Why Mandrake is Too Cool for UnitedLinux 392
An anonymous reader says "Mandrake's lastest community (spam) newsletter contains their explanation as to why they won't join in on UnitedLinux. Besides the obvious geek-fun of rolling their own distro, they claim that the underlying idea of UnitedLinux is based on a flawed comparison to the Unix world of the 80's. " I think the whole UnitedLinux thing is lame- the distros that want
to be compatible already are. UL is just the 2nd tier distros trying to get attention and ink away from the "evil forces" in North Carolina. I'll just
stick to the best distribution and watch
the fun from afar ;)
What? (Score:2, Informative)
Aren't they just a Redhat distro with some a few mods? If Mandrake is more than that, please explain.
Re:What? (Score:5, Insightful)
It's redhatesque but it's unique. It happens to be a damn fine distribution also.
they dont hack libc libm or anything important (Score:2)
e.g. lets see them actually use gcc3.1 before redhat
regards
john jones
Re:they dont hack libc libm or anything important (Score:2)
Re:they dont hack libc libm or anything important (Score:5, Informative)
lets see them actually use gcc3.1 before redhat
Nice flamebait.
They are already using gcc 3.1 in Mandrake Cooker, their development distro.
They built everything with it short after the release of 8.2. They tried before, with Mandrake's rpm-rebuilder robot, but a lot of software didn't build with gcc 3.0 then.
With gcc 3.1 and 3.1.1 things look better.
They were the first with devfs in mdk 8.0 I believe, allthough that might have been a bit early.
They were the second distro to use apt-get (after Connectiva), but they switched to their own tool, urpmi, which is working rather good nowadays (apt-get for rpm isn't perfect yet too, you know).
So all in all, it seems to me you put out a rather cheap flamebait; you mostly lack the right information.
Re:they dont hack libc libm or anything important (Score:2)
Not quite the MOST current, but close enough. They sometimes mask out packages that interfere with important stuff, and Portage broke a while back.
That said, Gentoo is still my favorite distro.
Re:What? (Score:2)
I honestly have NO idea what you are talking about. I have a 7 something MDK box that has been the main file server on my network having an uptime of damn near a year now. My MDK 8.2 (started life as 8.0) has been rock solid for over a year (reboots for hardware swaps, and even a total case swap (I bought one of them Lian-Li PC-60's... w00t!)).
Anyway. I have been playing with a few other distros too. I'm typing on a SuSE box, my Gentoo box is compiling KDE3.0.2 right now, and the RedHat machine to my right is sitting with a kernel panic.
Hmmm...
One OS (Score:2, Funny)
Grrr!! (Score:2, Funny)
GRR!!
--RMS
Re:One OS (Score:2)
Re:One OS (Score:2, Funny)
mandrake (Score:4, Interesting)
And not becoming a part of United Linux is partly due to the above and partly due to their use of RPM. I think they're doing the right thing, and the United Linux people fill fall big time.
---gralem
Re:mandrake (Score:5, Interesting)
"I will always only install Mandrake."
This is clearly retarded. Why do computer dudes always throw down insane ultimatums? It gives us a bad name and it's the reason people in companies don't trust us.
"DOS 6.3 is the last operating system this company will every use, PERIOD."
"Get out."
"Ok."
Re:mandrake (Score:3, Informative)
Re:mandrake (Score:2)
Re:mandrake (Score:2, Insightful)
Speaking of bloat, Debian recently passed the 10,000 packages mark. Many of them are silly or superfluous. However, the redeeming quality is that you don't have to install much unwanted software. When a package depends on oodles of unnecessary crap (like kde and gnome libraries), there's usually a lighter alternative.
As an example, I have about 250 packages installed on my firewall (including many I don't really need, such as complete X and gui programs), and about 550 on my desktop.
The only area I think is uncomfortably bloating is that each new version of a package is slightly bigger than the last. This is probably feature creep, but some of it is also probably new documentation (which is good!).
Anyway, my point is, you have a ridiculous number of distributions to choose from. Don't judge Linux as a whole based on the mainstream distros, which are trying to gain marketshare by making Linux more Windows-y. Linux is trying to be "everything to everyone," but each distro caters to a different subset of "everyone."
Re:mandrake (Score:2)
Re:mandrake (Score:2)
Yeah...the media may be bloated, but you don't have to choose "Install everything". Get back to me when you can install WinXP and IIS without the bloat of the GUI.
The media is cheap so why not pack it. Much prefered to the "here's the OS, go buy/download everything else"
At least they're committed to LSB. (Score:5, Interesting)
"In the same spirit, all software publishers should certify their products for a given version of the LSB (Linux Standard Base), not for a particular brand of Linux. Therefore, that software would work equally well with any Linux distribution that is in conformity with the LSB. "
Is this correct? The UnitedLinux people have been implying that they are somehow just the logical conclusion of the idea of the LSB, and in some way they will make things easier for developers-- i.e., less varied systems to test. Is this correct, or just misleading marketing? Are there any situations where it would be possible to certify a single binary for UnitedLinux, but not possible to certify a single binary for the LSB becuase the LSB is not extensive enough?
Re:At least they're committed to LSB. (Score:2)
1) LSB is formed
2) SuSE implements it, nobody else cares (especially RedHat and Mandrake)
3) SuSE forms United Linux with Caldera and some others.
4) All of the sudden Mandrake likes the LSB.
But I still don't believe Mandrake being compliant unless I see it.
Re:At least they're committed to LSB. (Score:4, Insightful)
Ok, they have caldera+ransom love onboard, that may explain it.
But the notion that LSB is enough to get a common base for installing binary software is complete nonsens. Yeah, it works in theory, but in practice, for enterprise ready software, you _want_ to test on an actual platform, not hope that everyone will play well along the standards.
LSB is a good thing, but nicely written standards don't compensate for excessive regression testing on a real environment (which is what united linux gives us)
Especially with such a complex beast like a GNU/linux/whatever environment - hell, this mindset fails with simple things like tcp and http. What does MDK think "reference implementations" are for?
And please, can we stop all this nonsens about "monopolisation", "per seat license" and stuff in combination with united linux?
The GPL is the GPL is the GPL
Re:At least they're committed to LSB. (Score:3, Insightful)
When the LSB was first being kicked around Bruce Perens happened to be on board and he suggested using Debian's set of core packages as a test distribution. However, Caldera (and to a lesser extent SuSE) didn't want a binary standard base that you could actually install, because the leaders at these companies knew that many people might simply deploy the test distribution and not pay for the proprietary extras that Caldera and SuSE had to offer. After all, if all you need is a Linux distribution that you can run Oracle on, it really doesn't matter which distribution it is as long as it is supported by Oracle.
That is why we have a written LSB standard and a set of tests instead of a much easier to create and use binary standard.
Well, Caldera and SuSE (and TurboLinux) have finally realized that their developers want a binary standard, and if they can't have one from the LSB they will simply use RedHat which is a very popular and extremely open.. Once again that leaves the proprietary distributions (Caldera, SuSE, TurboLinux) out in the cold, and so they have banded together to form a proprietary alternative. You see, they have created a binary distribution, but they want to charge people to use it. Since most of the software is GPLed, they can't deny sources to most of the distribution, but you can bet that they will be up to the same old tricks that they have always been up to. Caldera has said unequivocally that the UnitedLinux core would be licensed "per seat."
The truly unfortunate bit is that it would appear that Caldera is going to use UnitedLinux as a chance to drag SuSE into bankruptcy. SuSE gets to pay for the development and maintenance of UnitedLinux, and Caldera stands to receive a disproportionate amount of the benefit. Meanwhile Caldera still has revenues from the old SCO Unixes to keep itself afloat.
Personally, I use Debian, and think that it would make an excellent binary test platform. It is well-maintained, non-commercial, and it is a relatively slow moving target. There is lots of room for adding value to the Debian core packages. That being the case, I would much rather see RedHat or even Mandrake (both of which have firm policies of releasing source code under the GPL) become the binary standard than UnitedLinux.
Re:At least they're committed to LSB. (Score:2)
Yes,
but:
What has this to do with United Linux?
I fear most people have not really understood what this is.
SuSE already had said that
"We plan on having a downloadable developer's version as well," [and] "We are absolutely committed to working with the community to produce this product under the GPL."
So either they lie, or the majority is wrong.
Oh, and please, SuSE's YAST is _not_ closed source, binary only, etc. Whoever thinks that should read its license. Therefore, YAST is not an example for something to come with UL. In fact, publishing UL's installer under GPL might make the collaboration easier.
Re:At least they're committed to LSB. (Score:3, Insightful)
Debian has gone through hell (ask any debian developer about
I'd bet money that debian has a larger market share than any of the UnitedLinux companies.
Mandrake is closest to getting to mainstream (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:Mandrake is closest to getting to mainstream (Score:2)
I have to agree that Mandrake is an excellent introduction into the linux world. Before I started using it a year ago, I was a well experienced windows user who paid for university textbooks by building computers, setting up networks, doing user training/consultation all on windows.
Mandrake is great for easing users in, because as you say, the GUI helps prevent 'shell shock.' Now I started off using DOS in the mid 80s, but you can do so much more from the linux shell. Mandrake is great because you can ease yourself in and learn the linux shell slowly.
Just last weekend I compiled and installed Apache 2.0.39 singlehandedly (which is trivial for msot *nix users, I know) but this is a testament to Mandrake's user friendliness and ability to help users help themselves into the linux world.
Re:Mandrake is closest to getting to mainstream (Score:2)
Mandrake has a great distro, but their sales and marketing tactics are a little too "consumerish" for the business world.
AKA. We're low on funds, so let's petition our membership with spam-like emails begging for contributions. Hey, wait, we'll make a little "club" so people feel good about contributing to us! We'll even throw in single-user licensed of some commercial software like StarOffice! Now, let's try to sell some stocks in our company since we can show how our revenues are up. Yeah, I know - we're not listed on any major stock exchange (yet)... but nevermind that. Buy it anyway and we'll get listed eventually! Really, we will!
Meanwhile, RedHat has most of the deals inked to come pre-installed on name-brand servers when you order them with Linux.
"best distro"? (Score:2, Interesting)
Well Taco, it might just happen that United Linux fits your needs perfectly then: http://www.debian.org/News/weekly/2002/25/
Debian UnitedLinux (Score:2)
If you don't believe it, check out the UnitedLinux FAQ [unitedlinux.com], which states:
UnitedLinux would stifle innovation (Score:3, Insightful)
UnitedLinux is not the solution (Score:5, Interesting)
We all know all the problems with RPM based distros, compatibility between them breaks a lot, and, even if you should have only one RPM for any distro, when we go to download an application we get a RH6.X.rpm, RH7.rpm, MDK8.rpm, MKD8.1.rpm, etc
I'm a Mandrake user, and I love it, but I have seen apt-get working, and I'm really impressed. I think apt-get is the right direction for a real package management tool for all distros. This is the direction package managment under Linux should be taking, and not creating commercial standards without atacking the core of the problem nor creating apt-like solutions or apt-like-frontends for rpm based solutions.
Conclution: LSB + apt-get should be mandatory to be able to call anything a Linux distribution. I know a lot of us would kill for apt-get to be the default package manager in all distributions.
Re:UnitedLinux is not the solution (Score:3, Informative)
There's an RPM version of apt-get at freshrpms.net [freshrpms.net]. It's for Redhat but I don't see why it wouldn't work for Mandrake.
I don't think apt-get will solve the problem of different RPMs for different distros.
Re:UnitedLinux is not the solution (Score:2, Interesting)
That's exactly what we shouldn't be doing. Is the RPM package/dependencies list available to the apt packages? is the apt packages list availabe to RPM? Do they use the same notations? Ah, I see, making a RPM version of apt-get solves the problem, because we need more front-ends that hide a poor designed system.
We need to stop for a second and rethink a lot of things, and among them is package distribution for linux. No matter which distribution we use or we make, this is a issue that is comming back to us right now, and if we don't do anything it will get a lot worse in the future.
Re:UnitedLinux is not the solution (Score:3, Interesting)
As you pointed out, on Debian the major library version number is appended to the library name, e.g. libgnomeprint0. This is because the Debian people know that at some point in the future, the GNOME developers *will* break the libgnomeprint API. Then they will label the new package libgnomeprint1, and all your software continues to work. On Redhat it would still be named libgnomeprint, and you wouldn't be able to install the new version until all apps using the old version are fixed and recompiled...
Give APT to the Redhat folks, and before long you will end up in "APT hell," I guarantee it =).
glibc and gcc breakages are a separate issue. The developers of those packages need to be shot... I've read posts to the gcc mailing lists regarding libgcc that show most gcc developers haven't the faintest idea what "backwards compatibility" means.
Re:UnitedLinux is not the solution (Score:2)
What about a distro with no package management? Are they going to be forced to install an unused apt-get? What about gentoo? I prefer portage to apt. What about when I want to write a better package manager tomorrow? It can't get it's foot in the door because apt is standardised. What about...
Re:UnitedLinux is not the solution (Score:2, Informative)
2) Apt is a front end to the package manager, whatever you come up with will probably be usable with apt with a little tweaking.
Re:UnitedLinux is not the solution (Score:5, Informative)
It's the backend for the graphical software manager. Automatically downloads dependancies etc. similar to apt-get(I said similar, not like apt-get). I like typing partial package names and it will give you a list of all matches, versions, etc. Works fine out of the box but you really need to add mirrors for updates and cooker if you want to really work well.
Urpmi has had some teething problems in the past but works well now on my systems. Anyone working with it on the 8.0 PPC release will know what I'm talking about. The issues basically convinced me to run the development version (cooker) on this iMac until the bugs were worked out. Worked much better when I got the latest wget. Curl didn't really help the issues for me. The last couple releases have worked flawlessly for me. That has me looking for problems that may or may not be there. YMMV
I'm not knocking apt-get. I've used it and thinks it works great. I also like the package management in FreeBSD too. I think more Distos/OSes can look at what's been done and follow these examples.
CPAN (Score:2)
Re:UnitedLinux is not the solution (Score:5, Insightful)
you dont try and use windows-update to install photoshop, so why the hell are linux programmers doing the same? There is an excellent installer package available to all and is top notch... It's from loki, and doesnt take a rocket scientist to figure out...
the other problem is the overwhelming desire by EVERY programmer to use incompatable and bleeding libs.. if you are writing an app for the masses, USE COMMON LIBS THAT ARE ON CURRENT DISTROS. you dont see apps sold for windows that use pre-pre alpha graphics libs that are being designed for the next windows release... so why do linux users have to suffer? developers that cant keep their hands out of the CVS for the libs installed on their machine either need to be slapped or forced to publically state that "My program XYZ WILL NOT WORK ON A STANDARD LINUX INSTALL... See my requirements list for why"
and a standard linux install is RH7.2,7.3 Mandrake 8.2 or whatever. just list it, take the time to be sure your users can actually compile your app. Or offer up a completely statically linked version... no worries about libs there...
Linux is ready for prime time.. now only if the app developers would start getting ready.
Flamebait story.. (Score:2, Interesting)
Gentoo is my absolute personal favorite for personal systems. The major thing about FreeBSD I loved was the ports system, and here it is in Gentoo with a system that is more likely to get suspport from vendors. You can build *everything* with a nice automated build process with a good dependency management system and well designed configuration management. Tweaking make.conf can yield a very high performance system with only the optional dependencies you want. The price paid here is that this method of operation takes a great deal of time for a good install. Sure, a prebuilt stage3 can be used, but a) what's the fun in that? and b) still have to build X and desktops. Also, the portage maintainers mostly take software developers at their word that a package is ready and stable rather than having a heavy testing process. This is of course a double edged sword. On one hand you get all the cutting edge (or bleeding edge if you want) stuff before everyone else and it generally works well. However, the downside is that integration is not well tested and that stuff is left to the user. I personally am willing to test and debug in exchange for the system, but some don't like this.
Debian has a good distribution setup with apt, and can do a lot of the stuff portage does but with binaries which take less time to install, but are not as optimized. The testing process is certainly there, perhaps not highly organized and such, but what it lacks in organization it certainly makes up it time. Installing stable gets you a rock solid system, but the software is as old as dirt. If you aren't a performance freak nor do you care about the latest bells and whistles, user friendliness, but still want a *rock solid* distro, debian is good.
RedHat seems to have a more structured testing procedure that gets things out the door faster than debian, but not necessarily as stable. The free options for updates is far worse than debians. So if you want more up to date stuff than debian, need some good gui utilities to coddle you through certain configuration tasks, or want corporate support, and are willing to live without apt or portage and with a tiny amount more flakiness, RedHat is good.
Mandrake I like for desktop systems I don't want to be bothered with again. They consistantly have the most updated packages I've seen (outside of gentoo, of course). And for desktop configuration their tools are pretty damn easy to use. The price paid is increased flakiness, occasionally to the point of Windows 2000 flakiness, which isn't too bad, but not great. A common user will likely fare better with Mandrake than other distributions. For servers I would say debian or RedHat, maybe gentoo for home servers that can afford to take a long time to install stuff on, and for workstations/desktops mandrake or gentoo...
Re:Flamebait story.. (Score:2)
IE-
1. Debian (easy binary upgrades)
-1. Debian (upgrades as old as dirt)
2. Gentto (nice upgrade methods)
-2. Compile time
etc..
Re:Flamebait story.. (Score:2)
1.3b was broken as of 2 weeks ago, had to use 1.3a.
Mandrake Cooker is my favorite, burn an iso, poof your a gcc 3.1 system, no fuss, build in 15 minutes.
But then with Gentoo, your on the bleeding edge, takes time, takes work, but it does make a faster workstation. (BTW, it has a preemptive kernel which does make a better X workstation)
Re:Flamebait story.. (Score:2)
That aside, Mandrake is way more user-friendly than even Red Hat, for a home/toy machine at least. It come with more games -- my six year old loves it! But Tux Racer is missing in the cooker; apparently the sound libs are incompatible. And urpmi didn't resolve the problem, just said no. That aside, Mandrake does a nice job of setting up the desktop. And its installer beats Red Hat's. For instance, if your Disk 2 or 3 in Red Hat is bad or missing, Red Hat's installer hangs and won't finish up. Mandrake puts the critical stuff on Disk 1, and if Disk 2 is bad (see above about full CD-Rs), at least it completes the install with the packages that it could get from Disk 1.
Gentoo drive me nuts. It has no installer, so it's really a do-it-yourself project for hardcore Unix weenies. Not even like the old Heathkits, with step-by-step instructions that worked. I'm currently stalled figuring out passwords. As defaulted, Gentoo is incredibly, unusably picky about what it'll accept as a user password. I'm sure it's all settable via pam.d, but like the rest of Gentoo, if you don't want to learn all about the guts of something, you can't get it to work. I don't mind the compile times. If Gentoo could be run with a Mandrake-like installer, it'd be amazing.
Re:Flamebait story.. (Score:2)
As to the apt-rpm stuff, I was aware of it, but it kind of exists outside the world of RedHat proper. For home use I also like having a distro not tied to a version number/family. While it may be much easier to support people based on version number and ensure compatibility, it imposes limits on easy upgrade paths and keeps cutting edge major improvements out of the primary configuration for too long. Again, in a support capacity this is good, but for a sysadmins home system gentoo is just damn fun and offers the most control..
Re:Flamebait story.. (Score:3, Insightful)
This is not convincing, at all. Even if you were getting a performance difference, there are too many variables that could have caused it. Are your already-running programs taking up identical amounts of memory? Is your disk's DMA the same in both places (enabled or disabled)? Do have the same drivers compiled into the kernel? Do your KDEs have the exact same libs and features compiled into them?
If you want to be convincing, compile gentoo from scratch for plain i386, then compile gentoo from scratch optimized to the max (on the same hardware), then show numbers.
I'm tempted to do this soon and show some benchmarks. Either it will be hard proof that optimization gains significant benefit, which could inspire a Debian i686 port, or it will be a resource that reasonable people can use to say "look, optimization freak, it's all in your head and I have numbers to prove it."
Re:Flamebait story.. (Score:2)
- GCC 3.1 optimizations
- Only installing prereqs I intend to use
The second factor may have more to do with it, since it means fewer services start at boot, fewer processes run at a given time, and processes load fewer libraries and less data into memory and skip code relevant to disabled options in processing. This makes a stronger case for source installs, since most apps require these decisions to be made at compile time....
Meanwhile, Debian's UL plans... (Score:4, Funny)
Note to the uninitiated: The relevant paragraph has a typo, it's missing a ;-) on the end...
Re:Meanwhile, Debian's UL plans... (Score:2)
Not Spam (Score:5, Insightful)
You have to opt-in to get it.
Debian & UnitedLinux (Score:2, Redundant)
The Debian Weekly News [debian.org] say:
companies want that (Score:2, Interesting)
United Linux wont give us better distros, and it wont make Linux distros any more compatible with each other. However, it will create a bureaucracy which will give corporate managers a nice warm fuzzy. It's a marketing gimmick, and the corporations of the world will fall for it. It's too bad that most corporate IT managers are so clueless.
Why you're all incorrect about UnitedLinux (Score:3, Interesting)
UnitedLinux is clearly an attempt to raise the commercial value of compatible and LSB-compliant linux distributions.
The Mandrake solution of 'blindly do whatever RedHat does' does make things somewhat compatable, but there are a lot of drawbacks to this strategy, and it doesn't really help the commercial software vendors at all if Red Hat decides to change what they provide from version to version. (And they do.)
The Linux Standard Base is useful, it is relevant, it is important. This draws attention to and raises the bar of interest in this regard.
Now, please explain, all you slashbots, how this is a bad thing?
Heres why (Score:2)
Why Should Success == evil forces? (Score:4, Interesting)
What has RedHat done that is so bad? Sold out? Stifled innovation? As far as I am concerned, no, they have not. In fact, I am very happy with their products on the server level and use it on three production machines at my local university. The Airforce is even looking into using servers running RedHat. Not only does their stuff run well, but it gets good name recognition for Linux as a whole.
It isn't just RedHat, either. I am sure that if the Apache Foundation were to go private and start selling a commercial version of Apache httpd AND become commercially sound, they would be looked upon in the same way.
I am asking in all seriousness. I want to understand this mentallity.
Re:Why Should Success == evil forces? (Score:2)
successful financially (and by this, I mean is able to operate without going under)
As RedHat is yet to turn a profit, and it remains questionable whether she ever will, I would say she is in certain danger of going under.
Re:Why Should Success == evil forces? (Score:4, Informative)
This presumption isn't correct IMHO. Not even Richard Stallman (whos rhetoric, while often quite insightful, is about as feiery as it gets) is guilty of what you describe here, much less the majority of the GNU/Linux and Free Software/Open Source community at large.
Red Hat has done some great things for the community, and has given back a great deal to the community. I may not prefer their distro personally, but I have no trouble suggesting it (or Mandrake) to friends who want to install and play around with Linux.
What has RedHat done that is so bad?
They have encouraged proprietary software vendors to release their wares in a manner that is compatible with Red Hat and not other distributions, by falsely implying that they, Red Hat, set the standards and everyone else follows.
This is bad because (a) Red Hat does not (and shouldn't) set the standards and (b) it is quite possible, and vastly preferable, to package software in a distribution-agnostic form installable by evertyone. Blender did it, Loki did it, Id and several other proprietary vendors do it now.
This is my only real criticism of Red Hat, and if they would cease and desist this behavior (which IMHO does in fact do harm to the community as a whole, and to the vendors who are seduced by the erroneous notion they have to target one or two main distros) I would have absolutely nothing bad to say about them whatsoever.
UL, on the other hand, is an effort to exploit exactly this myth, mislead software vendors in the process (to their detriment and the detriment of the GNU/Linux community at large), all without giving even a fraction of what Red Hat has given back to the community, and that is a very real and serious problem. Actually, propogating the notion of commercially imposed standards (rather than standards formed by consensus) and forcing users to use a One True Distro (or forever chase and mimick a One True Distro) is a terrible disservice to the community, regardless of how much is "given back" to the community to compensate, and it is an effort that should be resisted and fought.
Re:Why Should Success == evil forces? (Score:4, Interesting)
They have encouraged proprietary software vendors to release their wares in a manner that is compatible with Red Hat and not other distributions, by falsely implying that they, Red Hat, set the standards and everyone else follows.
This is true to an extent. Red Hat did essentially "go their own way" in some respects, setting up their own standards for some things. The most notorious of these breaks is, of course, the use of GCC 2.96 instead of 2.95. This caused a lot of controversy, and deservedly so, but it's what they felt they had to do for their distro [bero.org]. They had customers who required the enhancements of 2.96, and so they met those needs. They took a lot of crap for it, too, but they stuck to their guns (and the customers they were serving).
RH also took some liberties with file system layout, etc. They obviously felt it was important enough to make the change, so they did.
What I'm trying to illustrate here is that in both cases, RH did what they did not to lock out other vendors, or to hyjack the industry, but rather to apply what they felt was some needed sanity into certain aspects of Linux. However, the community has now "caught up" to Red Hat's changes, by releasing GCC 3.x, and the LSB 1.1 spec. RH's next distro (which will undoubtably be called 8.0) is going to be using GCC 3.x, and will be LSB compliant. So it seems to me that Red Hat has only been doing what they felt was necessary until the community made their decision on the direction of things, and then RH re-converged their distro with the community at large.
it is quite possible, and vastly preferable, to package software in a distribution-agnostic form installable by evertyone. Blender did it, Loki did it, Id and several other proprietary vendors do it now.
Yeah, but they did it by making nasty custom installer scripts, typically with no uninstaller! Eek! This might be nice for Slack or Gentoo people, but how about an RPM for the RH, Mdk, Suse, Caldera, and (via alien) Debian users? What's more, they probably also statically linked the stuff to hell and back. I'd prefer to see 2 releases - LSB and non-LSB. A nice RPM for LSB compliant distros, and non-LSB for people who don't give a stuff.
While I'm on the subject, who isn't compliant now, or won't be by Fall? RH will be fully compliant with 8.0, MDK is/will be soon, all the United Linux distros are/will be (SuSE, Caldera, Connectiva, Turbo), and Debian is/will be as well. What about Gentoo, Slack, and the micro-distros? Anyone know if they plan to conform? FOr that matter, what about Lycoris and Lindows? ANyone have info either way on these?
Did you read the article? (Score:4, Interesting)
It is extremely hard for us to understand why some software publishers and hardware manufacturers only support one Linux distribution.
Each hardware manufacturer should develop drivers directly with the appropriate Free Software project. Network card manufacturers should cooperate with the Linux kernel project, videocard manufacturers should collaborate with the XFree86 project, and so on. For example, when a network card module is included directly in the Linux kernel it becomes a de facto standard supported by all Linux distributions.
In the same spirit, all software publishers should certify their products for a given version of the LSB (Linux Standard Base), not for a particular brand of Linux. Therefore, that software would work equally well with any Linux distribution that is in conformity with the LSB.
This article has really increased by respect of Mandrake and shown that they really do understand the Open Source/Free Software methods.
Is this really newsworthy? (Score:2)
Re:Is this really newsworthy? (Score:2, Insightful)
United Linux is an attempt by several companies that don't have a large portion of the market to build name recognition for themselves, and to make more money. Don't make it sound like they are out to save the world, they want more people to buy their brands of Linux, just like Red Hat and Mandrake do.
New definition of spam (Score:3, Insightful)
I guess Mandrake is sending their newsletter to *@*.* now, right?
Spam is unsolicited bulk e-mail with a specific commercial pitch or advertisement including a price. Introductory e-mails (especially sent to a specific address), newsletters and business correspondence is not spam.
Re:New definition of spam (Score:2, Offtopic)
Wrong, and spoken like a true spammer. (I hope you are not a spammer, but your definition echos almost precisely that which is used by some Spammers to justify their bulk emails).
SPAM is Unsolicited Bulk Email. Period.
Whether it is promoting Salvation from the Lord Our God(tm), Senator Hollings Reelection Campaign, or the Latest Penis Extention scam, it is SPAM.
However, opt in mailing lists are NOT SPAM because the Opt In process itself is an act of solicitation.
Of course, if a vendor or web site changes your selection from 'not opting in' to 'opting in' then, of course it is SPAM, because in fact you never did opt in, and they have deliberately miscategorized their lists in order to decieve.
Any bulk email that arrives without your having asked to be included on a list (e.g. for notifications, etc.) is SPAM. Period.
All of that having been said, it is my understanding that Mandrake's Newsletter is opt in, which means by opting in you solicited it and it is therefor NOT SPAM.
Re:New definition of spam (Score:2)
No. However there are times when I send "hello, our company is" e-mails to other web sites and news sites, one at a time. Is that spam? No.
Polite introductory correspondence is essential to business. Screeching SPAM!! SPAM!! SPAM!! every time an unfamiliar e-mail address appears in the From: field doesn't help solve the spam problem, and in fact, makes it worse.
That said, I'm glad to see Mandrake's newsletter is opt in. They don't seem like a spamming-type company (and they make an excellent Linux distribution).
Oh, and moderators: since the word SPAM appeared in the STORY, this is NOT offtopic.
Re:New definition of spam (Score:2)
Yes, and if I were a sysadmin that received your email, I'd simply firewall you off my subnet.
You have no right to advertise to me. If you want to send me an email, make sure it is ontopic for the email address you've found.
I really doubt any websites you've found had "send your advertising here" email addresses.
Next thing people will say that looking companies up in the yellow pages and dialing them by hand to advertise to them is not telemarketing.
Re:New definition of spam (Score:2)
What if our business wanted to buy something? By this definition, such an e-mail would be labeled spam.
So now every e-mail sent by a business is advertising, therefore it is spam. This is why screaming SPAM!! for *every* business e-mail is the wrong idea.
make sure it is ontopic for the email address you've found.
The topic being printed right next to the e-mail address no doubt...
The definition of spam is "unsolicited bulk e-mail." Sending a polite introductory e-mail to *one* address doesn't fit that definition.
The new definition is "if the e-mail didn't come from a familiar address, it is spam" and that is plainly ridiculous. I don't support mass random e-mail advertising by any means (I get about 50 such messages a week), but businesses have to communicate.
to advertise to them
I never said these e-mails were advertisements. We have a web site for advertising. E-mail is for communicating with people. Businesses may not have a right to advertise to you, but they do have the right to use e-mail like everyone else.
Re:New definition of spam (Score:2)
wrong.
In regards to email, the original poster is correct.
Feel free to look at the definition of SPAM in any anti-spam law.
Incorrect yet again (Score:2)
The definition of SPAM predates any legislation on the subject by years. The fact that our corrupt government has drafted legislation (or, in some cases, allowed mass marketers to draft legislation) that changes the definition for the convinience of the SPAMMERs themselves in fact does nothing to legitimize the incorrect definition you are defending. It does serve, however, to delegitize the government that is redefining the term
From whatis: The most authoritative definitions are probably the following ones, offered by the Net Abuse FAQ (for USENET) and the email abuse FAQ (for email) The only people who are defining SPAM in the self-serving, restricted manner as you are are the SPAMMERs themselves and the legislators they have bought (and, indeed, not even all of them).
2nd tier? (Score:2)
Yeah, because we all know what a second-tier outfit SuSE is [www.suse.de].
Treat Base Distro's like XFree (or the kernel) (Score:2, Interesting)
UL as the "Linux Ultra-Lite/Total-Fluff" distro? (Score:2, Insightful)
The final frontier of Linux computing is the Windoze desktop. RH, Mandrake, and a few of the geekier distros have pretty much conquered the hardcore Linux community, but there has been minimal penetration of the desktop market.
What remains is the competition over whose Linux will be pre-installed on the next batch of lowball Walmart machines. Simplified installs, upgrades and desktop support will appeal to the "Linux for dummies" crowd, especially those who don't know or care about the GPL issues.
No matter who UL says their target market is, the only customers that would be interested in a "pay per seat" implementation of Linux are those who are trying to abandon a "pay per seat" implementation of something else. The UL product should have some appeal for PC manufacturers who want a cheaper Microsoft than Microsoft. I think UL will evolve into the "Linux Ultra Lite/Total Fluff" distro.
Mandrake doesn't get UL, and neither do you. (Score:5, Insightful)
The biggest missconception about UL is that it is some Borg like entity that once you join you must fall in line with. This is just not the case. Each participating member can do whatever they like outside the UL organization. SuSE has stated quite clearly that they will continue to offer a desktop version. This version will (probably) not have the UnitedLinux tag on it, but then for a desktop, who cares? What UL offers is the ability to have your OS certified on enterprise hardware without being lucky enough to have the "defacto Linux standard" in your title (that's RedHat incase you missed it). With that in mind, there's no reason Mandrake could't join UL and realse a UL version, fully certified on all major hardware, with the added value of it's GUI tools, etc. Then Mandrake could continue to sell their deskop/server versions that would appeal to a broader, more price sensitive, customer base.
The second biggest missconception about UL is that it limits competition. This is just the opposite of the truth. To date there is only One distro that enjoys certification across all major hardware line, RedHat. Now, either RedHat has been unwilling or unable to convince it's hardware partners to certify agains all Linux distro's or, say, a Kernel/libs version of Linux. Sure, their are hundres of distro's out there, but only one certified for your enterprise needs, nice if your RedHat. With UnitedLinux there will not be two distros certified on all major hardwere, but five. And, because of the open (gasp) whey UnitedLinux was founded that could grow into as many distro's who care to achieve that level of certification. So, while UL does nothing to prevent a distro from producing whatever they like (thus not hurting competition), they provide the avenue through wich all distro's, not just RedHat, can achieve hardware certifications and compete in the enterprise market.
UnitedLinux is not a bad thing. It is focused on what it wants to do, but ultimately it does what RedHat never cared to, bring the rest of Linux along into the enterprise space. . . if they want to come.
Opus
Somebody mark this date... (Score:3, Insightful)
Someone please mark this date.
Inter-Linux FUD takes over any rational discussion of things.
Face it - it's a merger (Score:4, Insightful)
SuSE is RedHat's biggest competitor in Europe, and has the greatest marketshare in Germany. Caldera was formerly RedHat's biggest competitor in the US (until Mandrake came along). Conectiva is RedHat's biggest competitor in Latin America. TurboLinux is RedHat's biggest competitor in Japan.
So, these four distros realized that in every market, there was generally three corporate competitors: RedHat, Mandrake, and one of them. They decided to merge, so that there would be a common distro with worldwide marketshare; but kept the companies separate, so that they could leverage their brand in each market - would Latin Americans suddenly buy a copy of SuSE? As it is, they might fully merge someday, if/when the UnitedLinux brand becomes stronger.
Mandrake knew that they were a strong competitor throughout a very large geographical area; as they said in this statement, their worldwide marketshare is larger than the four UnitedLinux companies combined. Mandrake would have nothing to gain if they had to pool their resources with four companies who are much weaker then they are, and declining all the time.
I wouldn't be surprised if UnitedLinux ends up in a full corporate merger, and later the whole thing goes bankrupt; after reading Mandrake's statement, I get the feeling that they wouldn't be either.
Respectfully disagree (Score:2)
Being a FreeBSD user, and thus to some extent part of the problem ;-), I'm only peripherally aware of what's going on here, but an attempt to unify the operating environment of the various Unices can only help. Unifying Linux would be a great start. The inability to do this in the late 80's, combined with a refusal to make a user interface the mere mortals could use, handed the PC market to Microsoft in the first place. Unix was going gangbusters back then and was on the verge of standardizing, but everyone had to do their own thing, and Billy jumped in. And it's taken another 10-15 years for Apple to put a pretty face on Unix. The Open Source version still has a long ways to go yet to match it.
The Problem with Uniting Linux (Score:3, Insightful)
But Mandrake is missing the boat... and so is United Linux.
In Mandrake's FAQ entry, explaining why they have decided not to participate in United Linux, they state:
"Since all distributors use the same base
components, there are relatively few binary
incompatibility issues. And even when a
binary compatibility problem arises, it's
easy to recompile an application for a given
Linux distribution."
and they claim:
"It is extremely hard for us to understand
why some software publishers and hardware
manufacturers only support one Linux
distribution."
To me, the answer is obvious: a third party developer would have to not only internally certify their software for support purposes, but it would have to also maintain seperate SKUs (Stock Keeping Units) for each of the Linux versions on which it runs. For commercial applications, "recompile" is not as easy as the act itself. It's clear, these people have never produced a third party shrink-wrapped packaged software product intended to run on a UNIX system.
The intent of United Linux is to try and make it possible for a manufacturer to build shrink-wrapped product that they can know will run on any United Linux labelled platform.
But here, United Linux must fail, as the LSB has failed.
In the original UNIX Wars (of which I am a battle-scarred veteran), the problem was that each distribution of UNIX, even for the same processor family, was "standard plus extensions". Each vendor tried to provide "value add"... and, in doing that, they introduced incompatability between nominally standards compliant platforms.
So paying lip-service to a standard gets you nowhere. The LSB gets you nowhere, and POSIX gets you nowhere. You may be able to compile the same source code on each of these platforms, and, if you are lucky, and did not need to use any platform proprietary information to build your product, it may run without errors. But all you've achieved with this is source compatability.
The LSB doesn't give you binary compatability, and neither does United Linux. And it won't, even if they specify the ABI, even to the point of install tools and other minutia, like IBCS2 did (and neither BSD nor Linux has *full* IBCS2 compliance, until the IBCS2 installation and packaging tools also work -- it's not *just* the ABI, it's the environment).
Why will United Linux fail, since that's what I'm leading up to?
United Linux will fail because it's not possible to *turn off* the vendor "value add".
This seems counter-intuitive at first, but it's a fact. It's the same reason the LSB has failed to deliver on the same promise. And it's the same reason UNIX was never able to be defragmented, when everyone started using Intel processors and commodity PC hardware. Here is the reason:
Standard plus extensions is inherently non-standard.
Let me repeat that:
Standard plus extensions is inherently non-standard.
Until it's possible to turn off *everything* that isn't covered by a standard, it will be impossible for a third party developer to build something that they *know* will run on all platforms that conform to the standard.
Linux vendors: if you want to become the #1 developement platform for United Linux, then strip out everything that isn't covered by the definition of United Linux.
That -- and only that! -- will guarantee that any program that runs on your platform will run on any United Linux platform.
It will guarantee that there is no possibility of a third party developer accidently using a vendor specific extension (OK: "enhancement", but we know that it's really there for vendor lock-in).
It will also make you a commodity.
*This* is what the vendors in the UNIX Wars feared, and refused to let happen. And, in doing that, they lost all the third party development resources to Windows, which *was* a commodity, even if it was one only because of the Microsoft Monopoly.
Will this happen? Will the Linux Vendors wake up to the fact that they nust agree to *commoditize themselves*? Probably not. It's a lot easier for Caldera or Mandrake or Red Hat to compete among themselves, and try and beat each other down, than it is for them to try and take on Microsoft.
So Mandrake... you're avoiding doing the wrong thing by not participating in United Linux, given it's current vender differentiation model permitting vendor lock-in of third party developers.
*But*... you are doing it for the wrong reasons, and as long as you stick to your guns, you aren't going to be doing the right thing for the right reasons, either.
-- Terry
UL is a disservice to the GNU/Linux Community (Score:4, Insightful)
Well, yes, considering the best distros can be found here [sourcemage.org] and here [gentoo.org].
Personally I like the idea of United Linux. There's no reason that all Linux venders can't use the same base for rpm compatibility, etc. It'll hapen one way or another. Do you want one company to control the standards, or a shared effort?
I think the idea of UL is horribly flawed (and rather arrogant on its part), and the underlying premise of your reasoning for supporting UL equally flawed.
It isn't necessary to have One True packaging scheme, or One True distro to which all must maintain binary compatability, in order to effectively release binaries.
It has already been demonstrated by the folks at Blender, VMWare, Id, Loki, and others that it is quite possible to release binaries that are distribution agnostic. These real world examples, all of which install and run just fine on my Source Mage and Gentoo boxes, as well as my Debian, Mandrake, and Suse boxes, exist despite naysayers saying it isn't possible, and claiming that UL, or UL+Red Hat, bring a much needed cohesion to GNU/Linux.
Nonsense. It is an effort to impose a proprietary embrace-and-extended standard on a community that is doing just fine with consensual standards where they make sense, and a wide open, free and fair marktetplace that encourages choice everywhere else.
Telling commercial vendors that they should package their wares up as RPMs aimed at one (or two) distributions, when it is quite possible, and vastly more desirable, to package them up in standard tar.bz2 or tar.gz format along with a README listing the required libraries+versions, as well as a statically linked "last resort" fallback binary in parallel with the dynamically linked binary and thereby make them compatible with almost every distribution out there, is a terrible disservice to both the Linux community at large, and the vendors themselves who are being misled and excluding a big chunk of their target market.
This nonsense only serves the interests of the purveyors of UL, at the expense of virtually everyone else, and at the cost of our freedom of choice as GNU/Linux users. There is IMHO absolutely nothing good about this whatsoever, regardless of what your favorite distro happens to be, and even though I am not a Mandrake fan per se, I applaud them for their courage in standing up to this nonsense.
Re:UL is a disservice to the GNU/Linux Community (Score:3, Insightful)
Personally I run Slackware and compile almost everything I use. However, in a family of 5 that owns 4 computers, I'm the only know who even has a clue, or who wants to have a clue. So yous claims that packaging everything as
You seem to be from the camp that says "If you're too stupid to use Linux, then don't bother." I'm from the camp that says "Linux is good for everyone if efforts aer made to bring it to the general public." That's the difference of opinion, it seems to me.
Re:UL is a disservice to the GNU/Linux Community (Score:2)
That simply isn't true. It assumes the Distribution Creators know how to untar a tarball and install it into their own distribution.
There is nothing preventing Red Hat, Suse, Mandrake, Debian, et. al. from creating their own RPM/deb wrapper utility that will take a binary tarball and install it onto their respective distribution, perhaps even parsing the list of required libraries and versions and mapping it to their dependency resolution mechanisms anyway.
This is a far more reasonable and equitable approach to take than to tell vendors they should target one or two "preferred" distros and leave everyone else groping on their own, denying people choice and undermining the diversity of the community in the process.
You make grand assumptions about where people are coming from without any reasonable or logical basis for doing so, and extrapolate from that (example: I am in the "GNU/Linux should be for everybody camp", but that doesn't imply what you erroneously think it does), but those underlying assumptions are as false as those being promoted by the likes of United Linux, and the conclusions thereby just as erroneous.
Re:UL is a disservice to the GNU/Linux Community (Score:2)
Loki installer (Score:2)
I have never had binary incompatibility problems with any commercial Linux software, on any distribution. And, unlike most freeloaders who read this site, I buy a significant amount of commercial Linux software.
Re:UL is a disservice to the GNU/Linux Community (Score:2)
If you're referring to the packaging system (which will most likely be rpm), I hope you realize that rpm *is* released under an open license -- the GPL.
Re:Why Mandrake is right (Score:2)
It would be easier to code to something like UnitedLinux than support 5 or 6 different distributions. They'd rather just pick one (most just pick Redhat) and be done with it. They're just not willing to invest developer costs.
Love would have everyone believe that Linux is fragmenting Unix-style. But that just doesn't happen with open source. I mean, look at Ximian, they're a relatively small software house, they support boatloads of distributions.
Re:Why Mandrake is right (Score:2, Insightful)
Yes he does. A proper UNIX program will install files in /usr/bin, /usr/doc, /usr/share, /etc, and various other places, as opposed to a Windows program that installs everything in C:\Program Files\$progname, with the occasional library in C:\windows\system
Re:Why Mandrake is right (Score:3, Informative)
Seriously, try it out. It's absolutely wonderful. By far the best way I've found to keep your system from accumulating too much cruft (well, it won't stop the accumulation, but it will make it trivially easy to get rid of later). I've only used Encap, but it's way way cool. When you compile a program, use "--prefix=/usr/local/encap/program-1.0" with the configure script, and then you'll have /usr/local/encap/program-1.0/bin, /usr/local/encap/program-1.0/share, etc . . . Then you run "epkg -i program" and it'll install all the symlinks correctly into /usr/local the way you'd expect. Then you can remove packages, upgrade, etc, etc, etc. Very fun.
Re:Why Mandrake is right (Score:2)
Point-by-point rebuttal (Score:3)
1. Commercial software companies don't understand dynamic linking.
This statement might be correct in a few cases, but Linux does *not* provide a better development model than windows. The simple fact is that you can statically or dynamically link in *both* windows *and* linux. And ask anyone who's tried to update their libraries in Linux if it's easier than doing so in Windows.
2. Unix Filesystem
So, we've got files in, say the
As for a guarantee that a program "relocated" will or won't work on two systems, the same thing can be said for Linux/Unix.
3. Illegal cartel
I don't know where you're getting this, but you might as well claim that Steven King killed JFK. It's an unfouned conspiracy theory at best, slander at worst. And since when is OPEC or De Beers illegal? Or UL fo that matter?
Your main point is that prorpiatary software developers are incompetent. You use some... interesting justification. Just because there is so much more sofwtare for Windows doesn't mean that there is more bad siftware, but there us *plenty* of bad software (open source, free and closed) for Linux.
Re:Point-by-point rebuttal (Score:2, Informative)
http://www.cnn.com/SPECIALS/2000/yourbusiness/sto
http://www.professionaljeweler.com/archives/news/
Re:Why Mandrake is right (Score:5, Insightful)
Ugh. Is this a troll? Am I missing something? Staticically linked libraries are not a 'far superior' development model. Seriously. If you want to use your system efficiently, you really don't want every application completely self-contained. That's a lot of redundancy, and thereofre, al ot of waste. Not to mention the distribution of bug fixes. Linux or Windows, it's much nicer if I can download/build a new
If you want everything self-contained, then throw yourself back to some single-tasked OS from the 70's. If you want to take advantage of modern advances in application and systems design, you're just going to have to get "used to" the idea of some standard that applications can conform to. This could be the LSB or a guide from the OS vendor to which an application is tailored, but you have to have something. Otherwise, your wasting alot of (system/manpower) resources maintaining n-hundred copies of the same statically-linked library distributed throughout your system.
Welcome to the world of modern software. Have a nice day.
-Andrew
Re:Why Mandrake is right (Score:3, Interesting)
That said, you are probably right about the expediency of bug fixes through libraries. Still, when you consider the rapid pace of development of some projects, I think this isn't as much of an issue as you might think it is.
Worse than DLL or .so hell is RPM hell. I am sure all of you who have been exposed to this technological travesty agree. When a distribution's installation hinges on the installation of the Perl RPM, for example, you are virtually guaranteeing that you will break something and potentially assfuck your system if you remove or don't install the Perl package in favor of compiling from a tarball.
Re: (Score:2)
Re:Why Mandrake is right (Score:2)
Binary software vendors have been doing a better job of not breaking DLL interfaces. It comes out of necessity - you can't just ask each of your customers to recompile a whole bunch of things every time you make a change (like some open-source library developers have been known to do =).
Consider the *immense* lengths that Microsoft has gone to in order to avoid breaking user32.dll and msvcrt.dll after umpteen different changes. (e.g. according to Joel Spolsky/Joelonsoftware.com, MS kept a bug in malloc/free just so that SimCity would continue to run on Windows 95).
I do see a certain advantage to DLLs however - cache footprint. It is better to have one shared copy of a "hot" function like malloc() than many statically-linked copies... But this is a really small concern.
Keep in mind that even if all executables are 100% statically linked, they still depend on a stable kernel syscall interface. The Linux kernel developers have been pretty good about binary API stability over the years, but there have been occasional breakages. (e.g. changing the layout of files in
Re: (Score:2)
Re:Why Mandrake is right (Score:2)
Do you trust the providers of the DLL to only to provide updates that are strictly compatible with the version you installed on the user's machine?
Do you trust the other software vendors to do the right thing when writing their installers?
You balance off your feelings of unease with the performance cost of providing a copy of the DLL in your application directory or statically linking such functions as you need.
Re:Why Mandrake is right (Score:2)
I would say commercial software companies understand dynamic linking fine, they are not idiots (at least my company isn't). There is nothing about the windows architecture that forces *anything* to be in a
- Commercial companies can understand the filesystem fine, but that doesn't mean they like it. The typical installation strategy of putting binaries, libraries, headers, and documentation in standard, shared places can make it easier on CLI users, but makes support and integratin testing/implementation a nightmare. Companies want maximum control over the install process and want to keep things in a separate directory not because they don't "get it", but because they can only test a finite number of combinations, and the more the user deviates from those tested configurations, the more potential conflicts/bugs could be exposed by exotic configurations. If their product just happens to use the same filename as another product, and the user in trying to install erases the other applications file, will get upset with the second company. Same goes with relocation and such. Many commercial Unix apps never require access outside of ~, but some do, but same goes for a few open source projects.
- That whole last paragraph smelled of pure FUD. Quite frankly I don't see much the point of UnitedLinux, but I don't think they are doing this, if for no other reason then they *know* they lack the market presence to pull it off. As mentioned in the story, Linux distributions are not the same as the Unix vendor differences, and UnitedLinux seeks to solve a largely non-existant problem.
Re:Why Mandrake is right (Score:3, Interesting)
Dynamic linking has its problems, but the answer isn't "statically link everything". There should (and can) be a clear separation between changing the interface of a dynamic library and changing its underlying implementation. All of my applications which use zlib should benefit from upgrading the shared library to fix bugs.
Microsoft has tried to answer this with COM, where COM objects have interfaces which never change and instead create a new "version" of the interface if it needs to be updated. It's no panacea but it's the right idea.
The problem is that programming is hard. There's no quick solution that will fix all of these problems, and we don't need to go back to static linking either. Developers need the discipline to use the techniques which answer the problems effectively. And there is no way you can convince me that open source developers have more discipline in that area than proprietary developers.
Re:Why Mandrake is right (Score:3, Interesting)
I wish that this were true, but "make install" typically writes to a lib directory, a bin directory, and runs ld to update the library directory listings. Thank goodness it's not a binary-only registry like windows has (ld.so.conf is pretty simple to grok once you know why it's there), but it's not as simple as you make it out to be.
This, in fact, is the only reason I use rpms on my redhat boxen- it's a lot easier to uninstall a package than a tarball that has had "make install" run because the package management software keeps track of where all the files were installed for you.
More Links and More Opinions ;-) (Score:2)
heh!
But of course, that should actually read:
I'll just stick to the best [sourcemage.org] distributions [gentoo.org] and watch the fun from afar
[grin]
Seriously, though, it is this choice that allows you to use and enjoy slackware, and me to use and enjoy Source Mage and Gentoo, others to use and enjoy Debian, Red Hat, Mandrake, and so on, that makes the GNU/Linux community, and the Free Software community in general, so dynamic and so productive.
It is this choice the efforts like UL are trying to undermine, by promoting the myth that commercial and proprietary software vendors should (or need to) package their wares up for one or two reference distributions, rather than packaging them up in a distribution-agnostic manner as Blender, VMWare, Id, and Loki have done. This myth may serve the interests of the distribution promoters in question (in this case, UL), but it is a disservice to the GNU/Linux community as a whole by creating unneeded incompatabilities with other distributions and excercizing some degree of coercion for people to adopt the reference distribution instead. What is more, as other binary releases have proven, it is absolutly unnecessary.
It behooves us all, slackware, Debian, Gentoo, Mandrake, and Source Mage enthusiasts alike, to stand up and make sure the word gets out to commercial vendors that they can, and should, package their software in a distribution-agnostic manner so that they can target their entire marketplace, and not just a portion thereof, by packaging their software in standard tarballs, documenting precisely which versions of which dynamically linked libraries their software requires, and providing a statically linked binary-of-last-resort in parallel that will run regardless (this is important as distros mature and the old version of the software remains desirable anyway, so it not only allows any distro access to the software, it also provides insurance that the software will run on most any GNU/Linux distro 5 years hence, or even longer, long after the state of the art has moved a great deal further along).
Re:LINK CORRECTION (Score:2)
Nope...that would make it Red Hat :P.
(In case some of you don't know/remember, RH started out as a derivative of Slackware).
Re:Spam (Score:3, Informative)
That being said, Mandrake doesn't seem to spam - I had to explicitly sign up for the newsletter...
Re:debian rocks :) (Score:2, Funny)