enterprise distribution

[mattboston at gmail.com (Matt Shields)]

On Wed, 16 Mar 2005 14:15:47 -0500, Tom Metro <blu at vl.com> wrote:
> Matt Shields wrote:
> > I can tell you from experience and from being involved with the CentOS
> > group that it is a very good distro.  It is a direct recompile of RH.
> > So anything that runs on RH will run on CentOS.  They support numerous
> > architectures and updates come out within 24 to 48 hours of them being
> > released from RH.
> 
> Is the cloning process automated or a collection of operations done by hand?
> 
> How are the updates distributed? A collection of mirrors that are
> accessible via Yum?

Our group of maintainers do have scripts that automatically recompile
the sources, but there is a little bit of manual work, replacing logos
I think.  I'm not one of the maintainers.

Updates are done via Yum through a wide network of mirrors.  We have a
group trying to get Apt to work.  The main problem with Apt is it
doesn't support multiple architectures (from what I understand).

> Selling updates is their main business model. If you buy their argument
> that they're in a better position to deliver timely updates, then that
> seems like a reasonable service to charge for. (I also see they make


The guy that runs Lineox has critized us because we don't charge
saying that because he earns money from his distro that his updates
are done more timely and that his distro is more benificial to
businesses.  Honestly, a 24 hour turnaround, which is what CentOS has,
I think is really good.   Most times CentOS gets the updates out that
same day.

Why is it that people think they have to pay money for reliability????
 Take Debian or Slackware.


> > Scientific Linux/Fermilab is also a good choice, but I find they are
> > more geared toward the scientific community...
> 
> That was the impression I got as well, and thus didn't include them in
> my survey. Though I see I overlooked them on the DistroWatch popularity
> chart. They come in at 47, a few steps below White Box.

Honestly, SL is just as good as CentOS, they just market themselves
only toward the scientific community.  The only scientific part is the
Fermilab stuff.  Besides that it's identical to CentOS.

The other thing I can't figure out is how Whitebox got so popular when
they are so lousy at keeping up to date.  Yet, until recently almost
no one has heard of CentOS even though it's been around for almost 2
years.  Look at how many webhosts are now running CentOS compared to
most other distros.  It's a good enterprise Linux, has great support,
supports any hardware that RH does, but is free.

-- 
Matt Shields
http://masnetworks.biz
http://sexydates4u.com
http://shieldslinux.com
http://shieldsproductions.com