[Fedora-marketing-list] Re: Slashdot interview with Fedora Project leader Max Spevack

[Rahul]

Nicola Losito wrote:
> 
> Given that "non free" or "troble maker" packages has to stay away from 
> RedHat owned network (and so it's mirror) i then ask:
> - how comes there's so muck fragmentation in Extras, Livna, RPMforge and on

Livna has non-free packages and Fedora Extras does not carry non-free 
packages though they are compatible with each other. RPMForge is a third 
party repository that has a goal on creating packages that work on many 
other distributions other than Fedora and hence cannot be merged with 
Fedora Extras.  However they too are compatible with Fedora Extras

http://rpmforge.net/user/faq/#compatibility-and-mixing


> - how can we ecourage them to put as much free software package in 
> Extras leaving few non-GPL on an unique "non free" repos

Many of the maintainers working on both these repositories contribute to 
Fedora Extras too but a merge for above cited reasons cannot be done. In 
short we have different goals but work on common grounds wherever 
possible. That is the opposite of fragmentation to me.


> 
> Also, I'm ignorant, but it would be nice to have a Fedora-NONUS 
> repository for those who live outside the USA (a la Debian).

We dont want any non-free repositories associated with Fedora at all and 
that is unlikely to change considering our objectives. This is not just 
a question of what is allowed legally.

http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Objectives


> 
> I am insisting on package management policies becaus they are (for me, 
> clearly) the strongest point of the Free Software movement and the easy 
> availability of them could "convert" as much people as possibile (and 
> here we are in marketing list, trying to "sell" our distro).

We already have good package management policies that is shared by 
Fedora Core, Fedora Extras (and RHEL) and a entire committee devoted to 
tackling those issues on a periodic basis on the fedora-packaging list 
as well as weekly IRC meetings and keeping our guidelines updated.

http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Packaging/Guidelines
http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Packaging/Committee

> 
> When i have the occasion to let try "Linux" to some friend quite never I 
> am in the condition to make him try Fedora, principally for the reason 
> explained before. I would like to change that, and after the ease of 
> installation comes the package available to the user and the 
> configuration tool at disposal.

Pirut, Pup and Puplet along with yum should provide much of the user 
friendliness in dealing with software packages at this point. If you are 
suggesting that we adopt non-free packages, that is unlikely to be 
entertained.

Rahul