[plug] Red Hat 7

[James Bromberger]

On Tue, Sep 26, 2000 at 01:36:32PM +0800, Bret Busby wrote:
> And, with what I heard of the results of the Debian installs at the
> installfest, it can be problematic (unless the installer/user is a Linux
> guru-type person).
> 
> However, as I have told others, Christian has shown me the ease of
> adding a package, using a Debian system. It appears that, once a user
> gets past the difficulties of instasllation and configuration, it is
> simple to use (?)

There has been a long thread on Debian-devel recently regarding the new 
install design specs. I think you would be hard pressed to find someone who 
would not agree that the Debian install could do with some work. But as you 
say, once installed, you're pretty much set with a reliable system that can 
be completely upgraded in place. One recent success story was somenoe who 
upgraded from an old distribution from aruond 2 years ago (buzz? *shrug*) to 
potato (2.2, the current release) in 45 minutes using apt-get, with no problems, 
which took the system from libc5 to glibc2 and various other core changes.

Debian does seem to do the right thing, but does take its time to do so, 
but I think that is just the nature of the beast. Without the extra forces of 
commercial pressure, it can afford to do that, but only for a short time: 
It is the commitment of the volunteers that stop it from delaying itself into 
oblivion. Getting things right is more important than getting it shipped.

One RedHatter here just said this morning that he is going to nuke his 
6.x install and reinstall with 7. With Debian, the deisgn is so cool 
that this scenario is (almost) unheard of. ;)

  James

Debian sys admin since late '94.

-- 
 James Bromberger <james_AT_bromberger.com> www.rcpt.to/~james
   IT, Pelican Manufacturing - www.pelicanmanufacturing.com.au
   Snr Web Systems Admin, JDV - www.jdv.com  *  www.hartleypoynton.com.au

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