[NTLUG:Discuss] Redhat Offerings -- the Red Hat bashing tour is back!

[Bryan J. Smith]

Dave Augustus wrote:  
> Yes, the blessed GPL. I do know that they have taken some of the 2.6
> kernel features and backported them to the 2.4 kernel. That seems really
> wierd to me.

Red Hat's not the only company that does that.
The last time I ran a vanilla kernel was back in 1998.
I only run Red Hat kernels today.

If you're building a web server or other solution, then you might
be able to get away with not doing so.

But when it comes to GBps NFS/Samba fileservers, I want a Red Hat
kernel.  Red Hat's focus is different than Linus'.  Red Hat takes
a kernel and regression tests the heck out of it, patching it
left and right.

> They tout *stability* as one of thier reasons for doing this.

Of course!  Red Hat is one of the _best_ vendors for regression
testing their kernels for _months_ under _heavy_ loads.

> I have been using Redhat since 6.1 and I am well acquainted with
> their products upto and including Redhat 9. But now, it seems that
> what was free, is no more,

Not so, other than 2-3 years of updates.  Fedora Core (FC) 1 is
basically Red Hat Linux (RHL) 10.  Red Hat is _still_ paying the
_same_number_ of people who were _previously_ working on RHL to now work
on FC.

And yes, I've used RHEL kernels on RHL and FC.  No issues other than
grabbing a few support packages.  Isn't the GPL great?  Isn't it even
greater than companies like Red Hat release _everything_ GPL?

> at least from the standpoint of support (i.e. RPM updates).

Of course!  2-3 years of support without a dime?  Not even
Debian-founder Murdock offers that with Progeny!  He makes you pay for
it too if you want commercial support!

In a nutshell, Red Hat was trying to address both the "Enterprise
Commercial" user who wants 5+ years of updates, and the "Community User"
who wants rapid adoption.  So RHL split into RHEL and Fedora, to meet
both needs.

Like the community-run, Democratic-organized Debian project, the
community-run, Meritocracy-organized** Fedora project offers updates. 
The Fedora "Legacy" repository offers updates after RHL and FC releases
are "end of life" (EOL), for a total of the _same_ 2-3 period that we
previously had with RHL.

Not only does Fedora "Legacy" offer this, but the build servers, network
infrastructure and support lists are _funded_ by Red Hat, on Red Hat's
network, using their build servers and support staff!  Again, Fedora is
_heavily_ funded and staffed by Red Hat!

[ **Red Hat decided to model Fedora off of the Apache Foundations
"meritocracy" model, and not Debian's "democracy" model, after a very
publicized and embarrasing moment where a major Debian/Linux contributor
was not allowed to become a Debian maintainer because of a personality
conflict with one Debian maintainer.  I was on the Debian list at the
time (I used to maintain packages for Linux-WLAN releases).  Sometimes
Democracies are bad (don't get me started on "veto power") from an
organization standpoint. ]

> This really comes into play when trying to *sell* a linux
> solution- companies want assurances ( support contracts ) to mitigate
> the (percieved in some cases, acutally true in most) risk of using
> Linux. 

And that's where RHEL comes in.  It's the _only_ commercial Linux with a
_guaranteed_ 5+ years of updates.  That's what Red Hat's customers
wanted.

BTW, you _can_ still buy a "retail box" of Red Hat.  It's called "Red
Hat Professional Workstation" (RHPW) and retails for $109.  It's
basically the repackaged version of RHEL WS, only for the retail shelf.

And now Red Hat has introduced the "Red Hat Desktop."  It, again, is
little more than a repackaged version of RHEL WS, only sold in 10 and 50
license packs at a highly reduced rate.  This was to appease open
licensees, system integrators and those building clusters.

> I just find myself asking lots of new questions when building a
> server: the answer used to be Redhat, now I can't say that anymore and
> I am searching for new answers.  Ideas?

Yeah, stop listening to the mob and ignorant IT media and find out the
_real_ story about RHEL and FC.  I tire of the demonization of Red Hat. 
Just because Red Hat promotes its commercial products doesn't mean it's
not out funding a crapload of GPL development, including Fedora.

[ Although I _do_ think Red Hat has caused some of its own confusion. 
But the IT media BS of Red Hat "exiting/entering" the "desktop" was the
IT media, _not_ Red Hat.  Red Hat _never_ "exited" the "desktop." ]

Again, for _all_ intents and purposes, Fedora is what we had in RHL --
right down to the _paid_ Red Hat staff support.  They just opened up
some of it to the community, not "dumped" it on the community.  Legacy
is churning out updates of RPMs for RHL7+ right now, including an
announcement list.

The Fedora "Core" "Extras" "Legacy" "Alternatives" and "3rd Party"
repository approach is trying to build for RHL what Debian already has.
It's nice to be able to pull DVD/CSS and Macromedia Flash via Apt
with Fedora, free of the GPL/licensing issues that Red Hat previous
had with RHL.


-- 
Bryan J. Smith, E.I. -- Engineer, Technologist, School Teacher
b.j.smith at ieee.org