Thoughts from last meeting

[Bryan J Smith]

Chris Adams wrote:
> Um, it is all Open Source software, so if a third party (EPEL

Just keep in mind that the Fedora Project is quite differentiated from
other Third Party Software (TPS) by many people, including community
TPS repositories.  From post #1, I've tried to put for the reasons why
marginalizing Red Hat customers is not the way to go in the Red Hat
sponsored Fedora Project.

> or somebody else) wants to also provide it,

Indeed.  The question becomes where do people get it in a way that it
does not sprawl "out-of-control" from the standpoint of management.
You have to consider not just ...
A. Red Hat desktop subscriptions
B. Red Hat server subscriptions
C. Red Hat server subscriptions with optional enterprise channels
(pricing up to 10x as much as "B", a pricing/support differential
which has existed since RHEL 2.1)

But also ...
D.  EL Rebuilds who strive for bit-for-bit compatibilit y(who vary in
what they have in base, extras, etc...)
E.  Other projects that may or may not be involved

> Red Hat doesn't really have a leg to stand on asking it to be removed.

Again, why go there?  I've never considered it to be "versus" in the
Fedora Project, but trying to address the needs of Red Hat, customers
and community.  This helps no one.

> You are perfectly within your rights to purchase RHEL entitlements and
> load whatever software you want, even software that Red Hat offers to
> support at additional cost, without paying them any more money (you
> just won't get any support for it).

Unfortunately, people do, not just intentionally, but unintentionally.
 Red Hat wastes resources, etc...  And it's not the community that is
really the concern, but more costly, proprietary vendors that
intentionally put customers and community in the position of doing it,
unintentionally.

If it is at all possible, I would advocate the Fedora Project provide
diligence in mitigating this issue.  Several people have many solid
suggestions on how to mitigate this, even though it will still happen.
 The idea is to do what is technically and managerially possible to
mitigate it, and that's all the Fedora Project can do.

> If you don't like that, then don't use EPEL (or any other third party
> software repository).

The more you ignore the needs of one entity/userbase, the more you
marginalize them, the more it loses value.  This is hardly about
"having a leg to stand on," so don't go there.


--
Bryan J Smith - Professional, Technical Annoyance