ESR: Goodbye Fedora

[Steffen Kluge]

On 24/02/2007, at 3:07 AM, Mike McCarty wrote:

>> Firstly, I replaced my firewall and Internet exposed servers with   
>> OpenBSD boxes a couple of years ago. The OpenBSD camp are stuck- 
>> up  and hostile bunch, but with the sheer number of security  
>> patches my  Linux boxes required on a regular basis I just didn't  
>> feel  comfortable anymore to put them in the first line.
>
> You can make this same criticism for any of the *NIX like OS groups,
> though things are improving. *NIX with its cryptic, often only two
> letter commands, and command switches no two of which look similar
> to each other, *breeds* guru mentality.

What same criticism? That Linux isn't security-centered enough? Well,  
that clearly doesn't apply to *some* Unixes, such as OpenBSD. Two- 
letter commands don't affect security, and neither does guru mentality.

> In short, fiddling with an OS is not a hobby for you, nor for many.
> Linux, in general, is for fiddlers and those for whom such fiddling
> is a hobby.

Well, it used to be a hobby of mine, but it becoming less and less  
so. Apart from that, the Linux community is making far too many  
claims of real-world usefulness to withdraw behind the excuse of  
being "merely experimental" everytime someone points out a  
shortcoming. This isn't the early 1990's anymore.

> I have worked on and supported and written enough OS
> that fiddling with OS is not something that interests me any more,
> either. Fedora is the most extreme of the Linux in this respect.

I don't think this is correct, either. I have seen Linux OS projects  
that are far more experimental than Fedora.

> If installing and fiddling is not your "thing", then Fedora is not
> for you.

I know the mantra. I've been chanting it myself. On the other hand,  
if all the fiddling never yields any meaningful results or progress  
then it isn't much more than pissing against the wind. I have the  
impression that this was one of ESR's gripes with Fredora.

> My girlfriend, at my suggestion, is running
> Debian, and it works well enough, and is stable enough.

My wife and one of my sons used to run Fedora, without any stability  
problems, too. But it was a very time-consuming affair for me, they  
couldn't do much themselves, only what I've set up or made working  
for them.

Those of us who live and breathe Unix tend to lose touch with what  
user-friendliness means for computer illiterates. Give me the command  
line anyday, I much prefer it to any incarnation of "file managers".  
However, the command line doesn't mean squat to my family. The have  
to put up with the ghastliness of GUI file managers.

>> Of course, Apple have an unfair advantage, they make their own   
>> hardware...
>
> Well, they *market* their own hardware.

In fairness, they design and engineer it, and have it made in China.

> Linux has one really big flaw in one sense...
>
> It has no rudder at all. Linux is not a product. Some distros
> attempt to be somewhat a product. Fedora makes no bones about
> it: Fedora Core is NOT A PRODUCT, IT IS A PROJECT.

Projects have rudders, too. Or at least, they should (it's called  
project management). And they should have long terms goals and  
strategies. And they should communicate those.

Cheers
Steffen.