Date: Sat, 6 Jun 1998 01:24:47 -0400
From: Eric Kidd <eric.kidd@pobox.com>
To: lwn@lwn.net
Subject: 5.1 impressions

I chose to upgrade a workstation here at work to RedHat 5.1, and like it so
far. The package list is tiny compared to some distributions, but that's
nothing which can't be fixed by five minutes at <http://rufus.w3.org/>. The
proprietary CD is a nice touch; it will increase the total amount of money
changing hands in the Linux market and provide users with more choices.

Linuxconf proved to be a very pleasant surprise, particularly the Gnome
interface. While I like editing my own text files, this program goes far
beyond any admin tool I've seen anywhere. Give this thing 18 months of
Bazaar-style development, and it's going to have dozens and dozens of
modules and provide capabilities undreamt of on any other Unix or NT. Have
you seen the support for roving laptops which need different configurations
depending on where they end up?

The upgrade was painless, but it will probably hurt far more on our heavily
customized server. RedHat 5.1 seems stable and doesn't have too many
annoying bugs.

Cheers,
Eric