LWN: Comments on "Ten years of Fedora"

Ten years of Fedora

khim — 2013-10-03T22:01:15+00:00

WinNT was never sold as an upgrade to Windows 9X. Not even Windows 2000. Only Windows XP did. And if you'll consider the fact that it had completely revamped internal architecture and everything then it's surprising to see how few hiccups were there with Windows98 to WindowsXP upgrade.

Ten years of Fedora

khim — 2013-10-03T21:58:29+00:00

Even Microsoft has limits. Yes, it supports stuff for much longer than Linux vendors do, but 16 years old package (Ok, 12 years old at the time Windows 7 was released) is too old even for Microsoft. Microsoft clearly indicated that you should have upgraded over ten years ago, after all, it's not as if you had no advance notifications about the need to do that.

Ten years of Fedora

hummassa — 2013-10-03T18:52:51+00:00

Game? Try Microsoft OFFICE 97. Does not work in Windows7/64 bits. Oh, you can run it inside that virtual machine thingy, but it is so complex that NO end-users here at the shop (amongst a sample of a hundred or so) could bother to learn it.

Ten years of Fedora

vonbrand — 2013-10-03T18:14:25+00:00

I had a Microsoft game certified for their Win98 interfaces never get past the splash screen on WinNT. That one was certified to provide said interfaces.

Ten years of Fedora

yeti-dn — 2013-10-03T08:14:01+00:00

No, you put yourself to a Flash jail.

Ten years of Fedora

gvy — 2013-09-26T08:54:22+00:00

Надоест -- возвращайтесь ;-)

Here's a somewhat enhanced version in addition to the original one archived there, just in case.

Ten years of Fedora

dashesy — 2013-09-24T15:57:40+00:00

As I mentioned, it was 5 years ago or so, but I am searching my emails... If I find it, I will post it here.

Search again, for keywords like dll hell, missing MSVCRT80, side by side, ActiveX OLE COM.

Ten years of Fedora

dashesy — 2013-09-24T15:40:40+00:00

Try that fancy XP mode with an old database program that tries to save a file in C:
It seems to be successful, but you look in C: and it is not there, try to save again and it overwrites a ghost! a nasty OS level redirection to some secret vault, trying to increase security by hiding C: is only good for malware-happy old generation that is stuck with 80s OS.
XP mode rarely makes any useful application usable (really try some old game that needs XP mode to just run and notice the ugliness). If you do not mind the glitch there, I used to run a 8 year-old Fedora in a chroot and it worked great.
The fun fact is that there is no nasty OS-level hack (like XP copy/paste/redirection mode), but a clean and elegant forward-compatible design.

Ten years of Fedora

hummassa — 2013-09-24T10:05:30+00:00

> It is perfectly usable for me.

Congrats! You are probably a smart user. I have 100+ users (in an universe of almost 4000) that had to use the thing and none of them could touch it.

Ten years of Fedora

ovitters — 2013-09-24T08:40:11+00:00

They are working on allowing both. See the many stories LWN did on this.

Ten years of Fedora

ovitters — 2013-09-24T07:58:10+00:00

Why would API and ABI breakage be a bug? I know lots of software which doesn't have an stable ABI or API. I am not aware of any software which has all the bugs fixed before release. Stuff is always released with loads of known bugs.

The first is about being first to show changes (IMO they're often not first :P). Not about first to do what you want.

You showed a site which tracks something. Then this site should link together with upstream and provide continuous integration. Putting a distribution inbetween just seems inefficient.

Releasing a perfect distribution every 6 months is IMO not possible. For Fedora I'd rather have them focus on making the installer really good, really easy to upgrade, etc. API/ABI: just focus on allowing applications bundles.

Ten years of Fedora

intgr — 2013-09-24T07:55:46+00:00

> And note that Windows 7 provides an XP Mode VM.
> Does your fancy Linux distro provide such "plan B"?

Yes, my fancy Linux distro easily provides older releases for download. It also provides virtualization software in the repositories. What's your point again?

The thing for Microsoft is, they *have* to allow this explicitly, because otherwise you would be committing piracy. Not everyone with Windows 7 has a legal Windows XP license. In the open source world, licensing is not a problem, so they don't have to bundle it.

Ten years of Fedora

ovitters — 2013-09-24T07:51:34+00:00

I use Microsoft Office at work. Normal upgrades regularly break things. Resulting in requiring a reinstall of Microsoft Office until eventually it breaks again. I am not talking about my pc, it is multiple pcs in various locations. This on Windows XP.

Ten years of Fedora

jospoortvliet — 2013-09-24T07:37:52+00:00

Awesome:-)

Also,it might have taken a while, but things have changed since then :-)

Ten years of Fedora

jospoortvliet — 2013-09-24T07:28:19+00:00

Fedora: Freedom, Friends, Features, First.

With that comes a bit of instability, but that is the price paid for advancing the boundaries. And Fedora does that extremely well.

Congrats to the Fedorians :-)

Ten years of Fedora

Neowin — 2013-09-24T03:26:03+00:00

> We still have some 300+ Windows98/only hardware and 1000+ Office97 licenses. You have to work with what you have.

Don't you know http://www.openoffice.org/
Also http://kernelex.sourceforge.net/

> Have you ever tried it? We did. It's not pretty, nor is it usable by our regular users.

It is perfectly usable for me.
After downloading Firefox from its built-in IE6, it works like a charm.

> Yeah, you install libc5:i386 and you can run a xv binary compiled c. 1995.

Show something else? For example an valuable software like Office97.

Ten years of Fedora

khim — 2013-09-24T00:46:43+00:00

If you have said A you must also say B, you know. If Fedora insist that system-level libraries and not bundled libraries should be used then it must guarantee that these libraries can actually be used—and that means they should offer ABI which is stable and dependable.

Ten years of Fedora

torquay — 2013-09-24T00:21:50+00:00

Isn't API up to upstream?

API and ABI breakage is a bug, and Fedora fixes bugs before releasing its compilation to users, no ?

Fedora is in a good position to spot such breakage, whether by manual or automatic means, and submit patches upstream. Otherwise Fedora can refuse to ship an updated library until upstream fixes its API breakage. It's better to be part of the solution, rather than to continue propagating API instability throughout the Linux ecosystem.

As Fedora uses "first" as a motivation, how about being the first to have a deliberate API compatibility tests for the libraries and other software it ships? Part of the work is done already: http://upstream-tracker.org

Ten years of Fedora

ewan — 2013-09-23T20:23:50+00:00

"Who cares, what developer cares is whether the software working today will work tomorrow."

Indeed, and the original point was not 'Woo Flash, yay!', it was that even something as old, crap and unmaintained as Flash still runs on the latest Fedora. Ergo, no API breakage in Fedora. Flash is a useful illustration here, not because it's any good, but precisely because it isn't.

Ten years of Fedora

luya — 2013-09-23T19:42:06+00:00

Yes, but this comes too often at the cost of breaking things, on the levels of API, ABI and the User Interface. It seems Fedora is using "first" as an excuse to treat its users ("tech hobbists" in Red Hat speak) as guinea pigs. (Parallel installable Gnome 2 and 3? No, that'd be too much effort to do things properly. Let's just chuck it over the fence and see what sticks.)

We are all guinea pigs regardless the operating system otherwise nobody will report bugs, give feedback to improve newer features and changes. When Gnome announced their focus on Gnome 3 and provide the source of Gnome 2 so community can maintain as they please, nobody stepped up right away until year late after Gnome 3 was released. The message is clear right in front of readers, yet some people managed to overlook it. The past is done, let focus to the present.

The largest block of contributors are Red Hat folks, and they also get to steer where Fedora is going (by virtue of putting in the most resources). It's directly in Red Hat's financial interest to get people to test stuff out before putting into RHEL.

Those Red Hat folks came from different backgrounds from Fedora Project itself, Debian, Suse, Mandriva or other companies/communities where they can apply ideas.

Ten years of Fedora

mricon — 2013-09-23T19:30:38+00:00

FYI, this is how I found a job in Canada. Clearly, I need to troll more. :)

Ten years of Fedora

hummassa — 2013-09-23T19:13:25+00:00

It seemed an honest question to me.

Ten years of Fedora

hummassa — 2013-09-23T19:11:36+00:00

> Nowadays, Windows implies Windows NT, thank you.

We still have some 300+ Windows98/only hardware and 1000+ Office97 licenses. You have to work with what you have.

> And note that Windows 7 provides an XP Mode VM.

Have you ever tried it? We did. It's not pretty, nor is it usable by our regular users.

> Does your fancy Linux distro provide such "plan B"?

Yeah, you install libc5:i386 and you can run a xv binary compiled c. 1995.

> Can you name the APIs?

As I mentioned, it was 5 years ago or so, but I am searching my emails... If I find it, I will post it here.

Ten years of Fedora

drag — 2013-09-23T19:08:02+00:00

> Can you explain how you have greater freedom when you have less software to choose from?

The amount of software choice has no bearing on the amount of freedom you have personally.

When you say 'freedom' in your other post what you really are saying is: "I want people to do a bunch of work to make what I want to do trivially easy'. This is NOT freedom. This is a overarching sense of self-entitlement.

I can fully understand your desire to use the latest version of flash in your preferred browser, but guess what: Flash is a closed source pile of shit and if you want to use it you have to play by Adobe's rules because of copyright laws. If you want real freedom then petition the government to get rid of IP laws, not bitch about the fact that you have to use Chrome to get the newest version of flash.

> You basically put yourself in a jail.

Hardly.

Ten years of Fedora

luya — 2013-09-23T18:28:52+00:00

That is Adobe problem which has nothing to do with freedom.

Ten years of Fedora

Neowin — 2013-09-23T17:56:38+00:00

Where is /.
I cannot find this key on my keyboard.

Ten years of Fedora

Neowin — 2013-09-23T17:55:20+00:00

> I think you are severely degrading the term 'freedom' when you are using it in this context. It's actually somewhat offensive.

Can you explain how you have greater freedom when you have less software to choose from?
You basically put yourself in a jail.

Ten years of Fedora

drag — 2013-09-23T17:18:32+00:00

Seems so. If the upstream authors think that breaking APIs are fine then I don't think it's Fedora's place to do anything about it except maybe advise people what libraries not to use.

Irregardless, I love Fedora now. It's grown massively since the old 'Fedora Core' days and it is the most usable and interesting desktop platform for my purposes.

I was reminded of this last night when I booted up my old Debian testing/Unstable laptop and decided to do a apt-get dist-upgrade because it hasn't been updated in a year and a half. After about 2 hours of trying to massage apt-get and aptitude into getting back to a usable system I realized that the only thing I could do to get a usable system without a re-install is the aggressive use of apt-pinning to degrade my system to stable and then upgrade it to testing/unstable. I love Debian a lot also, but I am totally over the whole 'rolling release' thing and stable is just too old for Desktop Linux stuff. It's a great concept (rolling release), but I don't think it has much of a future.

All in all it's fantastic work that Fedora does. I have almost switched over entirely to using it for all my desktop/laptop needs.

Ten years of Fedora

drag — 2013-09-23T17:04:28+00:00

> Why should I lose my freedom to use latest Flash player in my favorite browser other than Chrome/Chromium?

I think you are severely degrading the term 'freedom' when you are using it in this context. It's actually somewhat offensive.

> What, you ask me to do some symbolic link?

I have no clue what you are talking about.

> I have the freedom to install a "spyware" and view a Web with more contents. You don't.

Again with the 'freedom' thing. Now it's even a more disgusting and deplorable usage.

Ten years of Fedora

LightDot — 2013-09-23T16:43:07+00:00

You are aware that you've somehow left /. and are now trolling on a site of a completely different kind?

Ten years of Fedora

Neowin — 2013-09-23T16:38:24+00:00

Don't forget that you don't have the freedom to use the proper tool to generate Flash content.

BTW, modern Adobe support Flash to HTML5 conversion:
http://www.adobe.com/products/flash/flash-to-html5.html

Ten years of Fedora

Neowin — 2013-09-23T16:30:20+00:00

> As for the API breakage comments, I'm not sure you're clear on the relationship of Fedora and upstream projects that are distributed by Fedora.

Who cares, what developer cares is whether the software working today will work tomorrow.

From a probabilistic point of view, the more independent parties involved (assume same breakage probability) the less the overall non-breakage probability will be.

Ten years of Fedora

Neowin — 2013-09-23T16:24:37+00:00

> It's just silly. Chrome PAPI plugin version of Flash outclasses the NAPI plugin version of Flash in most respects. It's faster, the audio works a lot better, it is sandboxed better, and it's a hell of a lot more stable.

Can I use it in Firefox, Opera?
Why should I lose my freedom to use latest Flash player in my favorite browser other than Chrome/Chromium?

What, you ask me to do some symbolic link?
See: http://tmrepository.com/trademarks/linuxteachesyoucompute...

> ... and it's also why I am using Chromium and not Chrome nowadays because it doesn't come with built-in support for Adobe Spyware. It is at least as bad, and quite possibly worse, then running around on the world wide web with a Java plugin enabled. (that and it avoids the proprietary PDF viewer also)

> If anybody actually use Linux Desktop because of the perceived improvement security and privacy, but still insists on using Flash they are doing themselves a huge disservice. Nowadays there is a significant amount of HTML5 video content out there and in many cases downloaders like 'clive' can fetch most content that isn't available under webm or html5 other format by default.

I have the freedom to install a "spyware" and view a Web with more contents. You don't.

Ten years of Fedora

Neowin — 2013-09-23T16:17:02+00:00

> Try to download (lots of) old w98 software and run it undef w7. Hilarity always ensue. Google for "improved windows 7 compatibility" for a lot of examples. In a house with a lot of custom software, shit hits the fan with some frequency.

Nowadays, Windows implies Windows NT, thank you.

App broken doesn't mean API breakage.
And note that Windows 7 provides an XP Mode VM.
Does your fancy Linux distro provide such "plan B"?

> Took half a man-month to deploy a solution for that problem, that appeared in a nondescript hotfix and vanished away with some (published) API.

Can you name the APIs?

Ten years of Fedora

zonker — 2013-09-23T15:16:28+00:00

"A Flash Player stuck on 11.2 is also a joke for a "desktop" OS."

Talk to Adobe, this isn't endemic to Fedora or any other Linux distribution. Fedora doesn't distribute Flash, it's proprietary software that can neither be improved or shipped by Fedora.

As for the API breakage comments, I'm not sure you're clear on the relationship of Fedora and upstream projects that are distributed by Fedora.

Ten years of Fedora

torquay — 2013-09-23T15:04:48+00:00

Fedora is pretty clear that one of its key aims is to advance the development of new stuff

That doesn't make Fedora a beta for RHEL

Ten years of Fedora

drag — 2013-09-23T14:58:32+00:00

This.

People need to be dragged out into the street and beaten with a clue stick for spreading misinformation about the 'Flash is now unsupported on Linux'.

I mean it's one thing to not understand what is going on, which is fine as most people have better things to do then worry about the state of Adobe support for Linux, but it's quite another to go around making innumerable reddit articles and forum posts announcing the demise of Flash on Linux or what can be done now that Flash is no longer supported on Linux.

It's just silly. Chrome PAPI plugin version of Flash outclasses the NAPI plugin version of Flash in most respects. It's faster, the audio works a lot better, it is sandboxed better, and it's a hell of a lot more stable.

... and it's also why I am using Chromium and not Chrome nowadays because it doesn't come with built-in support for Adobe Spyware. It is at least as bad, and quite possibly worse, then running around on the world wide web with a Java plugin enabled. (that and it avoids the proprietary PDF viewer also)

If anybody actually use Linux Desktop because of the perceived improvement security and privacy, but still insists on using Flash they are doing themselves a huge disservice. Nowadays there is a significant amount of HTML5 video content out there and in many cases downloaders like 'clive' can fetch most content that isn't available under webm or html5 other format by default.

Ten years of Fedora

Tester — 2013-09-23T14:05:08+00:00

> A Flash Player stuck on 11.2 is also a joke for a "desktop" OS.

Get the non-free Chrome then, this is now the only way to get Flash 12 on Linux as it's now Google maintaining it, not Adobe.

Ten years of Fedora

hummassa — 2013-09-23T14:02:23+00:00

> Can you name an 'API breakage' through the history of Windows?

Many.

Try to download (lots of) old w98 software and run it undef w7. Hilarity always ensue. Google for "improved windows 7 compatibility" for a lot of examples. In a house with a lot of custom software, shit hits the fan with some frequency.

There was a "security fix" in particular, 2007 IIRC, the bit us in the rear at the shop. Took half a man-month to deploy a solution for that problem, that appeared in a nondescript hotfix and vanished away with some (published) API.

Ten years of Fedora

Neowin — 2013-09-23T13:53:44+00:00

> <rh_sales> hey, all, if you really want a stable system, don't use
> fedora project. It will eat your brane. Buy RHEL instead.

I've bought RHEL.
How to install Chrome on RHEL5?