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Debian

Wichert Akkerman, Last Interview as Debian Project Leader 31

Posted by michael from the this-is-what-happens-when-you-volunteer dept.
Denial writes "Wichert Akkerman, the outgoing Debian Project Leader, has been interviewed on DebianPlanet. After two terms as the leader of the debian project, Wichert has decided to call it quits. He talks about how the election for a leader works, his plans for the future (VA Linux) and about the future of Debian. Interesting stuff."
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Wichert Akkerman, Last Interview as Debian Project Leader More

Wichert Akkerman, Last Interview as Debian Project Leader

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  • Time for Linux to move on... (Score:1)

    by Anonymous Coward
    RedHat, Suse, Corel and Debian must unite and make the Linux Corporation ltd with Linus Torvalds as president. AND GO COMMERCIAL. Forget GPL, open source etc. When WINDOWS XP hits Linux, it would be too late. Come on, it is time to hit Micro$oft with its own weapons!!!
  • Hey Jules, what's up? Long time no see... :0)
  • So says Netcraft [netcraft.com].

    Ironic.
    ---------
  • Uh, that's not from some port scan, that's what the server says in it's headers. In this case, it was Apache compiled for Red Hat Linux by Red Hat, so the server version line says that, and the version is returned with each http request.

    Try this:

    $ telnet www.debianplanet.org 80
    Trying 212.1.134.138...
    Connected to www.debianplanet.org.
    Escape character is '^]'.
    GET / HTTP/1.0<CR>
    <CR>
    HTTP/1.1 200 OK
    Date: Fri, 16 Feb 2001 17:52:35 GMT
    Server: Apache/1.3.14 (Unix) (Red-Hat/Linux)
    PHP/4.0.4
    X-Powered-By: PHP/4.0.4
    Connection: close
    Content-Type: text/html

    <!doctype html public "-//w3c//dtd html 4.0 transitional//en">
    <html>
    <head>
    ...

    So unless they have installed a Red Hat 7 apache rpm package on Debian, thy're using Red Hat 7 (the php 4.0.4 stuff indicates Red Hat 7).

  • my take on his statement was more that that market is taken care of by other distributions of linux.

    Debian doesnt need to become like SuSE or Mandrake or Red Hat because SuSE, Mandrake and Red Hat already exist. Debian can continue in it's own way and become it's own niche (which, arguably, it already has done).

    Personally, i have a machine at home running SuSE and a machine at home running Debian. I like them both.

    Darth -- Nil Mortifi, Sine Lucre

  • why bother responding if you know its a troll. besides that isn't a good 'old style' troll, everything is spelled correctly. if it was truly up to the old standards, akkerman would have been misspelled ackerman or something.
  • Hey. Interesting.

    There's a way you can follow the GPL while practically charging for the software. Just an idea, and I don't think it's a loophole.

    GPL makes you distribute the source. Sure, distribute it. However, don't distribute the binaries. Distribute a whole CD of source.

    Most people don't bother to compile anyway - then you'll charge people for the service of "compiling" the whole mess.

    Sounds outlandish but it can start a pretty nice discussion I guess.
  • >There's no reason to cater to people who can't
    >handle technical details, that market's already
    >taken care of.

    I beg to differ. The "market's taken care of" is "people who can't handle technical details AND don't care about an unstable system". By a very famous software company ;)

    However, there are also a whole handful of people "who can't handle technical details BUT want a rock solid system all the time".

    Now this is the market. Even some people from the "can handle technical details" group LIKE graphical installers and such, like myself. It is a lot easier to make a mistake in dselect than, say, the Stormix installer.
    It is the *usability* of the software that matters. And no, poor usability *cannot* be compansated by technical users. They *can* handle intricate technical details, but it doesn't mean they *have to*.
  • "And let me tell you, they don't want Debian! Why not you ask?"

    No, I don't ask. And I don't care. Who fucking cares about corporate uptake of Debian? Go away.

  • yeah, and i'd like to know how they distinguish between linux distros by scanning ports and the like.
  • The thing about Debian is that in addition to all the hardcore pure Debian users you have other distros that are based on Debian plus some bells and whistles. Corel and Storm did this for a while, and Progeney is still doing it. When you count the people using a superset of Debian its percentages go up. What other distribution can you grab the whole main archive of, and know that everything is licensed in a Free as in speach manner. The only licensing issues you have to work out are with the packages you add yourself.

    In the past couple of years Debian has had some rocky times, and made some major changes. There was a period of time when they were not accepting new maintainers and a lot of packages fell by the wayside during that time. There were some problems with coordinating the release of the newest release (potato) between the various architectures. I think what he means by this comment is that his bigest accomplishment is not screwing anything up so bad that Debian died.
  • Geez. I never realized he said this, I had to look it up and "verify" it (I found the post attributed to him anyway). I hope it was faked up because that quote is just about the most hypocritical tripe I've ever seen.

    I hope this view is not common to people who support GPL. Free as in speech, does not mean Free except when I want recompense.

    Thanks for the nugget.
  • HGttG: The guy on the top is there to draw off the attention from the real power.
  • "Wichert Akkerman" is kind of a scary name. It suggests demonic uses of Ackermann's function, no? Oh, well, back to Nickelodeon.
  • I wouldn't moderate that as funny... I think it should be "insightful". Do not forget "Open Source", but forget "free" as in "free beer".
  • Hey, as a pretty dumb user, I actually would like that. The fact is, that the better the installation and configuration GUI becomes, the less the user, who doesn't know Unix/Linux, will learn it. As soon as you want to run your own little network at home and get independent from the "technical" folks, you regret not having learned how to compile etc. I think it always a hassle to find out which app was compiled with what as a default.

    No, I disagree that you make money with compiling the whole "mess". Just sell the source without the binaries plus very good tutorials, explaining the "mess" and give advice, when and why and for what you should compile and configure in a certain way. The tutorials should cost a little money.

    The web is full of online free tutorials. As much as I love that (and depend on them), I think that is too much to give away.

    For example I love rootprompt.org for what they collect and point to. That's a site I actually as a newcomer would already pay some subscription fees to. Just for the convenience.
  • From reading it it sounds as if Debian is an example of a project being successfully maintained "by a committee" and not under the ultimate control of one guy

    Well, I read Debian-Devel and you wouldn't know that Wichert is the big boss only from reading that. In fact, nobody really seems to decide anything, it's basically discussed until a conclusion is found, and it's not like Wichert saying 'No, that won't work, EOT'

  • Re:Debian: the future is commercial? (Score:2)

    by Anonymous Coward
    Q: How can you identify a troll on Slashdot?

    A: They are the only ones who use correct spelling and puncuation.
  • The beginning of the end for debian? Corel being one of the most popular distrobutions? I don't know what people around here have been smoking, but of all the people I know, debian is used the most. Granted, it's not the easiest thing to get installed and running, but once you've got it setup, it's great. It's interesting how people who like a product tend to predict the "begining of the end" for it's competitors. How many times have you heard linux bigots say that it's the beginning of the end for microsoft? Or how about Microsoft people talking about the end of Apple? Or NT people talking about the end of UNIX as a whole? As long as there are people that still care about it, it'll keep being a worthy distro to install. Nite_Hawk
  • But it doesn't look like they're going to budge on their ideologies, which is a pity. Ideologies don't put bread on the table. Unless you're Richard Stallmann, who seems to have somehow managed it. But anyway, until Debian loosen up, I'll be recommending Mandrake as the superior distribution.

    Hmmm... I'm just in the process of rolling out Debian onto all our (previously Mandrake 7.2) machines. Why? Much better install, much better package management, much better stability, much easier administration. There must be something that makes Mandrake a 'superior' distribution in your eyes, but speaking as someone who has been using Linux for eight years and delivering Linux solutions to corporate customers for six, I can't think of one.

    I don't find this at all surprising. Many commercial businesses (IBM, Microsoft, Apple, Be, Acorn to name a few) have tried to develop a new mass market operating system kernel over the past decade. Only Microsoft has had any success, and theirs isn't very good. In the same period a loose anarchic collection of volunteers have produced Linux. If you didn't think Linux was better than what the commercial economy can produce. you wouldn't be persuading your clients to use it. So it shouldn't surprise you that the non-commercial distribution is measurably better than the commercial ones.

  • There are a number of problems that arise when a commercial entity tries to sell a free distribution such as Debian.

    Selling what you could otherwise get for free..

    What do you think is going through the mind of a Stormix or Corel customer? "Why am I paying Corel for Debian when I can simply install and maintain it for free by going directly to Debian?"

    Commercial distributions (forks) often break packages

    We saw this with Corel. They worked to create a commercial version of Debian, making custom packages that often break dependencies with packages from Debian proper. This makes it difficult to maintain an machine with packages that have cross-dependencies between the commercial entity and Debian proper. The helix-gnome packages are another example of this.

    The thing these entities do not realize is that if they feel a package must be "updated", simply providing a Non-Maintainer Update or patch is often the fastest and easiest way to update Debian, rather than forking the distribution and trying to maintain compatibility between them.

    The Debian Project has different goals than a commercial entity

    When the roadmap that the commercial entity requires its product to be at a certain stage at a certain time, having a product that it does not maintain internally becomes largely problematic. A company may be willing to become an integral member of the Debian community, contributing its time, money, and resources to improving Debian proper. Yet, when the community does not agree or comply with the desires of the company, it's often a hard pill to swallow. What do you tell your customers and investors when you fail to move Debian in the direction you would like to go?

    This symbiotic relationship requires a very open mind by the commercial entity. It has to be willing to accept the ebb and flow of Debian proper, and disregard what the company may traditionally view as a loss of time and resources. Instead they have to look at the glass as half-full, not half-empty, and make the best of the situation. Most companies are not willing to do that, and most investors do not like to see their money "squandered".

    What commercial model "works" with Debian?

    That's the million-dollar question, isn't it? Perhaps taking queues from Progeny Linux [progeny.com] would help in answering this question. Perhaps look at LinuxCare's support models [linuxcare.com]. IMHO, Debian should be viewed as a centerpiece tool for support models rather than a focus for a product model. It simply will not integrate well as the latter, but can work quite well in the former. "Our Developers work as members of the Debian Project and the Open Source community to bring you the most reliable, stable, and useable distribution of Linux available. When we find problems or bugs, we will not only provide you with timely fixes, we will give these fixes back to Debian in that same prompt manner."


    --

  • There are plenty of non-free software packages available for Debian, some apt-get able from the standard archive, and others from additional archive. There's also some packages (pine) which are only installable via source as modified binaries cannot be installed.

    What is your problem with Debian? Not able to make money out of it??

  • Guess that you could say that he is leaving Debian with the hot potato...

  • Re:The beginning of the end for Debian (Score:3)

    by kju ( 327 ) on Thursday February 15, 2001 @04:43AM (#430526)
    Excuse me, but the american president was too already *on* *the* *way* out of his job before a new one was named. This is the usual way in the past and in the future.

    Wichert will be debian leader until the new one is elected, so where is your problem? The transition period is always a problem in fields where people are elected.

    And regarding non-free: What have you smoked? For the first there are debian maintainers who do package non-free software for use with debian. If you miss a software, just contact a friendly debian maintainer or post it on the list. Probably someone will help you. Some of the most popular non-free software is included within debian for years.

    Of course debian can not package all software, but that holds true for free software as well. Debian currently has thousands of packages and its getting harder to keep the control.

    If you like debian, ask the authors of said programs which are not included to build debian packages. Show your support for debian and demand such packages! Or if the software is important enough: Again: ask a debian maintainer or post to the appropiate debian lists. There are defined ways for requesting a package!

    And whats about commercial software, debian can not package most of them regarding to license issues. But, hey, if you are paying for the software, its your right as a customer to demand a debian package from the manufacturer.

    Show the world that debian is a highly demanded linux distribution, and the world will give you the packages. But DO something instead of whining and FUD.

  • Re:The beginning of the end for Debian (Score:3)

    by Jules Bean ( 27082 ) on Thursday February 15, 2001 @04:32AM (#430527)

    Do you think so? I'm unconvinced. In fact, I'm not sure if the proportion of non-free software on Linux has even gone up over the last (say) two years. I think probably it's gone down, with a huge number of new open source projects getting close to full functionality, and some prominent non-free projects going free (mysql, netscape, staroffice==openoffice).

    Speaking for me personally, the only non-free on my machine is netscape and a couple of games. I still hope that mozilla will one day soon be a usable as netscape (and I've also just installed konqueror, which looks nice).

    Heck, even quake is free and will be moving to debian's main archive soon.

    I don't think the lack of official support for non-free is too much of an issue for potential Debian users: apt still installs non-free, and people still sell non-free CDs. I think a bigger issue will be that debian's usability advantages (apt, consistent configuration handling) will be adopted by the other distributions. Not that I mind, of course... everybody wins when things get better.

    In terms of debian's leadership, several strong candidates have already put themselves forwards (you should be able to see the nominations at the list archives [debian.org]). I think this coming year will be good for Debian (first release with a fully usable KDE as well as GNOME desktop, for one thing) as well as for the free software community in general.

  • Re:The beginning of the end for Debian (Score:3)

    by SquadBoy ( 167263 ) on Thursday February 15, 2001 @04:58AM (#430528) Homepage Journal
    0. Nice old style troll.
    1. Debian does *not* refuse to include non-free software it goes in non-free you then choose to use non-free or not when you install (and can of course always change this choice by editing one text file after the fact) If you don't know what non-free means in that context odds are you are not going to get Debian up and running without the help of someone who does.
    2. Debian is not about getting users. It is about a good solid easy to maintain stable distro that is good for the people who use it. For the most part the people who maintain Debian do so for the same reason a butcher sharpens his knives. If you don't understand think about it for a minute.
    3. Get a sense of humor. That was a *funny* line.

  • Re:No power to the guy at the top? (Score:3)

    by davejhiggins ( 188370 ) on Thursday February 15, 2001 @04:31AM (#430529) Homepage

    Lol... we must seek out the real Leader of the Debian Project... who must by definition be the man who would least want to do it... indeed, one who refuses to even believe that Debian exists.

    Bill Gates? ;)

    Dave

    --
    If you think this is a troll you really don't read enough Douglas Adams

  • No power to the guy at the top? (Score:3)

    by davejhiggins ( 188370 ) on Thursday February 15, 2001 @04:10AM (#430530) Homepage

    I was interested reading the "...in reality most of it is delegated to others..." and "..the only real decisions you get to make directly if I remember correctly is appointing delegates." bits. From reading it it sounds as if Debian is an example of a project being successfully maintained "by a committee" and not under the ultimate control of one guy. Compared to, say, the linux kernel where Linus gets the final say on what goes in and Slashdot, where presumably Taco gets the last word on everything.

    Do people agree? Is this really proof that there are other successful formulas besides the "one amazing guy" one, or do those on the inside think that the Debian project would be more streamlined / fast-moving if it was controlled by one person more than a committee? (Or am I just talking crap as usual;) ?

    Dave

  • Re:Debian: the future is commercial? (Score:3)

    by herk ( 313044 ) on Thursday February 15, 2001 @05:30AM (#430531) Homepage
    Why must we commercialize every form of Linux? I've used Debian for some time now, and found it vastly superior to any commercial flavor I'd worked with previously. Debian represents a viable alternative for Linux users who don't require a fancy install procedure or commercial support, but prefer to have more power and control. There's no reason to cater to people who can't handle technical details, that market's already taken care of.

    Personally I'd rather have my distribution maintained by people doing it because they love it, rather than because someone's paying them too.

  • Re:No power to the guy at the top? (Score:5)

    by Jules Bean ( 27082 ) on Thursday February 15, 2001 @04:51AM (#430532)
    Yes, you're right, it is interesting. How Debian continues to function is a constant source of amazement to me, but it does nonetheless...

    More or less, Debian functions by consensus, and small areas of local authority. So, just as Linux has the absolute last word about the kernel, each debian developer has the last word about his particular package. In principle, the developers en masse or the project leader can overrule a developer but this very, very, very rarely happens. I can't recall a specific instance at all.

    In general, discussions carried out on the mailing list suffice to convince people amicably.

    I find the most interesting phenomenon the way my trust (and presumably other peoples') of particular email addresses builds over the months. When I keep seeing a particular email address giving well reasoned arguments, I start to trust that person to understand complex issues, and simply take their word on things I may not have time to investigate fully.

    So no, it's not committee as such. More community (oops.. that word will get me in trouble!)

    Jules

  • Re:My take on Debian (Score:5)

    by Jules Bean ( 27082 ) on Thursday February 15, 2001 @04:40AM (#430533)
    No, of course not. People jumping on the Linux bandwagon typically want a supported solution, and Debian doesn't offer a supported solution; that's not our business. Some companies do offer supported solutions based on Debian (for example, VA and Progeny) but I'm quite aware that RedHat has most of that share; if you're recommending Mandrake to your clients, fair enough.

    There's room out there for more than one distro with different aims and objectives.

    When I work as a consultant (and I certainly wouldn't call myself top-flight) I recommend Debian; that's for much more down-to-earth reasons like usability, upgradability and maintainability. But my clients typically self-support, so they're not interested in paying for support licenses; that's not the right decision for every company, but it is for some.

    It's a very unusual member of the corporate world who knows enough about Linux to formulate a thought like 'if the Debian team had their way, Linux would still be booting off a floppy'! Certainly such an idea has never remotely been a Debian goal; Debian's goals relate to free software, certainly not to limited usability.

    Finally, why should we budge about our ideology? Debian is about its ideology. Other distributions may be about other things, and that's all well and good. RMS believes, and I think he may be right (and many, but certainly not all, debian developers agree with me) that free software's inherent advantages make it the best solution. Time will, presumably, show whether we were right.

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