Fedora 7: The Linux Knight in Shining Armor?
Robin Laing
Robin.Laing at drdc-rddc.gc.ca
Tue Jan 23 20:30:11 UTC 2007
Rahul Sundaram wrote:
> Robin Laing wrote:
>
>> I can agree that a major change could be a real headache but if the
>> changes are grouped, lets say the move to PATA as part of the kernel
>> upgrade, then most applications can be updated at the same time. Now,
>> I remember doing a kde update that was massive so why not a change
>> like that. There is still the testing branch to work things out on.
>
> Not many people are prepared to help out and provide feedback in
> updates-testing. Have you on a regular basis? A KDE update is small
> potatoes compared to other fundamental changes we are making with every
> release. Some of them like in GCC or Glibc requires rebuilding every
> single component in the distribution. If you want such massive changes
> as updates within the same release, you might as well as be running the
> Fedora development tree.
Now this is a way I never thought of. I do remember issues with
changing gcc in the past and maybe there is a way to have a
compatibility package to ensure older applications keep working. There
was a *compat package in the past to do this.
>
>> Is the present system a deal breaker for Fedora? With the loss of
>> legacy support for older versions, it is looking more and more that it
>> could be.
>
> I don't consider it a deal breaker but a rolling release model with
> major changes now and then is just too problematic if you want a
> somewhat robust release. A slightly longer updates cycle might have been
> better as I said elsewhere before. Fedora updates lifetime has increased
> updates lifecyle to two releases. That means previously FC4 received
> main updates till FC6 test 2 was released. Now when F7 is released, it
> would get updates until F9 is releases which is from about 9 months to
> about 13 months. That gives you the ability to completely skip one
> release. If you want a longer lifecycle, you are free to get involved
> and help.
>
> Rahul
I hope to help more when I have time. I do download some test packages
and I report any bugs that I find. One is the change on the USB "safe
to remove" message that is in FC6 after trashing the file system on my
USB stick.
I also want to start running the next version as a test mode. I am in
the process of setting up my home computer for this purpose with an
interchangeable HD. I do have to be careful as I also have to keep it
running with many applications for all the things I do and want to do on
it. Many that are not supplied by Core or extras. I wish I could
afford a third and forth computer. :)
I wish I could do more.
--
Robin Laing
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