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Queen of England Gets Red Hat 150

Posted by Roblimo from the sun-never-sets-on-the-linux-empire dept.
Zerbey writes "According to Linux Today The Royal Family's web site is now running Red Hat as apposed to Solaris. See for yourself on Netcraft. Congratulations, Ma'am :) "
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Queen of England Gets Red Hat More

Queen of England Gets Red Hat

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  • Almost true. If there is an inconclusive parliamentary election, the Queen can appoint a Prime Minister, and it can be whomever she pleases. This has almost happened a number of times. Also, she can technically dissolve parliament and call for a new election at her whim. This, as you've said, is a prerogative not exercised since the time of Queen Anne. It probably wouldn't fly today, unless some very important crisis called for it.

    All this ignores the real power of a Monarch, though. They have a sort of centrifugal effect on a country- they draw a sort of uber-loyalty that transcends mere politics. It's very valuable to have such a symbol of continuity and immutability, particularly in tough times. Ideally, they'd serve as a role model for the nation, though some royal families (the Windsors!!) have done an awful job of fulfilling this responsibility.

    Maybe choosing Linux for Her Majesty's Web Servers is a good first step on the road to Windsor redemption.

  • but ms uses bsd... and so do A LOT of isps, it's not like bsd is more obscure than linux or anything, sure less folks know about it but that doesn't make it less used. Just don't use redhat if you don't want to be using what they're using. Personally i don't find it cool to switch os'es because one is "less cool" than another. I don't use redhat- but only because i don't like a distrib that depends so heavily on their gui.
    char *stupidsig = "this is my dumb sig";

  • Could we soon be kneeling and saying, "Sir Linus"?

    The rules would not permit either a "Sir Linus" or
    "Linus KBE".

    Though a "Sir Alan Cox" would be possible...
  • you're right that it could be a firewall, else why does the current ervice look like its comming from a linux 2.0.x box?

    All the static pages have the suffix .htm so its could even be running windows95 for the weserver.
  • you're right that it could be a firewall, else why does the current service look like its comming from a linux 2.0.x box? ( as seen at WTF is www.royal.gov.uk [slashdot.org] )

    All the static pages have the suffix .htm so its could even be running windows95 for the weserver.
  • Obviously you know different young British people to me.
  • Sorry. It's correct. Doubly so if you're American.
  • ...the british will stop at nothing to keep their empire.

    Not strictly true, for two reasons. Firstly, there's not much of an empire left (c.f. Hong Kong, handed back to China not so long ago), and Australia isn't part of the `empire' (on which, of course, the sun never sets :); it's part of the Commonwealth, which means that the Queen is officially head of state. Practically, it seems to mean the odd state visit here and there, to allow someone a pot-shot at Prince Charles :)

  • Well she probably has her own personal Linux guru to help her out. Hmm, wonder if I could get a job... :-)
  • That would be the current version of the old saying.

    Incidentally back in my grandfather's day the wags used to add to that ...because God doesn't trust an Englishman in the dark.

    :-)

    Cheers,
    Ben
  • Couldnt it be that the Sun box was the firewall ?

    The firewall (where I work) is running Solaris, and all of the servers in the DMZ are running IIS or apache. Perhaps the firewall has changed, or the firewall was changed to linux.

    No way to tell, if they are behind a tuff firewall.
  • But the thought of having to address current Red Hat luminaries with titles is odd, "Sir Robert", "Lord Donnie", and so on.
  • Well...officially you call her "Your Majesty" when first introduced and from then on can get away with "Ma'am". Point taken though :)

  • I thought the US system was summed up well many years ago, when the Beyond the Fringe gang explained the political system in the US to a UK person: ``There are two parties in the US: the Republican party, which is the equivalant of our Tory party, and the Democratic party, which is the equivalant of our Tory party.''

    cjs

  • Not the first time (Score:3)

    by Squirtle ( 73289 ) on Saturday September 18, 1999 @11:11PM (#1674692) Homepage
    She was a RedHat user a year or so ago. Then she experimented with Solaris, but now she's back.

    I bet she got sick of recompiling KDE and just installs it from RPMs nowadays.

  • Maybe she found Solaris licensees to expensive to maintain. Hmmm. Pehaps not - I guess there must have been another reason to switch to Red Hat. I wonder what.


    -W
  • Actually, the young British people I know are really young Scottish people, and maybe there is a distinction there regarding loyalty to the Queen. Thing is, I lived in England for four years, and in the whole time I lived there, the only person I met who expressed support for the Monarchy was a certain technical support Bob going by the nickname of Zerbey....
  • Now that Australia is voting to remove the royal family from the ruling status, they finally do something worthwhile. Maybe we should have options like this in our upcoming referendum:
    Should Australia become a republic?
    1 Yes
    2 No
    3 No, because they use linux

    Perhaps this is the best thing related to the royal family that has happened in a long while :)

  • Comment removed (Score:3)

    by account_deleted ( 4530225 ) on Saturday September 18, 1999 @11:16PM (#1674697)
    Comment removed based on user account deletion
  • As a Brit living in California - this is looking like a hell of a lot more of a Police State than Jolly ol' England, or most of Europe for that matter.

    Get a clue.

    j.
  • You know, I always get the impression that America would love to have colonies, if it were politically correct to do so...

    j.
  • This is truly hearsay, but I heard that the decision was made by a sub-contractor. But still it is a nice decision and Red Hat should certainly see whether they can get the standard, By appointment to... line approved. (At least for their British sales.)

    :-)

    Cheers,
    Ben
  • Yep, she even changed official protocol so that bowing etc is optional.

    j.

  • I have no idea, but I kind of doubt it was due to monetary concerns.

    I never did like SunOS or Solaris, though. At work the "time clock" runs on SunOS and is practically guaranteed to go down each and every day. I hate writing times down in a book.

  • ...which, remember, is exactly the same support we (the UK) give to the USAF when we let them fly F-111's etc. out of British bases.

    I think the proof-of-capability bombing of the airfield at Port Stanley by an RAF Vulcan was pretty cool - pitty one of them had to go and break a refuelling boom so it couldn't make it back to home soil...

    j.

  • Glad to see everyone associates the Queen with RedHat now thanks to someone at the 700+ command of power making the decision :-)

    But the queen does need a stable website like she needed that hip replacement. After all, if another one of the royals die, she can totally ignore their death on a stable server.

    Fumbling towards royalty,
    Matthew
    _____________________________________
  • ..ROTFL. As Jeremy Clarkson observed re the American war of independence:

    'It was a civil war. Therefore, we kicked our own butts'.

    j.

  • I can see it now: (Score:4)

    by ptomblin ( 1378 ) <ptomblin@xcski.com> on Saturday September 18, 1999 @11:25PM (#1674706) Homepage Journal
    Red Hat Linux, By Appointment To Her Majesty The Queen.
  • Nah, she's alive and well and having JFK Jr.'s love child.

    :-)

    james
  • My original headline for this was "Tux: By Royal Appointment" *shrug*

  • Cretin (Score:1)

    by tobyp ( 10493 )
    Ghandi was killed by a Hindu nationalist - same as those right wing BJP arseholes who seem so keen on destroying mosques at the moment. Toby Poynder

  • This may be a bit off topic, but... (Score:5)

    by Anonymous Coward on Sunday September 19, 1999 @01:45AM (#1674711)

    ...could any of you Linux experts give an old lady a hand?

    Now that I got the server and the firewall running fine and dandy, I have been trying to set up a WWW site that would allow me to map the genealogical data of our fairly unique family tree. I'd like to find an application that would enable me to do this automatically.

    All of the software I've tried so far crashes with "Too many unreferenced child nodes", "Circular references not permitted" or "Tree does not branch".

    Any tips are greatly appreciated. Thanks in advance, dudes!

    st4y k00l,

    Her Majesty the Queen of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland and West Indies^W^W^W

  • I love reading all this crap about the Queen, it's really quite entertaining! Maybe 300 years ago, it would mean something, but today? Come on! The Queen holds no power over Great Britain, let alone Austalia and Canada. It's all -symbolic-!

    BTW, most of us Brits really don't care about the Queen anyway, and whether people want or don't want the Queen to have anything to do with their country doesn't matter to us. We don't give a shit, and I seriously doubt the Queen cares much either.

    Why not rant about something that has meaning in today's world, like Tibet or East Timor or something.
  • In a move hailed by the Green Party, Christopher Hitchens, and Italian PM Massimo d'Alema, the Labour Party announced that they will use Slackware [slackware.com] instead.

    "Finally Labour is going back to its proletarian roots" an enthusiastic Christopher Hitchens was quoted as saying, expressing his hope that the adoption of OpenSource "will hasten the demise of that bunch of inbred, brain-addled morons". Asked to specify who he was refering to (Labour or the Crown), Hitchens declined to comment.

    Others were not so thrilled. An angry Richard Stallman summoned the British consul to his Boston office and upbraided the diplomat for "the imperial arrogance" shown by the crown by not referring to "Red Hat GNU/Linux".

    Meanwhile the Conservative Party expressed regret that the Queen had not "shown support for free enterprise and Capitalism" by adopting Microsoft's Internet Server. A spokesman for the Tories added, "we'll have lots more to say about this on our web site, just as soon as we reboot".
  • Now go away, or I shall taunt you a second time!
  • I bet she doesn`t even know her server`s running RedHat. Someone somewhere will have the job of sorting it out silently, and as long as it works (or even if it doesn`t), she won`t know or care what the webserver is being run on.
  • Well, that is nitpicking, but why should anyone that is not a citizen of the UK address her as if she was their queen?

    To me, a Greek citizen (that has lived for several years in Scotland btw), she is just another person. I would probably ignore her or just say "Hi there, what's up?" if I met her.

    Just FYI, The Greek constitution prohibits Greek citizens from accepting titles of honour. Which makes sense. After all, how can all people be equal if some are more equal than others (as George Orwell put it very eloquently)?

    No offence, but in my book absolutely noone has to address British Lords, Sirs, Dukes and whatnot with their title. If they are offended, tough. I don't care. If they are disappointed that people in other countries don't treat them in a special way, again, that's tough. Expecting to be treated as royalty outside the empire (what's left of it anyway) is really backwards. They should just be glad that the majority of the brits still do them the courtesy of using their titles and maintaining monarchy, for it will not last long IMHO.

    -W
  • She don't look too majestic to me.

    You do realize that most of the world sees the queen as the mascot of the Great Britian. As far as I'm concerned, anyone who wears a title of nobility deserves disrespect, regardless of what she represents. But then again, that's just my Yankee egalitarianism talking.
  • Who Yahoo and Walnut Creek CD-Rom are?

    Face it.. they're both great operating systems.

    ...
  • The real argument for BSD is the mascot. The daemon is *way* cooler than the penguin. Figuratively.
  • Maybe she just thinks she looks better in a red hat? :)
  • They think "Oh, we can read the source, so they can't
    erally be serious, they said they were joking.. meanwhile, they keep missing that one
    single, all important line of perl code in linux v2.2 ... bwaahahaha :)
  • I know where finland is, and if the finnish government switched all their computer to linux that would be wonderful. But it is ALSO wonderful that britian and the us are using linux, right?
    char *stupidsig = "this is my dumb sig";
  • > As an American I can think of nothing that we could contribute more to our friends the Canadians and Australians than helping to eliminate the shackles of the British tyranny.

    Since the IRA stopped taking money to blow up busloads of schoolchildren you Americans just don't know what to do with yourselves.

    > Break free of the obsolete monarchy

    You're living in the past, man.

  • I noticed that www.netaid.org is also running Red Hat, cool since their claiming to be expecting 60 Million hits a day...
  • I don't have a problem calling the president of a corporation or a country 'president'. I have a problem with calling someone "Your Majesty". Greece for example is a presidential republic. I do refer to our president as "president". Difference is, he is:

    1) elected by the people
    2) remains an equal person, paying taxes and all.

    In that sense, it's nothing more than a job title. I can't really say that about "Majesty" -it is VERY different. I am quite confident that the majority of people out there can discern the difference, and I wouldn't like to explain it in detail.

    As for not addressing a queen as "Her Majesty" I don't find that disrespectful, since I simply don't recognize "Her Majesty" and I have no reason to do so. I am not being a troll here - don't misunderstand me. I'm just trying to make a point - I am a citizen of a country that all people are equal, and I find titles of honour redundant and offending. You wouldn't find me using them, and if a Queen of some other contry is offended or something if I don't address her as "Your Majesty", well, that's none of my business, she should get over it.

    -W
  • It's none of your business whether or not you offend someone? I bet you're a joy to know. This has absolutely nothing to do with the fact that she is the Queen. It's just a case of being *polite*

    I'm from the U.K. and I think that the Queen doesn't serve any useful purpose apart from bringing in the tourists. If I ever met her, I wouldn't call her a freeloader to her face. It's not because I recognise her importance, it's just that I am polite. Big deal if you respect the president of Greece more than the Queen of the U.K. They both deserve our respect and courtesy. Learn some diplomacy sometime.

  • If I saw her on the street I wouldn't even call her Ma'am, as she has no authority here in the U.S.
  • ...After all, what else would you expect redcoats to use? ;)
  • Red Hat Linux, By Appointment To Her Majesty The Queen.

    Well - not immediately. To get the official "By Appointment to HRH" one has to have been a regular supplier to the Royal Family for over 3 years.

    Oh, and you still have to actually apply for it too :-)

    Finally, it's issued to a named individual rather than an organisation.

    However, it must be nearly time for someone within the Apache group to apply.... even when on Solaris HRH was using Apache.

    S.
  • Methinks Her Majesty's Royal WebMaster, if he or she had needed to switch at all, should have chosen OpenBSD instead of Red Hat.

    I believe that for something like this, security should override all other concerns. That, and the price is approximately the same. Also, Red Hat is known not to be the world's most secure Linux distribution.

    I just hope the Royal Webmaster knows how to find and close the security holes that might exist...
  • Please, don't take that out of context - I didn't say it's none of my business if I offend *anyone*, and I assure you I'm not a total arsehole ;)

    I understand your point of being polite perfectly, but I didn't say that I'd call her a freeloader to her face - that is something *you* suggested. I agree totally with showing courtesy and respect to people that deserve it.

    Maybe it's my greek egalitarian ideology, maybe I'm nuts, bottomline is I do not and will not show extra courtesy or respect to someone *just* because they have a title of honour. I do not, and will not recognize them as valid - in my book, the Queen or any queen for that matter is equal to every other person on this planet. Now, if a person holding a title of honour *expects* everyone to treat them with extra courtesy and respect, compared to 'mere mortals' so to speak, and they are offended because someone doesn't *that's* their problem, and they should get over it.

    I stated from the start that I don't particularly like the idea of Monarchy, but I like to belive that I am a reasonable person. I hope that clears it up.

    -W
  • Glad to see her Majesty is using a decent OS; our pathetic government seem keener on sucking up to Bill G and insisting NT runs everywhere. Luckily, she's rather practical; what works is OK with her. Gawd bless you ma'am...(pauses to tug forelock). It should be remembered by non-Brits that the "Great Britain and Northern Ireland" bit is important. Most ppl forget..
  • Umm, I thought Austrailia was already a republic, but a republic that was a member of the British commonwealth, kinda like Canada, or the Bahamas.
  • Ahem...I suspect that you are rather out of touch with the British political scene. Labour (Democrat equivalents to you Yanks) are the establishment worshippers at the court of the great Bill G, whereas the Tories are those desposed to listen to something new. Try reading the history of the last twenty years in the UK...you soon see who was "anti-establishment", and it wasn't the likes of Tony Blair
  • What part of Scotland?

    Anywho... the first king of the UK was James Stuart, AKA, The King of Scotland. And the Queen Mother is Scottish too. Just thought I'd inform you...

    The Scottish rule the world.
  • Tony Blair is Bill Clinton Incarnate with an English accent. And like the US, the English have more than two parties as well, if I'm not mistaken.
  • Could we soon be kneeling and saying, "Sir Linus"?
    Will he have a Penguin on his Coat of Arms?
  • ...if a Queen of some other contry is offended or something if I don't address her as "Your Majesty", well, that's none of my business, she should get over it.

    Probably just a poor choice of words then. Sorry. But calling the Queen "Your Majesty" isn't a case of acknowledging that she is a better person than anyone else, in my opinion. It's just a case of recognising that she holds a position of authority over me. I would call her that whether or not I was a British citizen, because a title is mostly just tradition anyway.

    I'm basically in agreement with you though. I don't believe anyone is a better human being just because of their heritage. That would be bordering on racism as far as I can tell.

    For the record though, I don't respect our Prime Minister for getting elected by the public any more than I respect the Teletubbies for getting to number one in the music charts. It's basically the same thing, isn't it? Except for the fact the Teletubbies didn't lie to the public about what they would get if they bought their single.

  • > You don't really think that every single member
    > of the kennedy family died by coincidence, do > you?

    Of course not, but that was the CIA, not the royals :)
  • episode 2.3.x: from points across the globe, followers of linus trade rumors that governments in their particular part of the world have switched to linux. linux: the gnu choice of world governments. yes, linux, deposing the totaltarian dictatorship of the once mighty microsoft empire. a weekness has been found in their software and licensing; with the help of a small band of rebel fighters and one penguin the shackels of injustice will be thrown away forever. the world and indeed one day the entire universe will be saved by the open source marvel called the 'linux kernel'.

    on a serious note: this is really cool. i wonder what microsoft thinks about loosing american government support? on the point of the royal family sacking solaris, well, i used to play solaris on my atari 2600, it was cool then but pretty out of date now. 8^)
  • so linux now has england and the us goverments... now don't get me wrong but aren't those two of the most powerful goverments of earth? and linux is number 1 as an os in japan. I think that qualifies for world domination...
    char *stupidsig = "this is my dumb sig";
  • Seems, she've been slashdotted - I barly could load the frontpage...
  • Just count the red hats on http://www.royal.gov.uk/family/hmqueen.htm [royal.gov.uk]. At least 3, and a pink one extra.
  • Two things:

    1) Isn't scotland awesome!
    2) In the US, it takes an act of congress (not easy, since congress doesn't do anything) to be able to accept a title.
  • Neither Australia nor Canada nor the Bahamas is a republic. They are constitutional monarchies with a governor general representing the queen when the queen's not in country. They are all members of the Commonwealth, yes.
    Australia may become a republic in a few years it's true... but they haven't decided yet. And yes they could still remain in the Commonwealth after becoming a republic. There have been several republics in the Commonwealth for some time.
  • As a British "subject", I feel slightly more qualified to talk about this then you do. First, "billions of dollars collected from you" is rather inaccurate---first, she collects pounds, and secondly, it's more like millions or tens of millions (remember the British billion is 10^12). "Rules like she is God's right hand" is also an interesting viewpoint, given that Britain's monarchy hasn't exercised its right to veto a law passed in the UK for at least a couple of centuries.

    I'm pro-Monarchy, but only 'cos they make a nice tourist attraction.

    "I want to use software that doesn't suck." - ESR
    "All software that isn't free sucks." - RMS

  • correct.


    according to another majoritoristic view, she couldn't be said to be serious about Linux until she sports a Tux the penguin
  • A couple of centuries?? Seriously?? I have no clue about this sort of thing, but that seems to push way too far back - You're saying that the monarchy hasn't touched the laws since 1799??
  • That's right, they haven't. Actually since about 1700.
  • Your low class and lack of manners is your own problem, but as a point of fact, the Queen pays the same taxes as any other British citizen, and, though not elected, her office is certainly wanted by the vast majority of her subjects.
  • Your comment is cute! But remember that Thatcher had to wait to invade the Falklands until the US aircraft carrier and support ships had arrived to back up the tiny British navy. (Man, I love Thatcher!)

  • whitehouse.gov running Debain?

    nsa.gov running LinuxPPC?

    Slashdot.org running IIS

  • Mr Anonymous,


    So the article was not something you were interested in? Rob can't please everyones literary tastes. It was just a harmless story to say somebody in the public eye has their site hosted with our beloved OS.


    Did it ever occur to you to just skip onto something else? Your post served only to get on peoples nerves. It doesn't surprise me at all that you're a 'anonymous coward'.


    Best wishes,


    Brit who'd kick your ass
  • You know, the last time I checked, the Queen
    was still the Queen up here in Scotland, which
    means she is the Queen of Britain, even though
    I hate her, I'd prefer it if people stopped
    treating the UK as England, and ignoring the
    fact Scotland (and Wales, and Northern Ireland)
    exist.
    --
    David Taylor
    davidt-sd@xfiles.nildram.spam.co.uk
    [To e-mail me: s/\.spam//]
  • "I have no idea, but I kind of doubt it was due to monetary concerns."
    of coarse not, that is why this is so cool. Linux was chooosen purely because it's a good os.
    char *stupidsig = "this is my dumb sig";
  • Pardon me, your majesty
    I just changed my mind, lets remain a monarchy.. it could be worse, you could end up as our queen
  • She's still the Queen of Australia too.

    In fact I _think_ she is probably the Queen of
    the Commonwealth.

    Either way she is still the Queen of England even if she is also the queen of a bunch of other countries as well.
  • Actually, I think you've got the wrong war - there was no overt US involvement in the Falklands due to the Americas Treaty.

    However, the US Navy airbase at Kindley Field, Bermuda (British soil on loan) did give a few Harrier pilots a helping hand and a bit of fuel on their way from Farnborough to Ascencion.


  • So does this mean that Linus will be knighted?
  • To be honest, the thinking among young British people isn't so much "those stiking Australians getting rid of the Queen" as "how long will we have to wait before *we* can get rid of the Queen?".

  • Oxford University [oxford.ac.uk] is running on RHL too [netcraft.com], so all our major institutions are obviously catching on. Nice to see [netcraft.com] Microsoft running on a beta of NT5, you've got to admire their bravery.
  • The OS upon which the sun never sets.

    Does anyone else think it's ironic that an operating system with designs on "world domination" is being embraced wholeheartedly by governments around the world?
    ---
    Put Hemos through English 101!
    "An armed society is a polite society" -- Robert Heinlein
  • Recompile? Vuz iz zees... recompile?

    Solaris packaged KDE installations, available
    right off the KDE main site.

    pkgadd -d, baby.
    --
    Brandon Hume
    hume -> BOFH.Halifax.NS.Ca, http://WWW.BOFH.Halifax.NS.Ca/

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