Re:Does anyone even use this OS?
on
CentOS 5 Released
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· Score: 5, Insightful
I want an enterprise quality Linux to run a database server on it. But I don't want to pay the Redhat price tag; CentOS gives me the quality of Redhat Enterprise Linux for free.
And thus the beauty of free (as in freedom) software. Red Hat takes the work of others, adds a few features, a lot of stability and testing, and sells their result with a support plan for a nifty profit. They give those changes back to the community, which then takes their work and releases a free (as in beer) version for people who don't need the support.
Everyone wins. This is no longer a zero-sum game. I don't understand why that's still so difficult for so many people to understand.
Remember, this is America. We don't start revolutions. We don't fight for anything unless it's the last Tickle Me Elmo on store shelves at Christmas. The most effort we're willing to put into our civics and society and the most we're willing to risk of ourselves for them is a text vote or two on our cell phones.
For America to fare so poorly in your judgment system, there certainly must be some other country that does start revolutions, that does fight the good fight for Truth and Justice, where people do risk of themselves for civics and society?
So what is this other country? What is that single shining example of the paragon of humanity, the heights of which all other countries should strive to achieve?
Since microsoft have made it perfectly clear that they don't want anyone running their OS without paying, why continue to try, how about giving one of the many shiny desktop linux distros a go instead?
Because the thought of having my OS nag me for an entire year about activating is just so enticing! All I have to do is hack some undocumented configuration setting that some guy found, and I can then look forward to eight more months of reminders to send my data to Microsoft? SIGN ME UP!!
Whatever the technology crowd might think of Red Hat's new toys, the markets sure don't seem to care. Their last five days show a large amount of "who cares" on Wall St.
That's because this isn't news. Everyone has known for quite a while that RHEL5 would be released in this timeframe. Wall Street is controlled by big money, and big money doesn't wait until they read something in the newspaper before they act on it. They are continually in contact with the companies in their portfolio and they know what direction the company is headed in long before the general public does. This "news" was already built into the price of the stock.
However, it's a bit disappointing that my employers were still paying a support contract on this box but the package updates that were part of this contract were more than 3 years old.
The point is that, even though the Python package may be 3 years old, if it's still under support, and tomorrow they found a security bug in that years-old version, you would still get a security patch for it.
I don't think it's too much to expect a little flexibility when you're paying for it.
That's the thing.. you're not paying for a little flexibility. You're paying for stability and maintenance. It may seem backwards to you but that's the exact sorta thing that most "enterprise" customers want. If they offered the sort of flexibility you're looking for, that would mean supporting multiple different versions of different packages within a single distro.
The reason they can offer such long-term support is that every user of every package in that distro is running the exact same version. It would simply not be economically possible for them to offer 7 years of support on a product if they allowed people to run whatever version they wanted, even as an option.
RHEL is certainly a distro that is aimed at stability rather than the latest features. It is Red Hat's policy that they will not upgrade any package past the minor version that originally shipped with that release. So if it shipped with Python 2.2.3 then it will never go past 2.2.x. They will backport security or stability patches from later releases if necessary.
If that's not the policy you're looking for in a distro, then RHEL is not the distro for you. That said, I have had lots of luck in compiling SRPMs from later RHEL versions or from Fedora when necessary. For example I wanted to upgrade my CentOS 4 box to PHP 5, so I just grabbed the latest php-5.2.x SRPM and was able to compile and install it without much modification (I believe I had to take out a not-yet-supported gcc option and a couple other tweaks).
Going that route IMO is a good mix of stability and being able to upgrade certain packages when necessary, because the SRPMs already include Red Hat specific patches when necessary, but if that method is still too far from the bleeding edge for your tastes then I would agree RHEL is not a good match for you. That doesn't mean there's anything wrong with RHEL though.
and that just meant I had to delete my phpinfo.php file that I kept in the root of each domain I host.
Heh... guess I'm not the only idiot that does that.:) Even though I'm running 5.x and that bug doesn't affect me, I've known it was a stupid idea for a long time but laziness prevailed. You and the PHP bugs project have just given me the motivation to fix that!
I will agree that finding worthwhile music on EMusic may be a bit more difficult than other sites, but it's not impossible. Their sample clips work very well, and once you find some stuff you like they have plenty of ways to branch out, such as listing others' playlists that have that same music, or finding similar music that is highly rated by users.
I was never much of a fan of indie music but after playing around a bit on EMusic I'm finding that there are some great tracks on there, you just need to spend some time to listen around. The great thing is that you're not "penalized" for purchasing individual tracks so if you're not sure of an album just download a track or two.
EMusic is the second-most popular (legal) download service behind iTunes for a reason. To me it's well worth a little extra time to support a distribution model that is geared to help the consumer and not punish them.
Perhaps they could use this technology for the tailpipe, too...
Let's not be too hasty here... we all remember that tragic day over a decade ago when NASA's Straw Shuttle project ended in catastrophe. We must introduce these organic technologies very carefully when dealing with such explosive substances.
With Firefox and all those other browsers out there, exactly why should we care about a new version of Netscape? Especially since most of the versions I've tried have seemed rather, well, sucky. <2002>
With Internet Explorer and the Mozilla Suite out there, exactly why should I care about this new browser called "Mozilla Phoenix"? Especially since most of the versions I've tried have seemed, rather, well, sucky.
</2002>
Good thing the Firefox guys didn't follow such thinking back then. Just because Netscape hasn't put out a decent product in over a decade, and each version since 6 is worse than the previous, doesn't mean they'll never get better. Browser fortunes rise and fall.
Believe it or not, Netscape still has great name recognition as "the other browser". I'm a little ashamed to say that my current employer advertises "Internet Explorer and Netscape" as the browsers they support, although I'm trying to change that to bring them to the 21st century.
Choice is always a good thing. Maybe Netscape will actually release a good product again someday.
Yeah, because so many bombs feature blinking lights. Bomb makers really want to draw attention to the bombs before they go off.
So if a guy walks into a crowded building with a bomb strapped to him, everyone should just ignore him as long as the bomb features blinking lights and exposed wires?
Not so fast... that's only true if you're using the regular "Avoirdupois" pounds. In the Troy system, which is used for precious metals and gems, a pound is only 12 ounces!
I read a "brain teaser" once that asked: Which is heavier, a pound of gold or a pound of feathers? Of course, we've all heard a variation of this question (usually bricks and feathers), and know that the answer is that they weigh the same -- one pound. However, a pound of feathers weighs more than a pound of gold, because feathers are measured using the avoirdupois system (1 pound = about 453.59 g) while gold uses Troy (1 pound = about 373.24 g).
The other problem will be ME going postal when the impolite person sitting next to me yaks and yaks for 5 hours straight on a flight.
Reminds me of one of the funniest responses I've seen in The Onion's "What do you think" column, asking what people thought of the FCC's decision to review lifting the in-flight cell phone rule:
"Now the only thing left is to fill the cabin with ankle-deep brackish ice water, and air travel will be about perfect."
The classic example is the database access API (or maybe it's specific to mysql, I forgot). It doesn't support bound parameters.
It's obviously been a very long time since you've coded in PHP. The native PDO layer in PHP 5 supports bound parameters for all database drivers, and there are numerous other data abstraction layers that support this which have been around even longer.
Just because all these "popular PHP applications" you mention (care to cite examples?) don't follow good programming practice doesn't mean the language itself is flawed. PHP can't force someone to write good code.
read LOTS of other people's code (DL a smallish OSS project at first, then larger ones).
You've gotta be careful with that approach. I've seen some very poorly-coded OSS projects, and they tend to be the smaller ones. Just because it's open source doesn't mean it's well-coded!
Rather, it may be more helpful to look at large OSS projects, but one where you can concentrate only on a smaller module. Something like Apache, Subversion, the Linux kernel, etc. These projects tend to have much better coding guidelines in place, and their development lists are very active with good discussions on best practices, refactoring methods, etc.
The smaller projects are more often run by just a single person or two, which means that they aren't as diligent in discussing changes beforehand and following well-established development practices.
It's articles like this that clearly demonstrate one thing: the only single useful tag to come out of the whole Slashdot tagging beta is "slashdotted".
Now, when I see that tag, I don't even bother clicking until it's off the front page (or use mirrordot of course).
Put another way, this would equal 50 full-time employees doing nothing but surfing online game and auction sites." I just have one question: are they taking applications?
I dunno, but if there are that many government employees going to auction sites, I'm gonna go try to sell my hammer on eBay for $600...
Slashdot Mirror
And thus the beauty of free (as in freedom) software. Red Hat takes the work of others, adds a few features, a lot of stability and testing, and sells their result with a support plan for a nifty profit. They give those changes back to the community, which then takes their work and releases a free (as in beer) version for people who don't need the support.
Everyone wins. This is no longer a zero-sum game. I don't understand why that's still so difficult for so many people to understand.
For America to fare so poorly in your judgment system, there certainly must be some other country that does start revolutions, that does fight the good fight for Truth and Justice, where people do risk of themselves for civics and society?
So what is this other country? What is that single shining example of the paragon of humanity, the heights of which all other countries should strive to achieve?
I like apples. Especially them apples.
Because the thought of having my OS nag me for an entire year about activating is just so enticing! All I have to do is hack some undocumented configuration setting that some guy found, and I can then look forward to eight more months of reminders to send my data to Microsoft? SIGN ME UP!!
That's because this isn't news. Everyone has known for quite a while that RHEL5 would be released in this timeframe. Wall Street is controlled by big money, and big money doesn't wait until they read something in the newspaper before they act on it. They are continually in contact with the companies in their portfolio and they know what direction the company is headed in long before the general public does. This "news" was already built into the price of the stock.
The point is that, even though the Python package may be 3 years old, if it's still under support, and tomorrow they found a security bug in that years-old version, you would still get a security patch for it.
I don't think it's too much to expect a little flexibility when you're paying for it.That's the thing.. you're not paying for a little flexibility. You're paying for stability and maintenance. It may seem backwards to you but that's the exact sorta thing that most "enterprise" customers want. If they offered the sort of flexibility you're looking for, that would mean supporting multiple different versions of different packages within a single distro.
The reason they can offer such long-term support is that every user of every package in that distro is running the exact same version. It would simply not be economically possible for them to offer 7 years of support on a product if they allowed people to run whatever version they wanted, even as an option.
RHEL is certainly a distro that is aimed at stability rather than the latest features. It is Red Hat's policy that they will not upgrade any package past the minor version that originally shipped with that release. So if it shipped with Python 2.2.3 then it will never go past 2.2.x. They will backport security or stability patches from later releases if necessary.
If that's not the policy you're looking for in a distro, then RHEL is not the distro for you. That said, I have had lots of luck in compiling SRPMs from later RHEL versions or from Fedora when necessary. For example I wanted to upgrade my CentOS 4 box to PHP 5, so I just grabbed the latest php-5.2.x SRPM and was able to compile and install it without much modification (I believe I had to take out a not-yet-supported gcc option and a couple other tweaks).
Going that route IMO is a good mix of stability and being able to upgrade certain packages when necessary, because the SRPMs already include Red Hat specific patches when necessary, but if that method is still too far from the bleeding edge for your tastes then I would agree RHEL is not a good match for you. That doesn't mean there's anything wrong with RHEL though.
Heh... guess I'm not the only idiot that does that. :) Even though I'm running 5.x and that bug doesn't affect me, I've known it was a stupid idea for a long time but laziness prevailed. You and the PHP bugs project have just given me the motivation to fix that!
I will agree that finding worthwhile music on EMusic may be a bit more difficult than other sites, but it's not impossible. Their sample clips work very well, and once you find some stuff you like they have plenty of ways to branch out, such as listing others' playlists that have that same music, or finding similar music that is highly rated by users.
I was never much of a fan of indie music but after playing around a bit on EMusic I'm finding that there are some great tracks on there, you just need to spend some time to listen around. The great thing is that you're not "penalized" for purchasing individual tracks so if you're not sure of an album just download a track or two.
EMusic is the second-most popular (legal) download service behind iTunes for a reason. To me it's well worth a little extra time to support a distribution model that is geared to help the consumer and not punish them.
Let's not be too hasty here... we all remember that tragic day over a decade ago when NASA's Straw Shuttle project ended in catastrophe. We must introduce these organic technologies very carefully when dealing with such explosive substances.
Heh, you're right... the formatting of the article made it look like that was Esser's picture but the author is some other dude. My bad.
Of course it's self-promotion. Why does the guy stick his picture on the front of the article?
Attention geek bloggers: You are not attractive. Stop posting pictures of your dorky looking selves at the top of your blog.
It doesn't make you look like a real journalist, it just makes you look like a tool.(Note: in case you're wondering how I got so many pictures to prove my point, I simply looked up the fud tag on Slashdot and started clicking away :)
With Internet Explorer and the Mozilla Suite out there, exactly why should I care about this new browser called "Mozilla Phoenix"? Especially since most of the versions I've tried have seemed, rather, well, sucky.
</2002>
Good thing the Firefox guys didn't follow such thinking back then. Just because Netscape hasn't put out a decent product in over a decade, and each version since 6 is worse than the previous, doesn't mean they'll never get better. Browser fortunes rise and fall.
Believe it or not, Netscape still has great name recognition as "the other browser". I'm a little ashamed to say that my current employer advertises "Internet Explorer and Netscape" as the browsers they support, although I'm trying to change that to bring them to the 21st century.
Choice is always a good thing. Maybe Netscape will actually release a good product again someday.
So if a guy walks into a crowded building with a bomb strapped to him, everyone should just ignore him as long as the bomb features blinking lights and exposed wires?
Not so fast... that's only true if you're using the regular "Avoirdupois" pounds. In the Troy system, which is used for precious metals and gems, a pound is only 12 ounces!
I read a "brain teaser" once that asked: Which is heavier, a pound of gold or a pound of feathers? Of course, we've all heard a variation of this question (usually bricks and feathers), and know that the answer is that they weigh the same -- one pound. However, a pound of feathers weighs more than a pound of gold, because feathers are measured using the avoirdupois system (1 pound = about 453.59 g) while gold uses Troy (1 pound = about 373.24 g).
Apparently not only has parent never seen Office Space, a whole lot of /.ers never have either. Shame on the lot of you.
Reminds me of one of the funniest responses I've seen in The Onion's "What do you think" column, asking what people thought of the FCC's decision to review lifting the in-flight cell phone rule:
It's obviously been a very long time since you've coded in PHP. The native PDO layer in PHP 5 supports bound parameters for all database drivers, and there are numerous other data abstraction layers that support this which have been around even longer.
Just because all these "popular PHP applications" you mention (care to cite examples?) don't follow good programming practice doesn't mean the language itself is flawed. PHP can't force someone to write good code.
You've gotta be careful with that approach. I've seen some very poorly-coded OSS projects, and they tend to be the smaller ones. Just because it's open source doesn't mean it's well-coded!
Rather, it may be more helpful to look at large OSS projects, but one where you can concentrate only on a smaller module. Something like Apache, Subversion, the Linux kernel, etc. These projects tend to have much better coding guidelines in place, and their development lists are very active with good discussions on best practices, refactoring methods, etc.
The smaller projects are more often run by just a single person or two, which means that they aren't as diligent in discussing changes beforehand and following well-established development practices.
Getting a terabyte of data onto a DVD is easy. You simply render the bits using little colored shapes instead of traditional laser-beam pits and valleys.
It's articles like this that clearly demonstrate one thing: the only single useful tag to come out of the whole Slashdot tagging beta is "slashdotted".
Now, when I see that tag, I don't even bother clicking until it's off the front page (or use mirrordot of course).
HA! You were WRONG all those years, Mom! Sitting up straight isn't better... IN YOUR FACE!! BOOOYAAAAA...
But is it almost literally, or literally almost? What would make it true life after death? (Literally)
I dunno, but if there are that many government employees going to auction sites, I'm gonna go try to sell my hammer on eBay for $600...