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Fermilab/CERN recommendation for Linux distribution

news.fnal.gov

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Re: Fermilab/CERN recommendation for Linux distribution

#23

Post by keewee7 »

bayesian_horse wrote: post #19

What I didn't like about AlmaLinux so far is that it takes more effort to google solutions to problems than for Ubuntu. That may sound stupid or lazy, but there it is.

AlmaLinux is highly compatible with Fedora and CentOS. You should be able to use the same solutions.

Re: Fermilab/CERN recommendation for Linux distribution

#24

Post by bayesian_horse »

keewee7 wrote: post #23
bayesian_horse wrote: post #19

What I didn't like about AlmaLinux so far is that it takes more effort to google solutions to problems than for Ubuntu. That may sound stupid or lazy, but there it is.

AlmaLinux is highly compatible with Fedora and CentOS. You should be able to use the same solutions.

I am. The impression remains.

Re: Fermilab/CERN recommendation for Linux distribution

#26

Post by bclemens »

djha-skin wrote: post #4

All this time I had thought that Rocky Linux was winning the fork war over Alma (in the fight to be the successor to CentOS), but this post might change that with a good chunk of the science community throwing their weight behind Alma. Do we have anyone else in the audience that has any insights over whether Alma is more prevalent over Rocky or is it the other way around? I know I can run Rocky Linux from DigitalOcea…

Rocky is "winning" if by "winning" you mean more widely used. Here are some graphs charting usage through EPEL statistics: https://rocky-stats.tiuxo.com.

The source used to generate the graphs is available at https://github.com/brianclemens/rocky-stats, however please be kind to the Fedora servers and don't download the stats database too often if you use it.

Also Rocky Linux is far larger in terms of community size, etc.

Re: Fermilab/CERN recommendation for Linux distribution

#27

Post by Mikhail_K »

Dracophoenix wrote: post #25
Mikhail_K wrote: post #21

Is AlmaLinux systemd-free?

It's a RHEL clone, so no. However, you can install runit or OpenRC if you want.

That doesn't solve the problem, because systemd developers have insinuated dependencies on it into multiple unrelated system components.

Re: Fermilab/CERN recommendation for Linux distribution

#28

Post by IceWreck »

keewee7 wrote: post #22

How are these long-term support Linux distros able to provide LTS for the thousands of packages they include? If a security bug is discovered in an old version of RabbitMQ do the distro maintainers learn Erlang/OTP to patch the bug?

Alma/Rocky are just rebuilds of RHEL. And afaik, Red Hat does employ people to do that.

Re: Fermilab/CERN recommendation for Linux distribution

#29

Post by Proven »

1letterunixname wrote: post #17

I went through the Rocks Cluster cycles in 3, 4, and 5 with SLC and Scientific until those fell by the wayside. Rocky is the underdog you want to win. Alma is the leader except in terms of security update latency. The problem is that Cent 8/9 Stream has quicker critical CVE patches because it's essentially the source and is closer to mirroring RHEL. It's hard to convince corporate folks to use Alma when Cent is still…

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Re: Fermilab/CERN recommendation for Linux distribution

#30

Post by liamnal »

dotancohen wrote: post #16
djha-skin wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's interesting because there's a question in the air right now over what fork of CentOS will be its spiritual successor since it got bought out. Will it be Alma, or Rocky? This post holds in favor of Alma.

As much as it pains me to say it, FOSS devs are a finite resource and it seems that being divided is just as if having been conquered. Neither Rocky nor Alma are progressing at the rate that a CentOS fork with a hostile RH upstream would progress if they were working together and not duplicating efforts. What is the philosophical schism between the two? Why can't they split the workload on a single distro and reunite…

It's just like with any distribution, each have their own philosophies and how they want to tackle something. Oracle Linux is still around for example, but we don't talk about them too often.

Rocky seems to have mostly volunteers. Alma has people who are likely paid because they come from or likely still work for CloudLinux. Either way, you're getting a RHEL clone if you go with either. And that is keeping in mind that devs are a finite resource and always will be, regardless of how you look at it.

The thing to keep in mind is that more choices are better than just having one. Think about it, let's say Scientific Linux actually made an 8. CentOS users would've likely gone over to them instead at the EOL date. Since SL didn't keep going, there was only CentOS (and Oracle Linux, but again no one really wants to talk about that - and there are folks who will avoid oracle like the plague; I don't blame them). You take away the one distribution a large amount of folks used and where are they going to go? Stream? Fermilab/CERN were going to stream and... not anymore. Perhaps the bugs and instability were a bit too much.

The long story short of it is, you don't want another situation like CentOS. More options, the better. All EL derivatives/clones should all operate and work the same.

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