Alpha Newbie needs help netbooting linux

[Jiann-Ming Su]

On Wed, 31 Mar 2004, Mike A. Harris wrote:

> 
> So "debian uses apt, which is very useful" alone, isn't really a
> compelling reason for a Red Hat OS user to switch to Debian, 
> since they can already use apt if they wish to have that 
> functionality.
> 

That's why I said "almost recommend."  :-)

> An example that is directly in my own neighborhood is XFree86.  
> Debian stable ships XFree86 4.1.0, which is about 3 years old,
> and supports no modern video hardware.  It may work on 10-15
> different architectures that Debian supports, but it is not
> up-to-date so to speak.  Red Hat ships XFree86 4.3.0 in Red Hat
> Enterprise Linux on 7 architectures to contrast, albeit Alpha (to 
> keep this on topic) is regrettably not one of those supported 
> architectures (x86, x86_64, ppc, ppc64, s390, s390x, ia64).
> 

apt-get -t unstable install xfree86?  Not to discount your point,
but is this even an issue for alpha hardware anymore?  I mean, 
there aren't new alpha's being released.  And, most alphas seem 
to be used for number crunching, anyway.  

> My recommendation to those who want more recent Linux bits for
> their Alpha hardware, (since this is a Red Hat mailing list
> afterall), is is to get involved with testing/volunteering, etc.
> with Fedora Core once Alpha architecture gets merged into it.  
> 

You can do the same thing with debian... 

> 1) How many people on this list are interested in seeing Fedora
>    Core for Alpha?
> 

This I would actually be interested in.  Debian installers for
the most part are crap.  The RH/Fedora installers are so much
more polished.  Although, I'm really getting use to simply 
using a business card net install CD on x86 systems and simply 
using apt-get to grab the packages I need. 

> 2) Would you be willing to volunteer to do test installations on 
>    Alpha hardware if and when installable CD images become 
>    available as a test release, or even a pre-test?
> 
> 3) Would you be interested in volunteering to report bugs, fix 
>    bugs, supply patches, and/or do other volunteer work related 
>    to Alpha?
> 

If there is an active group, it's easier to say yes to these two.
But, then the question becomes to what end?  Right now, I'm 
actively testing OpenSSI (on x86) because the developers (at HP) 
are active and responsive.  Plus, I think OpenSSI is the future of 
Linux deployment.  

But, with alpha, as technically superior as it is over x86, 
to what end would we be working?  New distro on old hardware?
If the current distro works fine, what's the point?

> The greater the masses of Alpha users out there that we can get 
> interested in this, the more likely we are to get something 
> together that is useable sooner rather than later, so any 
> feedback is appreciated.
> 

Don't get me wrong, there are many things about RH/Fedora that I like
over debian.  But, you listed out three very valid reasons why we don't 
see RedHat supporting the other architectures.  Since alpha has become
essentially a hobbiest's system, why volunteer for Fedora as opposed
to Debian?  Debian doesn't seem to work within the same constraints as
RedHat and even Mandrake. 

-- 
Jiann-Ming Su
"Tempers are wearing thin.  Let's hope some robot doesn't kill everybody."
--Bender, robot from Futurama