tools that make up the meat of every distro.
But, it seems to be that what really sets distros apart is branding and mindshare. I use SuSE not for Yast, not for ISDN support, but because I see them as _strategically_ aligned with KDE, and I see KDE as being new and innovative (and European!) (no flames please).
If I was into clustering I might go with RH because I see them as aligned with relevant kernel development and the Beowulf project.
If I was into bsd style init scripts and curses, I'd go with Slackware. (Joke).
At the moment distros that really go for innovation run (even greater) risks. In the marketplace of openness, no one wants to be seen to break even de facto standards. No one wants to get too friendly with closed software. No one wants to say that another distro is wrong (solidarity, brothers!) - there's room for everyone.
for now.......
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"And worst of all, it's much harder to install Red Hat on a Windows machine and then boot between the two operating systems, since Red Hat doesn't include software to partition your hard drive" Although its not as pretty as Partion Magic, FIPS does a quick and painless job of partitioning your hard drive. I've set up several dual boot Red Hat/Win98 systems with this great utility and have had no problems. I guess CNET didn't realize that FIPS is included on the Red Hat CD.
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"Every artist is a cannibal, every poet is a thief."
Hey mom, look. Caldera will install from Windows. :P
Big flipping deal. I mean, so what? I honestly wouldn't want to install a distribution from anything with a kernel leaking that much memory. It'd suck to have windows decide to BSOD when I was "walking my Lizard". A RH installation is simple enough for the average jane user. Boot off CD, and p'n'c.
Then again, this entire article is petty space filler. If you like Caldera better than RH, use Caldera. If you like RH better, use RH. If you like Slackware better... well, i wont comment. After all, this revolution is about choice, right? But it's CNET, so we can all claw and hiss over it for a while.
Honestly, I'm not biased by the fact that i work for a RedHat ISV. Or that I grew up in Raleigh/Durham, NC.
"and no, im not the spot working for Transmeta, although i wish i was..." -- ~spot "i'm the epitome of public enemy..."
I didn't have a problem installing the server (or tweaking Apache) and I admin NT (and Linux) for a living. The problem comes from a total change of perspective. It would probably be *easier* for a clueful 13 year old to do it from scratch than your average NT admin. Why? There is no baggage, no looking for a c:/, no assumptions, you get to learn from a tabula rasa, not one filled with FUD (which you get from using M$ product extensively).
You don't learn what's *different* just what is.
+&x
round 1
Red Hat offers several new installation options, including Custom, Workstation, and Server.
this isnt new to 6.1, i know 5.2 had them, possibly earlier versions as well.
RedHat 5.2 was the first to give you three installations choices, with 5.1 you had to custom define what packages were loaded.
George
It's more than that. Most people think of computers as a tool. Same as a screwdriver or a hammer. It should be easy to figure out and easy to work.
Linux is great in that IF you want to tweak the bejesus out of it, you can. But for it to really succeed, it's gotta be a tool to get a job done. Nothing more, nothing less. If this means the installer is easy and graphical, so be it. Some users just don't have the luxury of time. "Get it up and get it running, we have money to make!" is the mantra.
The beauty of all this is as follows: Just like Burger King, you can have it your way. If you want the ease of installation and configuration with point in click, pick the distro behind door #1. If you want the pain and suffering because you like it, pick the distro from behind door #2.
Linux is about choice. Don't beat down the newbies because they want to configure their network using a point and click interface. To them, it's just a tool and they need to get a job done.
mike
What's my Karma Mr. Burns? "Excellent"
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> Are you telling me that there are multiple flavors of Linux out there?
/don't/ like it when said distributors start referring to themselves as /the/ Linux.
As a programmer and a sysadmin, this is my only problem with the billions of distributions. Newbies get a particular distro and refer to that as "Linux" to the exclusion of all else. Just yesterday I had to figure out what my fencing apponent was talking about when he said "Linux 6.1" (it doesn't ring a bell to me because I don't use RH).
I like the idea that any ol' J. Random Burner can throw a selection of stuff together and burn his own JRB Linux v52.8 CD distro. I
Enh, just my two timeslices.
You cannot apply a technological solution to a sociological problem. (Edwards' Law)
I wonder why they think that somehow KDE is more "slick" or "easier to customize" than Gnome. My experience is that KDE is leaner, more efficient, and certainly less buggy than Gnome. Nonetheless, Gnome+E is my preferred user interface, because despite the instability and system requirements of Gnome, it is certainly inproving at an alarming rate, and the interface is EASILY more customizable, and perhaps more "slick" than KDE, which is, in fact best for newbies, for now. I'm really license agnostic; I like Gnome for its feature set, and it attempt to not make everything windows-esque. My $.02.
The Distribution HOWTO is probably a good start. Distributions, to summarize, are packages of software, including a Linux base operating system.
Think of Windows without all the extra software (IE, WordPad, etc.). Then think of Microsoft selling the base Windows system to any company who wanted it (Symantec comes to mind) and those companies selling packages of Windows + Office + Extra software all together.
Distributions are basically that; they take the Linux kernel (the common denominator) and package software around it in a typical Unix style (sometimes they change how the files are laid out on the drive, etc.) and sometimes add their own custom software to make life easier for configuration and installation.
As long as distributions are testing the software they're packaging together and making life easier for those of us who want to keep an up-to-date Linux box, distributions (and paying for the support) are a good thing.
- Michael T. Babcock <homepage>
- Michael T. Babcock (Yes, I blog)
Um, here's a few bytes. Go get yourself a clue.
SuSE, RH (at least 3.3, 5.1, and 5.2) let you customize to a T with cat, Perl, rm and dd if you like.
Repeat after me:
The underlying configuration is STILL THERE.
If you like, you can run a RHAT box exactly like a Slackware box; change what you don't like -- you've got the source -- and run it how you prefer. Ditto for SuSE. So, the clueful who actually read manuals and don't say, "Oh, a GUI? Gee, they must have taken away the CLI configuration methods" are unhampered.
Only the dead have seen the end of war.
I remember why I switched to linux. I was bored with OS/2 and i had heard quite a bit about this unix stuff and how powerful it was. I was curious. OS/2 was nice, but I wanted to learn more. I had used crappy operating systems for years (OS/2 much less than windows), and had come to accept all the quirks that 'all operating systems have'. I didn't know better. So I started using linux, and was blown away by what i could do with it, and how well thought out the thing was. As I learned more, repeatedly my mind was blown as I realized what was possible with a real OS. What intruiged me the most was the philosophy that presented itself in all the tools, and design philosophy of just about every piece of unix software i could get my hands on. Ultimately it was my thirst for knowledge that got me hooked. the more I learned, the more i liked what i saw. Now take average joe-bloe. Been using windows forever. Doesn't know anything but windows because according to him, windows is what came with the computer he bought, and he basically stuck to it because that's what he was fed. Words like stability, robustness, and configurability equate to hardware to these people. "Faster CPUs makes more robustness, if you buy good hardware then your system will be stable. Better not play with windows too much because I might break something." Fact is, this is all most people know, and what they concider the truth. They accept it as truth. Stick these people in linux (regardless of distro) and watch them hate it. They don't care that they can configure X in 100,000 different ways, and the thought of customizing something for themselves scares them. They want to hit the power button, and see what they are familiar with, windows. In the garbage that is windows, things are much simpler. It's a flat, single user system, and its closed. As terrible as we all know this design is, it caters to the moms and the pops. There is no need to promote linux to the home user. If he/she is the sort that would explore linux and enjoy it, then they must first be looking for better philosophy from their computing environs. It wasn't the eye candy of E, or the dozens of window managers, or the 800+ packages that comes on a distro that hooked me on linux. It was a question of philosophy. The rest was a bonus.
As many people already pointed out, I was having trouble figuring out which things were fact and not in this. Neither RH nor Caldera are running the 2.3 kernel (thank god). Since when does Microsoft have a deadlock on the server market? Get real people. Try commercial unices, DUX or Solaris/SunOS, not to mention of course FreeBSD and Linux. RedHat has no partitioning software? Where did that come from? If you need more than FIPS and fdisk, you're in trouble. Apparently CNET has some real trouble on proof-reading. What a shame. Linux crusaders get enough bad press as it is for flame-spewing arrogance. Let's at least get the facts straight.
Interested in open source engine management for your Subaru?