[CALUG] irc client in Fedora 12

[Bryan J Smith]

From: Walt Smith <waltechmail at yahoo.com>
>Of course.
>But, and here's the but... I don't any reason not to have a reasonably simple
>page ( from a single link at some level 1-2-3 page) with a list of previous
>releases.   Not having it is more of a marketing decision.

Mirrors are free to return the many GiBs of disk space by removing older, 
discontinued and unmaintained releases. 


> Specially on the fedoraproject.org site.   And I can't image for the 
>repositories
> having some subset with older software is a bad thing ??
> (Obviously I'm not saying ALL the repose should have ALL the software.. and 2
> years old is not THAT old !!!  )

In the upstream open source world, it's _old_.  Most distributions drop support 
for old releases after 12-24 months.

> Probably.  But each new release of Fedora gives me something to ponder--
> whether it  *might* have something of interest.  And I lose nothing by 
sticking
> with an earlier Fedora.

Red Hat Enterprise Linux is based on Fedora.  So why not just use it instead, or 
a free rebuild of it?

> I'm obviously not paying monetary for the distro...( errr. 

Then run a free rebuild of Red Hat Enterprise Linux.  Either that or pay the 
small subscription price (sub-$100) for the developer version, which I do 
personally myself for non-production servers and VMs (under Fedora KVM) at home.

I've been loading up some RHEL build environments as I'm re-enabling my Fedora 
Maintainer status over the next month.  I have some packages I want to push into 
EPEL.

> So the support I'd get from RHEL is the same as support from Fedora.
> no difference.

Big difference.  RHEL has updates with security fixes for up to 10 years.  Even 
better, updates are designed with ABI/API compatibility in mind, so they won't 
break things.

The concept of support and SLAs in RHEL is only a part of the value of RHEL.  
There's a much bigger discussion.

> I wasn't blaming Fedora for particular program changes, but Fedora
> does  select which apps to include in a distro.  And they change them often.
> So I blame upstream for specific app changes and Fedora for selecting the 
apps.

Fedora ships a lot of different applications, just like other distributions.  
Fedora is even starting to rival Debian when it comes to the software in its 
base repository, because of the large community of contributors.  I don't 
understand your point.  Pick a distro, and explore what it offers.

Whether it's Fedora or otherwise, just get out there and _run_ the 
distribution.  If you don't like the rate of upgrades and change, then pick a 
7-10 year Enterprise Linux distribution, or something with a Long Term Support 
(LTS) 3-5 year release.

> My bigger problem is one app that simply doesn't work.
> Never has.    It could very well be "my fault".  But fault tolerance
> ( errr... user tolerance ) is really not something any linux is known for.

I don't understand this point at all.  (?)  Please explain.

> When it works, it works well, as long as you don't break it.
> In my  experience, Windows is generally more fault tolerant.
> And better at recovery in normal use.   

I would argue the exact opposite.  Linux is recoverable.  Windows is not in most 
cases.  That's why most Windows Servers are run under VMware, so there is the 
option of snapshot recovery.  If Windows cannot boot, you're in real trouble.  
That's why I have professionally run Windows Server only under VMware ESX since 
2004 (and KVM/RHEV more recently).

Furthermore, Windows dorks itself up far more than Linux.  That's why rebooting 
Windows often works.  When Linux is broken, it's broken and a reboot will not 
work, but only a reconfiguration to fix the problem.  But it happens far, far 
less in Linux.  And, again, when Windows cannot reboot ... game over.

Microsoft did a faux study several years back about recovery and downtime.  What 
they failed to mention was that all of the failures were simulated.  I.e., 
induced.  What they did not study is the actual creation of real faults in the 
system.  That utterly made the study null'n void as the rate of random faults in 
Windows are a joke compared to Linux, especially Enterprise Linux.

Anyone with experience in Linux can typically solve the issue.  Those 
experienced with Windows are often unable to, often because Windows does not 
allow the same level of access.  I cannot emphasize this point enough, including 
at my current client.  I kid you not, my current client is making comparisons to 
Red Hat regarding why Microsoft does not provide similar solutions over the last 
few weeks.

As a current MCITP on 2008, even I'm getting pulled in (despite who I work for).

I would argue strongly that your statements are based on only Windows' ability 
to recover itself with a reboot.  In the case of Linux, reboot doesn't matter.  
A mis-configuration is a mis-configuration.  If you reboot Linux you'll just 
reboot into the exact same state.  ;)

> Everything is moving from 2D apps to 3D apps.
> ( and I have not even seen a 3D app personally yet..
> I just read about it in the posts ).

Fedora 15 ships GNOME 3 shell, which leverages the 3D framebuffer.  If 3D is 
disabled, then it will fall back to IceWM.

In either case, it's darn fast.  Even a single core, 1.2GHz AMD will whip 
through the interface fast -- both IceWM or full GNOME 3.

> But old user problems are still there.
> Am I pissed.  no.
> Am I disappointed? yes.
> Am I still using linux after all these years ?   yes.

Why?  If Linux has all these issues compared to Windows, I'd run Windows.  I 
don't because Linux doesn't have the issues of Windows.  But if you do, by all 
means, run Windows!

I hate to say it, but unless you have specifics, and file Bugzilla ( 
http://bugzilla.redhat.com ) report for them, no one in the Fedora community is 
going to stop and listen.  They are looking for contributors and users who 
provide specific feedback.  It's called community.

> But if someone occasionally doesn't tell the emperor he
> has no clothes, next years fashions won't mean a whole lot.
> Specially to a new buyer.

There is no "buyer" of Fedora.  Fedora is releases for free and is total 
freedom.  There is no "consumer," only "contributors."   Think that is the point 
that is continually missed.

Fedora cares about "contributors."  People who add to the community.  Fedora is 
not demand-supply, it's community.

> I'll be looking at F16.   I see several changes that are mentioned in
> news items, but would like to see more discussion here as to pro's and cons
> of coming changes.

Again, I don't know what you are looking for.  You say you don't need to 
upgrade, but you then are looking for new features.

I honestly think something like RHEL would be best for you, given your need for 
updates that don't change anything.

> By the way, from what I've seen, there's a lot of disappointment
> with Ubuntu using the Unity, even though you can supposedly use a gnome
> desktop in 11.04 (?).   Haven't seen much  discussion here,  but there's a lot 

> of verbosity elsewhere.

I was a hopeful fan of Unity.  But given how slick and fast GNOME 3 Shell is, 
I've totally ignored GNOME 2 and Unity options now.