The embedded Linux nightmare - an epilogue [LWN.net]

The embedded Linux nightmare - an epilogue

Posted May 2, 2007 3:48 UTC (Wed) by raven667 (subscriber, #5198)
In reply to: The embedded Linux nightmare - an epilogue by drag
Parent article: The embedded Linux nightmare - an epilogue

Old Debian Stable shipped 2.6.8 and Redhat EL 4 used 2.6.9. Those systems are the longest supported distributions out of all mainline Linux versions and now they are basicly obsolete, except as legacy installations. Nobody would want to install either of those systems for new servers or workstations.

I disagree with this statement. I still install RHEL4 in my business and plan to do so for some time, heck I still install the occasional RHEL3 host. I'm not going to rebuild systems that currently work just to get the latest and greatest without some clear justification. It costs time to maintain another OS variant, re-checking our services and potentially porting them to the new release. Of course they are all similar (RHEL3-RHEL5) but each version has differences (or else it wouldn't be a new version) that I need to understand and account for. The long term support for RHEL, SLES and Ubuntu LTS exists for a reason, users which don't want a high rate of churn for their base OS.

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The embedded Linux nightmare - an epilogue

Posted May 2, 2007 5:17 UTC (Wed) by dlang (✭ supporter ✭, #313) [Link]

however, you won't be trying to install that old version on brand new hardware, you will be installing it on the hardware that it supports.

as such you just need bugfixes, you don't need new drivers and other major improvements from the new kernel.

so you are just fine. the maintinance nightmare is when you try to backport larger chunks of things, and they drag in more stuff that they depend on.

even bugfixes aren't going to be complete, many bugs get fixed by replacing the code that is buggy (frequently without the person writing the new code recognising all the implications of the bug, sometimes without them noticing that there is a bug) with new code, useually to add new features, or as part of a cleanup effort.

bugs that are fixed like this are extremely hard to backport

The embedded Linux nightmare - an epilogue

Posted May 3, 2007 11:59 UTC (Thu) by raven667 (subscriber, #5198) [Link]

<blockquote>however, you won't be trying to install that old version on brand new hardware,
you will be installing it on the hardware that it supports.

as such you just need bugfixes, you don't need new drivers and other major improvements
from the new kernel.
</blockquote>
I hate to say it again but this is also not true. RHEL3 supports modern hardware, the have
backported newer versions of drivers and other compatability fixes. RHEL3 is supported on the
latest Dell PowerEdge 9th generation systems for example and even comes with the Dell hardware
management kernel drivers that were integrated with upstream.