[PLUG] Distro concerns

[Matt McKenzie]

Hello,


On Wed, Sep 2, 2009 at 2:50 PM, Michael Robinson
<plug_1 at robinson-west.com>wrote:

> I have been trying to build a local repository of the Fedora 10 updates,
> but now there is Fedora 11.  Yikes!
>
>
Yes Fedora 11 is out, with 12 on the way.  It is a 6 month cycle.
If that is too fast for you, Fedora is not your best option.
However, they do officially support the N-1 release, which means each
release is supported for 12 months.  Fedora 10 is supported until Fedora 12
is released, and 11 is supported until 13 is released.
By supported I mean questions in the forums and IRC channels, security
updates, bugfixes, etc.


> I wish there was an attempt to take a stable distro like CentOS which
> works without updates and add modern features to it.  I realize that
> CentOS is an enterprise distribution that tries to follow RHEL, but
> the problem is that there needs to be something between CentOS and
> Fedora.
>
> It isn't easy to build local update repositories, or maybe I just am
> not the best at it.
>

I am trying to understand your bottom line here- you want a stable distro,
that doesn't have updates, yet you want modern features?  You either have
stable (CentOS, Debian Stable, Ubuntu LTS), or you have modern (Fedora,
Debian Testing, Ubuntu current), there really isn't much middle ground.  I'm
not sure but OpenSuSE and Mandriva probably fall into the "modern" category
as well, being desktop focused.

As far as "between CentOS and Fedora", if you mean the old vs. new package
point of view, would probably be the previous release of Fedora, as
mentioned above the releases are supported for 2 release cycles or 12
months.  So if you want somewhat more stable than Fedora 11, stick with 10.
But be prepared to upgrade when 12 comes out.  You can stay one behind if
you want, but once you are two releases behind you are no longer supported.

And what exactly do you mean "works without updates"?  You can run any
distro without updates, just don't expect to remain secure.  Is your problem
internet bandwidth, you don't want to have to download the updates?

I know for Fedora, there are the Fedora Unity "respin" ISOs, which are
released periodically, and contain all of the updates to that point.  So at
some point there will be a Fedora 11 respin release, with all the updates up
to the date of release, so you can just install it and be good to go,
without having to install all the updates since 11 was initially released.
These are not "official" ISOs, but they are suggested for those who don't
have the bandwidth to download all the updates.

http://spins.fedoraunity.org/unity

It looks like they have torrents for the Fedora 10 respins, but not the 11
respins yet.



>
> I find the Ubuntu root business with sudo a bit odd.  I am also
> uncomfortable with the fact that Ubuntu tends to be installed from
> a CD that doesn't contain most of the Ubuntu packages.  I don't want
> to use a Linux distribution that isn't supported for very long if
> I'm expected to go to the Internet to get packages for it.  Even
> though Ubuntu is supposedly a desktop operating system, I know my
> brother uses it on his server system.
>
> The nice thing about CentOS is that you can literally order a DVD
> for it and without the updates it will work.
>
> I wish there was a Linux distro that takes Fedora and fixes anything
> that breaks before making a new release.  No updates between releases.
> Frequent releases with the ability to upgrade existing systems.
>
>
I am not sure I understand your point here- Fedora project takes the release
and "fixes anything that breaks" with updates, that's what they are there
for.  You want it to be "fixed" but you don't want any updates?  If you want
there to be 0 bugs in any given release, that is a pipe dream for any
software, commercial or open source.  Bugs happen, updates fix them.

And you want more frequent releases than 6 months (Fedora style)?

Most current distros have the upgrade option, Fedora and Ubuntu included.
Going from Fedora 10 to Fedora 11 example, you can do it with a CD/DVD, or
there are ways to do it with the update repos.
However as with any OS, it is better to back up data and install the new one
fresh.

To put it another way, how many people still run a machine that originally
had Win95, then did upgrade installs of Win98, WinME, Win2k, XP, Vista, and
soon Win7?  Making the jump from the old DOS based Win95/98/ME to the NT
based Win2K/XP/Vista would be very messy if not impossible, without a fresh
install.  And just going from one major release to another would be rather
messy as well and is not recommended.  Granted MS systems tend to gain much
more bloat than Linux, but you can see the gist of it.



----
Matt M.
LinuxKnight