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

[Kevin Hulse]

--- Kermit Jones <lug at freelifeministries.org> wrote:
> 
> >>People running Windows 98 are people with
> unpatched
> >>systems since
> >>Microsoft no longer supports that product.  Of
> >>    
> >>
> >
> >Windows 98 isn't free software.
> >
> >It's also a very poor frame of reference to compare
> >against. It's not useful to use the worst vendor
> and
> >products in the industry as your yardstick.
> >  
> >
> You missed my point.  People don't upgrade from

Then why bring up the fact that Win98 ar running
"unpatched systems"? This is only relevant if you
intend to use Microsoft as some sort of general
purpose bogeyman for unsupported systems.

"unpatched systems" are generally a Microsoft
problem. Any other OS is dramatically less
problematic in this respect.

> Win98 to WinXP because 
> it cost them $100.  So if they won't pay to upgrade
> an OS they already 
> use, they'll never pay for an OS they know nothing
> about.  My point was 
> in reference to the "$109 Linux isn't expensive." I
> was stating that 
> $100 is too expensive for most people.
> 
> So I wasn't implying Win98 is free, but it IS on a
> majority of older 
> computers out there. (That I have encountered - the
> average Joe)
> 
> >No, Fedora is a "supported version" of Fedora.
> >  
> >
> ?
> Fedora supports themselves?  :)
> 
> >It is has been forked into something that Redhat
> >is no longer comfortable in associating themselves
> >with directly.
> >  
> >
> I thought the point of support was you stand behind
> your product.

This is relevant for those of us that run applications
that cost 60K per cpu. For everyone else, it's not 
really that interesting. 

Linux progresses independent of vendors that want you
to pay for the privelege of accessing the latest
security patch.

> 
> >In this context, "community based support" is 
> >equivalent to NO SUPPORT. Although that doesn't
> >really matter. Being a Sun/M$ wannabe isn't the
> >point at that pricepoint and never was.
> >  
> >
> True.  I wish that many companies would realize the
> fallacy of this, 
> though.  I've had better luck with community base
> support more often 
> than I have calling Microsoft... or Redhat.  Ask a
> boss, "Sir, do you 
> want us to pay XXX for two hours of support or would
> you like me to find 
> the answer and fix it through some people I know." 
> Bottom line is 
> usually: Make it work.

If "support" is an issue, then it is usually an issue
on the frontend and the money is spent upfront for
support contracts. If you've gotten to the point where
you need to cut a PO for a single support incident
then your company is clearly not in the group that
needs a Linux distributor pretending to be Sun.

Jacking up the price of distributions will only erode
marketshare and mindshare in this environment. If we
are lucky, that erosion will be in favor of another
Linux distributor.

> 
> >>With regards to the names...
> >>Red Hat obviously needs two separately trade
> marked
> >>names in
> >>order that they can treat the two products
> >>independently when
> >>    
> >>
> >
> >This is not obvious at all actually.
> >
> >Mandrake doesn't have this problem. Neither does
> >Debian.
> >  
> >
> Excellent point.