Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Rocky Linux: A CentOS replacement by the CentOS founder

github.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

301–310 of 555 posts

Re: Rocky Linux: A CentOS replacement by the CentOS founder

#301

Post by pinewurst »

CoconutPilot wrote: post #296

Whats missing is an analysis of why CentOS failed. I think Rocky Linux needs to put out a plan how they will make themselves financially viable as we've had 3 high profile RHEL respins go down in the last 10 years. CentOS failed twice, it ran out of money in 2014 and was rescued back then by Redhat sponsership. Again in 2020. Another widely used RHEL respin was Scientific Linux which mothballed when RHEL 7 was releas…

It’s hard to continually fund any project defined by its users’ abhorrence of compensation.

Re: Rocky Linux: A CentOS replacement by the CentOS founder

#302

Post by smitty1110 »

macspoofing wrote: post #298

What's the point of keeping the CentOS brand at this point? Why not have RHEL and RHEL Stream?

Because there is still a chance they can extract value from it, or up-sell someone from CentOS to RHEL and a juicy support contract. And they will keep it a round to keep the trademark, if for no other reason than to deny it from everyone else.

Re: Rocky Linux: A CentOS replacement by the CentOS founder

#303

Post by effie »

jessaustin wrote: post #299
effie wrote: post #283

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm wary of doing that, because in near future, Microsoft is likely to take over Canonical. You don't put all eggs into one basket. Always plan for escape, always have a plan B. Preferably one not relying on crystal-balling whims of a for-profit corporation. Rocky Linux, Alpine Linux, Debian, Gentoo, BSD, etc.

Moving a server from Ubuntu to Debian doesn't seem a very arduous task? I've got a box in a rack that came from the factory with Ubuntu installed, but there are Debian addresses in /etc/apt/sources.list.d Besides isn't that pretty much the exemplar of FUD?

But it is still a task, isn't it? So, now you move to Ubuntu, then if things get south, you move to Debian. Or, you could move to Debian or other less risky distribution now and likely save some time and energy.

On the other hand, maybe Ubuntu is providing something special that Debian can't do - then it may make sense to go with Ubuntu and maybe even swallow Microsoft's fishing hook if it comes.

Re: Rocky Linux: A CentOS replacement by the CentOS founder

#304

Post by cortesoft »

em500 wrote: post #268
thr0w3345 wrote: post #253

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Redhat acquired it, then ibm acequired redhat and then game over.

Obvious next question: what drove the CentOS devs to sell to Redhat. From previous discussions, I understood that it came down to lack of resources / devs to maintain and support it. So OP's question is on point: what will Rocky Linux do to avoid a similar misfortune?

What drives anyone to sell anything? Money.

Re: Rocky Linux: A CentOS replacement by the CentOS founder

#306

Post by konjin »

CoconutPilot wrote: post #296

Whats missing is an analysis of why CentOS failed. I think Rocky Linux needs to put out a plan how they will make themselves financially viable as we've had 3 high profile RHEL respins go down in the last 10 years. CentOS failed twice, it ran out of money in 2014 and was rescued back then by Redhat sponsership. Again in 2020. Another widely used RHEL respin was Scientific Linux which mothballed when RHEL 7 was releas…

It failed because it let redhat people in.

I know mentioning incentives and that people lie is not popular here but when the same thing happens to two different projects you have to be willfully blind to not see a pattern.

As for making it viable long term: a clear goal, community norms and quick removal of anyone not toeing the line.

Re: Rocky Linux: A CentOS replacement by the CentOS founder

#307

Post by konjin »

circularfoyers wrote: post #272
thr0w3345 wrote: post #253

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Redhat acquired it, then ibm acequired redhat and then game over.

There isn't any evidence that I'm aware of that this decision was influenced by IBM (correlation doesn't equal causation).

There isn't any evidence anything causes anything else. Cartesian dualism is irrefutable. So for all we know we live in a world where IBM destroying everything they touch is purely the will of a malevolent daemon who wants to tarnish the good name of the company that enabled the holocaust.

Re: Rocky Linux: A CentOS replacement by the CentOS founder

#309

Post by kondbg »

em500 wrote: post #294
netzvieh wrote: post #264

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> 1. Where do the upstream RHEL sources live? CentOS sources are in https://vault.centos.org/8.3.2011/BaseOS/Source/SPackages/ , but where do they get them upstream? I believe they're only available to RHEL subscribers, does this give RH a way to block clones? Red Hat publishes it's sources on https://git.centos.org . Those are then used to build CentOS Linux packages. In the future they'll do their development there…

> Red Hat publishes it's sources on https://git.centos.org . Those are then used to build CentOS Linux packages. Have you checked if this repo actually works as intended? Because I was wondering if the git repo has RHEL or CentOS sources (or both). So I tried to find out myself instead of just throwing the question out there. It went roughly as follows: - Let me check the sources of dracut (the RHEL installer) in htt…

The git repository stores only the packaging related items (the specfile, the custom patches, etc.). The actual source is stored as a binary artifact that is downloaded by a `get_sources.sh` script.

The build process is documented here: https://wiki.centos.org/action/show/Sources?action=show&redi...

Re: Rocky Linux: A CentOS replacement by the CentOS founder

#310

Post by acdha »

StillBored wrote: post #238
mmrezaie wrote: post #3

I am really interested to know why should anyone go with this when Debian or Ubuntu LTS exist. The two later have not changed their policies in the last decade, and they have a clear path for upgrading. CentOS was always a clear choice for device drivers support, but I never understood the stability claims.

RHEL and its derivatives are the only linux distribution which maintains binary compatibility over 10+ years while getting not only security updates but feature additions when possible. This is something I don't think the wider community understands, nor do they understand the incredible amount of work it takes to back-port major kernel/etc features while maintaining a stable kernel ABI as well as userspace ABI. Ever…

That's the value pitch for RHEL, where it's understandable — whether or not you like the enterprise IT model of avoiding upgrades as long as possible, there's a ton of money in it.

I think the gap is the question of how many people there are who want enterprise-style lifetimes but don't actually want support. If you're running servers which don't need a paid support contract, upgrading Debian every 5 years is hardly a significant burden (and balanced by not having to routinely backport packages). There's some benefit to, say, being able to develop skills an employer is looking for but that's not a huge pool of users.

I think this is the reason behind the present situation: CentOS' main appeal was to people who don't want to pay for RHEL, and not enough of those people contribute to support a community. That lead to the sale to Red Hat in the first place and it's unclear to me that anyone else could be more successful with the same pitch.

Post reply on HN