Os discussion / debate [Archive]

ProWebUK

12-16-2003, 02:33 PM

Originally posted by loopforever
Redhat is useless unless you're dependent on RPMs (which you shouldn't be! :p)

I think every RPM available for redhat is available to be compiled by source. RPM makes many programs far easier to install and precompiled to any systems, it also speeds up how quickly certain applications can be installed configured and running. Also, RPM can be used on many unix systems, not just redhat so either way you can use it :p

Originally posted by loopforever
The smart choice, if you're looking towards the future, would be to push the demand for a release of DA on a stable (in both developmental and usage respects) OS.

I know how the RedHat OS works, i know when you pay for support with redhat you get it, I had support with redhat and never had a problem - i'm willing to pay for something if it works how i want it, and would rather pay for something that is suitable for my needs than to get something I dont know very well and isnt really guaranteed any support.

Since RHEL is what ev1 plan to have as a main offering it is what we are intending to work with for the future. We are in no way looking to learn any new OS nor move to something we don't feel comfortable with. In the future we may look into other opertaing systems such as debian and FreeBSD and explore, for now i think priority is on on OS thats supported and that we know.

Look around and check what moves the big providers are doing.... many are taking RHEL simple due to it being the 'premium' OS.

ev1servers and rackspace (both huge companies as you probably know) taking on RHEL as their primary OS. I would guess the reason to this is simply, neither would have to retrain staff in any dramatic ways. ev1 are releasing FBSD 2 weeks later (15/01/04 I think) since they have to train for the new OS quite simple, and that is for unmanaged... if rackspace had to do it, the training I expect would be a lot more in depth due to the servers being managed - they need to know every small piece of information in the case that any of them servers occured a problem without that they would more than likely come across a fair few problems.

Reading back through this i wrote a little to much, maybe :D

Chris

interfasys

12-16-2003, 03:05 PM

Since you're an admin, maybe you can move those OS posts in the general discussion forum?

Also, RHE is already available at Servermatrix at no extra cost and those servers are managed, meaning that they run up2date daily and that you have access to all the ES version RH servers.

ProWebUK

12-16-2003, 03:25 PM

Originally posted by interfasys
Since you're an admin, maybe you can move those OS posts in the general discussion forum?

Done :)

Originally posted by interfasys
Also, RHE is already available at Servermatrix at no extra cost and those servers are managed

What i meant was, if rackspace were to move from something like redhat 7.3, to freebsd or debian then they would have a lot more difficulty than moving to RHEL, redhat upgrading to redhat is similar, redhat to bsd is not - or so it seems.

Chris

interfasys

12-16-2003, 06:40 PM

Agreed

loopforever

12-16-2003, 07:03 PM

Common sense and love for open source software should tell you that what RedHat is doing is ridiculous - they're taking a product that they have built up to be very popular over the years, and forcing users to pay for newer versions. Sure, it's tried and true, but so are a bunch of other OSs, they're just not as widely used. I know for a fact that RedHat cannot offer any level of official support in the time frame Gentoo devs or users can. If you log on to Gentoo's IRC room, you'll see hundreds of ACTIVE users ready to help you out. They're damn good. With support like that, offered at NO cost, and a proven superior operating system (AND portage system based on BSDs) there is NO way in hell I'd ever pay for RedHat.

Secondly, of course, freeBSD is great, but the development is not. My friend is friends with some of the developers and they've reported that feuding is tearing the project apart. Do I want to invest my time in running and maintaining a server that has an operating system that is borderline obsolete? Absolutely not.

This is why I suggest that Debian (which Mark has confirmed they are going to release DA for) and Gentoo versions of DA be released before freeBSD 5.1. Especially since RHEL is right around the corner and RH and RPM lovin hippies are dead serious about upgrading.

interfasys

12-16-2003, 07:44 PM

I just got myself a lifetime license of Lindows, maybe I should try to see if they have DA in their Click n' Run =)

loopforever

12-16-2003, 08:41 PM

Originally posted by interfasys
I just got myself a lifetime license of Lindows, maybe I should try to see if they have DA in their Click n' Run =)

I'm going to pretend like I didn't hear you say this... :p

Btw, Lindows is no more, or at least its name is...

ProWebUK

12-16-2003, 08:57 PM

As much as a few would prefer debian, i'm sure there will still at the moment be many more using redhat and RHEL not really wanting to move elsewhere for the reasons I stated above.

im sure a provider for many users here would be ev1, and they alone are *currently* only planning to offer RHEL and FBSD support. That immediatly knocks directadmin out of the door for users wanting to stick with the redhat based OS.

Look at the other panels, what they support;

Ensim: Windows / fedora / RHEL
Plesk: Fedora / FBSD (4.7 / 4.8) / Mandrake / RHEL /(howto on forums)
CPanel: Redhat / mandrake / FBSD / os x / Suse / fedora / debian / beta / trustix / windows /RHEL

When you compare like that you can see RHEL is possible on all 3 (on 1 of them its not official, but you have a guide on upgrading!)

comment i noticed on another forum:

Most likely Fedora will be an alternative in several months, but not now. RHEL is also an alternative if you lease the server from a company that has a contract with Redhat; the fees are much lower.
Personally I wouldn't hesitate to switch to FreeBSD to cut costs, but my personal advise is to use what you can afford. If you can afford RHEL, use it because in a way or another the entire Linux comunity will benefit. Let's not forget that RedHat has money behind Fedora and several other projects.

Chris

interfasys

12-16-2003, 09:06 PM

loopforever, I'm only aware of one country that stopped the distribution of Lindows : Sweden.

bvvelzen

12-17-2003, 01:46 AM

I think this is a difficult feature for DA because now when anybody is asking support I think 99% has RH so that's quit easy. Now DA faces a choice to go for only 1 or 2 OS's or for a lot like CPannel. But the problem with a lot of OS's is what I think that the support needs to be much bigger because of so much OS's.

But I think that DA will find a perfect solution for us to simply migrate to a stable system.

Greetings,

jlasman

12-30-2003, 05:11 PM

there's already an RHEL clone created from the original RHEL source RPMs (legal, as per the license).

But you'll also need security updates for it, and it remains to be seen if any volunteer group can manage that.

Fedora-Legacy has been around for many months, and now, two days beforte they're supposed to start offering updates, they're still arguing about the first press release.

I'm sticking (for the time being) with RHL7.3, and buying commercial updates from Progeny.

I'm testing FreeBSD, and from where I sit I haven't heard anything concrete about problems with the project; I'd like to see something a bit more specific than a friend of a friend said. All that is, is spreading FUD.

Jeff

jlasman

12-30-2003, 06:41 PM

Originally posted by me
there's already an RHEL clone created from the original RHEL source RPMs (legal, as per the license).
I found it; it's called WhiteBoxLinux and information is available at:
http://whiteboxlinux.org/

But the bad news is security updates; you'll have to get the latest ones from Red Hat. You'll only be able to get the SRPMs which as of today, RH is making available to everyone, whether or not they've bought RHEL.

However there's nothing in the Linux license that requires they give the SRPMs to everyone, so they could stop at any time.

And you'll have to compile them yourself.

Jeff

existenz

12-30-2003, 09:44 PM

Originally posted by loopforever
Secondly, of course, freeBSD is great, but the development is not. My friend is friends with some of the developers and they've reported that feuding is tearing the project apart. Do I want to invest my time in running and maintaining a server that has an operating system that is borderline obsolete? Absolutely not.

I am not sure what you were getting at...and I am sure you have crediable information but I don't see the FreeBSD project getting torn apart? Currently you have reps from Apple, Yahoo, The Weather Channel whom all have a major stake in FreeBSD. I have heard about problems among teams but who here has a job where everyone gets along. I am sure people working in the Fedora project will face the same problems.

Could you clarify the obsolete part of the deal? Are you reffering to lack of development? I like bvvelzen idea, take one or two very stable Linux distro's and possibly FreeBSD and OS X on the Unix side and call it a day. That covers just about anyone...as long as we don't see a windows version everything will be ok
:D

jlasman

12-31-2003, 07:35 AM

Originally posted by existenz
as long as we don't see a windows version everything will be ok
I think we agree about FreeBSD and it's development.

While Our shop is almost completely MS free (no MS hosting, only two MS desktops, one an ancient 98 scheduled to be retired, and one a W2K desktop here to run some systems that won't run on anything else) I think it would be wrong to completely discount MS hosting; it's a market to fill.

Now that said, I don't expect to see DA for Windows. Sure you could run Apache, Bind, Perl, PHP, etc., on Windows and that would make it much easier (though still not really easy) to port DA to Windows. But then you'd have no reason to make the port; any port to Windows would have to use IIS and offer Microsoft native FPX , DAV, ASP, etc., as well as offering a choice of the expensive Microsoft Exchange or less expensive (perhaps Mailtraq) alternatives for email hosting.

It's not an easy port, and not a one-man or two-man job.

Jeff (who used to be the Western Hemisphere Distributor for Mailtraq)

interfasys

12-31-2003, 07:45 AM

Yep, a WinDA should not be considered before the release of DA 2 which will bring much needed features unless Windevs are hired to do the job.

prophecy

01-24-2004, 02:26 PM

Any change DA could work on SUSE?

existenz

01-25-2004, 12:06 AM

That would not be that hard as long as the software matched and all the files were located. They have talked about supporting other *nix OS's one at a time.

Wunk

01-28-2004, 04:25 AM

My opinion:

Start supporting both Fedora as RHES..

Fedora for the people who just want a working server with a good and not too costy controlpanel..

RHES 3.0 WS for the people who want a bit more security considering updates and support, WS isn't too expensive anyways, but will come with 5 year worth of updates

Shouldn't be too much of a hassle to make it work, since it's all very Redhat 9 oriented..

prophecy

01-28-2004, 09:38 AM

My opinion:

Support SUSE, it seriously rocks.

jlasman

01-28-2004, 10:15 AM

Originally posted by Wunk
Start supporting both Fedora as RHES..
I presume you mean "Fedora and RHES".
Fedora for the people who just want a working server with a good and not too costy controlpanel..
Supporting Fedora will require a lot of resources; it's a moving target, and if the Fedora team meets it's goals, there will be several major releases a year. Think of making the changes necessary for CR1 today, and in six months having to make changes again for CR2. Think of making changes every four to six months for a release with a total lifetime of less than a year.

I surely hope that DA doesn't fall into the trap of trying to keep DA working with a moving target such as Fedora.
RHES 3.0 WS for the people who want a bit more security considering updates and support, WS isn't too expensive anyways, but will come with 5 year worth of updates
RHES comes with a yearly subscription; you pay the full price every year of those five years. The Basic (download) version will cost $900 over those five years. If you've got 50 systems in a cabinet that's $9,000 each year.

If you want the package and/or the 24/7 Web Support and 12/5 phone support (in the US, 8/5 in the rest of the world), that's an extra $120 per year per license, $1500 over those five years, or $15,000 each year for a cabinet full of systems. (Yes, I know you can't get 50 systems in a cabinet; I'm just rounding for easy "in-my-head" math.)

And for those fees the 24/7 web support response time is two business days and the phone response time is 4 hours.

But better not get that support anyway, since it won't cover you. WS is a workstation edition; I expect they won't want to support any issues at all in a server environment.

To get the minimal server edition (ES), we're talking $350/year, $1,750 over five years; you can do the math yourself if you've got more than a few servers.

But on this you might want to pay $800/year ($4,000 over five years) since the support will cover your use as a server.
Shouldn't be too much of a hassle to make it work, since it's all very Redhat 9 oriented..
Funny you should point that out. In fact it's almost exactly RHL9. The major difference being they're promising to not change it for a few years.

Don't even think of upgrading packages yourself outside of their upgrade system, say to a later version of GD, or else the support is worthless.

Whoops... did I say that? I did. That means their five years of stability become close to worthless since the DA install will kill the important (to us hosters) RPMs RH installs and supports, and install their own, totally unsupported by RH.

Sure RHEL may give you some warm and fuzzies but do you really get any more than that for all your money? I did the research, I did the math, I spent hours on the phone with their sales reps (that happens when you have a lot of systems you're going to stop subscribing to RHN for), and I don't think so. YMMV of course.

The best solution so far appears to be either WBEL (White Box Extended Linux) compiled from RHEL source minus the copyrights and the relatively worthless support, and FreeBSD.

Consider the relative ages and maturities of the two, and what that means for continued availability of upgrades, I think FreeBSD to be the better bet.

I'll support DA on anything, but I see what I see; that's my story and I'm sticking to it :) .

Jeff

jlasman

01-28-2004, 10:21 AM

Originally posted by prophecy
My opinion:

Support SUSE, it seriously rocks.
The last time I seriously studied SUSE was about five years ago.

We supported multiple machines in house with our own software, and were adding systems fairly frequently.

The deal killer for SUSE was that at the time their release numbering system seemed to mean little.

We discussed this both with their technical people and their sales people, so I believe I'm correct when I say that at that time every time they ran out of CDROMs and burned a new batch they did it with the latest versions of the various packages that made up the distribution. And they didn't change the release number.

That made it impossible for us to maintain with our small staff of three; virtually every one of our servers would be running different packages.

I would hope they're no longer doing this. If they are it'd be a no-brainer for us right from the start: "No".

What's your experience on that?

Another issue I've heard recently about SUSE is that the distribution seems to overwrite various configuration files without concern for the current settings. If so, I'd hope only the gui tools would do that.

Do you have any experience with that?

Thanks.

Jeff

ProWebUK

01-28-2004, 10:54 AM

Just to mention, as much as RHEL directly from RedHat costs $900 over 5 years - plus support, there are always partners and resellers - we intend on using RHEL ES as our default OS as soon as DA, Plesk and Ensim support it, we are able to offer servers at around the same cost as what we are now with redhat 9.

Chris

jlasman

01-28-2004, 01:24 PM

Would you pass on more clue, Chris?

Or do you consider that a competitive advantage ;) ?

Jeff

ProWebUK

01-28-2004, 04:03 PM

Competetive advantage ;)

I cant hold it back..... ev1 - same cost monthly for RHEL as redhat 9 (plesk or ensim) and also the same as FBSD.... cant beat that now can you ;) :D

Chris

jlasman

01-28-2004, 04:25 PM

I hoped you had found a way to buy a license at a reasonable price; I should have known better.

I don't know how these companies can afford to buy RHEL at the prices they rent at, but here's an interesting tidbit I just got by calling their sales line:

They supply RHEL ES, the package that Red Hat sells for $349 per year.

But they don't pass on any license to use it.

To get the license and the RHN subscription (which is both the only legal way to use it and the only legal way to upgrade it) you'd have to pay RHN $349 per year.

Or at least that's what I'd have to understand based on what the EV1 representative and the RHN page tell me. I'll have to call RH in the morning to find out if there's some other way to use the EV1 install legally.

Jeff

ProWebUK

01-28-2004, 04:48 PM

EV1 have special deals with RH (same with rackspace and other large providers)

They provide a huge figure of Redhats customers and could lose redhat hundreds if not thousands of customers alternatively redhat could give a deal, keep all the current customers and get a mass more at the same time... not making as much profit but increasing the customer base in a huge way.......

Also.... ev1 now have their own mirror for up2date so all ev1 customers using RHEL get updates basically as quick as it gets - downloading on the same network :D

You get subscription, you get a legal license, you get support, you get a on-network up2date service - all for the same cost as redhat - being a non ev1 user it may not suit you, however for us it is more than perfect :)

Chris

jlasman

01-28-2004, 05:51 PM

I wonder why the rep I spoke to didn't tell me about the up2date server?

She said there was no support for updates.

:)

Perhaps I'll call them again after I speak to Red Hat about it tomorrow.

There are lots of reasons why I'm not an EV1 user, and frankly that could change. I've got a need for a mailserver (not for spam; rather for spam-filtering) which will use much more bandwidth than I want to pay for at my own colo's; I may decide to go with EV1 for them.

Jeff

ProWebUK

01-28-2004, 06:46 PM

I can see what your saying, and why you thinking what you are (that they are doing this illegally i assume?) although i'm sure if that was the case, someone would have taken the action and sorted it already....

EV1servers are currently serving around 20,000 servers, have a customer base of probably a little under that, and host hundreds of thousands of websites, and have been announced the largest dedicated provider in the world - them stats and figures alone allow me to believe the fact they know what they are doing, and being a customer of some time now I can honestly say customer service and support levels are not slighly affected by size they are.

Here are some links you may want to see:

Instructions for using the internal updates system (posted by Director of Web Support)
http://forum.ev1servers.net/showthread.php?threadid=39461

RedHat announcement (mentions of a contract with redhat made by headsurfer)
http://forum.ev1servers.net/showthread.php?postid=236867

Chris

prophecy

01-28-2004, 10:18 PM

Ok, I just have to get in here, I just upgraded a server to full 64-bit system, dual opteron, SUSE 64 bit (FREE), 64 bit mysql, 64 blackdown Java. This thing seriously rips, it processes at least 3 times faster than a single p4, 3 ghz.

And as for SUSE, since we're on the OS topic, their 64 bit version is free, Redhat, $1992 USD!!!! Can you believe that bull****? I seriously have lost all respect for redhat and will never ever use redhat again, although i had to on another server since DA doesn't support SUSE yet.

Why does SUSE rock? Free. Awesome installer and updater, YAST. This thing even rocks from the command line and you don't have to subscribe like up2date. Install SUSE, run YAST from ssh and you get an ASCII interface to update everything on your system. Just try it once, and you'll never use redhat again, that's for sure.

What really gets me is that Redhat was the granddaddy of the open source movement. Now they are all capitalistic and it's really a sad state of affairs if you ask me.

Wunk

01-29-2004, 01:54 AM

Honestly.., the RHEL WS is more then enough, specially since DA comes with it's own webserver and such, all you need is a plain Redhat.., WS suffices for that

I presume you mean "Fedora and RHES".
Well, English isn't my native language, so excuse me ;), yeah, that's what I meant..

And considering Fedora..., Redhat 7.x wasn't all that different in the release scheme.., still, a lot of major controlpanels still support Redhat 7.x (HSphere, Plesk)

ProWebUK

01-29-2004, 07:28 AM

Originally posted by prophecy
Ok, I just have to get in here, I just upgraded a server to full 64-bit system, dual opteron, SUSE 64 bit (FREE), 64 bit mysql, 64 blackdown Java. This thing seriously rips, it processes at least 3 times faster than a single p4, 3 ghz.

And as for SUSE, since we're on the OS topic, their 64 bit version is free, Redhat, $1992 USD!!!! Can you believe that bull****? I seriously have lost all respect for redhat and will never ever use redhat again, although i had to on another server since DA doesn't support SUSE yet.

Why does SUSE rock? Free. Awesome installer and updater, YAST. This thing even rocks from the command line and you don't have to subscribe like up2date. Install SUSE, run YAST from ssh and you get an ASCII interface to update everything on your system. Just try it once, and you'll never use redhat again, that's for sure.

What really gets me is that Redhat was the granddaddy of the open source movement. Now they are all capitalistic and it's really a sad state of affairs if you ask me.

However, suse has never really been used in production server (web hosting) environments, or not main stream anyway..... go to any large (ie a server provider with over 5000 servers) server provider and tell me they use suse as a main os... doubtful.

Dont forget, redhat are contributing to the fedora project aswell as having RHEL, if you want a simple OS for home etc get fedora......... I honestly believe redhat deserve credit, not as much as they are hoping although free for sofware that must have taken months to develop and matches other OS's such as windows in a similar if not better way....

Not being a big user of many other linux os's i cant really say this... however im sure RHEL is and will remain one of the most stable operating systems around, with thenew system they will have masses of funds allowing them to increase development and update steps rapidly..... i'll assume far quicker than OS.

Put yourself in their place, you have been given a base piece of code, you expand that code a huge amount, customised it silly, made it much much better overall, added a complete interface which matches that of windows XP, provide update software which continously monitors for updates based on your exact server, you provided patches and updates as they are required, you provide a system for easy installation of updates and at the end of all that you have provided an enterprise business class operating system for people who need and want it RedHat are contributing to the fedora project as I said, allowed up2date service for fedora etc.... Now tell me after all the work / services etc i mentioned above, if you were them you would remain complete free (also considering the fact of the size of their customer base and their reputation already that is)

As much as its difficult to say, in my opinion redhat is succeeding here and im sure if it continues the way it is currently other OS's will follow.... even if its a smaller jump.... I have a huge feeling if it remains successful for redhat others will follow the same direction.

Also Jeff, any information between redhat and ev1, was it illegal / legal etc..?

prophecy

01-29-2004, 10:53 AM

Actually, SUSE is the most popular distro in Europe.

However, suse has never really been used in production server (web hosting) environments, or not main stream anyway..... go to any large (ie a server provider with over 5000 servers) server provider and tell me they use suse as a main os... doubtful.

Agreed, everyone uses Redhat because it's still the most popular and it's what most people know. But that does not mean it's the best. And if that were the case, then we'd all be on Windows because it's the most popular OS. And you usually don't have a choice. Redhat or nothing is usually the case. But I think you'll see a lot of people starting to use SUSE in the near future. with the Europe community embracing it. I'm surprised you don't endorse it being from the UK.

ProWebUK

01-29-2004, 11:03 AM

Originally posted by prophecy
Agreed, everyone uses Redhat because it's still the most popular and it's what most people know. But that does not mean it's the best.

Nothing can really be classed as the best since its opinions and what the user requires - as mentioned redhat suits us perfectly, I honestly cant see the need for ourselves to chnage that however for you that is obviously different.

Originally posted by prophecy
And if that were the case

Windows is the most popular OS due to ease of use, however i could not bare to think how windows 95 would have handled well in a server environment.... if you were happy with 50% uptime rates due to requiring reboots every 2 hours then i guess it would be fine, I struggle to keep XP running for more than 3 days, I reboot redhat only for major updates (kernel - and where its easier such as hostname) and can get 100+ days out of it without any problems at all - again that suits us perfect - only reboot 3 /4 times a year downtime keep to a bare minimum

Originally posted by prophecy
And you usually don't have a choice. Redhat or nothing is usually the case.

Look @ other control panels - especially CP... redhat is one of many choices obviously some software is specific but you will get that with all OS's

Chris

prophecy

01-29-2004, 11:49 AM

Windows is the most popular OS due to ease of use, however i could not bare to think how windows 95 would have handled well in a server environment

Could you imagine.... ;-)

We used to have a Win NT server and it was an absolute nightmare. As soon as we went to Linux, all our problems ceased.

jmstacey

02-15-2004, 02:25 PM

A little late to be getting into this discussion :p
But just thought I'd share my opinion.

I'd say go with slackware as it is very stable and has been here since the beginning.

I don't think it would be that hard to port DA to it either. I don't know how the internals of DA work, but gathering from the installation from freebsd, most of the commands appear to be native to linux.

Best part of it all, its free :D
And the support channel is very helpful most of the time.

Just my opinion.
Oh, and NO windows :eek:

-Jon-

jlasman

03-07-2004, 11:32 AM

Originally posted by ProWebUK
Also Jeff, any information between redhat and ev1, was it illegal / legal etc..?
I'm sorry it's taken me so long to find this thread again and respond to it.

I never meant to imply that EV1 was doing anything illegal.

What I did point out is true, that if you get a copy of RHEL you can't update it from RH withough a license to RHN, and that costs $349 per year.

Anyone can compile RHEL from source and put it onto as many systems as they want. They probably can't call it RHEL, though, at least according to evey license I've read.

And anyone can set up their own up2date server, and compile updates from source and put them there, as well.

Whether EV1 is or isn't doing anything illegal is not my concern; I have enough problems keeping up with my own licensing issues. For example, have you ever figured out what you have to pay MS if you run an MSW IIS webhosting server? (BTW, the answer is "a monthly fee"; the licenses you get with packaged MS software do NOT cover any use for commercial web access.)

Jeff

rumrugby

04-23-2004, 09:25 PM

now that the beta version of DA for RHEL has come out, has anyone tested it on White Box Linux 3??? that would make a great os if it was any good...by the way does anyone have any feedback on it???

thanks

ctnchris

04-25-2004, 12:02 AM

While redhat is great with being able to do up2date, I for one would prefer a DA version for Gentoo. Since gentoo's emerge compiles things from start instead of using a precompiled package, it will probably run better on that system, since its made by that system. On old boxes this may take a bit, but on newer servers it would be great.

ProWebUK

04-25-2004, 07:25 AM

Redhat is an RPM based distro, hence the reason it uses RPMS for all the software packaged with it...

You can't really use "since its made by that system." as a cover up for that.

The RPMS distributed by redhat are compiled for that specific redhat version, it's *extremely* unlike any basic hardware differences will affect the hardware, a kernel rpm is probably the only rpm based package that may work with your statement, to say the least I have never had problems using kernel rpms on redhat 7.2/7.3/8/9 Fedora or RHEL... if you have problems you can always compile your own, even package your own kernel rpms which get built from *your* system.

On a further note, you can compile any of the redhat rpms yourself, build fresh rpms yourself or rebuild source rpms provided by redhat.... do *not* think by using RPM you are locked to redhat RPMs only......... you can have redhat made of software compiled on your own system, whether you remain with RPM or not is another question...

If you compile everything from source without building RPMs, you will come across problems later on though, if you continue to use RPM packages that is..

Chris

opuszczony

05-14-2004, 12:16 PM

Gentoo is gaining quite a head of steam and its portage functionality has added the beauty of the BSD ports tree to the Linux environ; I am currently running mulitple production servers both related to commerce and eductaional purposes. Any and all of these systems comply with FIRPA standards of security. If an ebuild can be created for this distribution, I can certainly state that it will greatly enhance the future viability of this panel and thus its future market share.

jlasman

05-14-2004, 12:19 PM

Everybody has their own favorite brand of Linux, and it's hard to expect a small company to support every flavor out there.

While I like the whole Gentoo concept, I don't like it for webhosting, because in an ideal world you don't have a complete development environment on a webhosting server.

While I'm not there yet, that's a direction I'd like to go in, rather than the direction of needing the development environment.

Jeff

netstability

05-14-2004, 03:57 PM

I must say I have seen an ever increasing number of people using and recommending gentoo for websevers. I think DA and gentoo are an excellent match that could rise together and through sheer speed, security, and intelligence, completely overtake the current mainstream.

jlasman

05-15-2004, 04:29 PM

Just having a compiler on a web-addressable server implies a whole bunch of insecurities.

Jeff

Nazzy

07-29-2004, 04:24 PM

Originally posted by jlasman
Just having a compiler on a web-addressable server implies a whole bunch of insecurities.

Jeff

Nonsense ... if nothing else look at gentoo hardened

Secure your box and its safe as houses.

oh ... heres a good reason for supporting Gentoo

#gentoo users == 876
#debian users == 738
#fedora users == 334
#redhat user == 84

go figure ;)

Has anyone actually done DA on gentoo?

jlasman

07-29-2004, 05:26 PM

Your opinion.

Are you saying that only 84 users actually use RHL to do webhosting?

Or only 84 people actually use RHL ?

You've got me very confused.

Jeff

Nazzy

07-29-2004, 06:26 PM

What is to stop the sysop making gcc root:root 700?

As for the figures ... those are the number of people in said channels on freenode ... ie there are ten times as many people in the freenode channel as #redhat ... doesn't mean less users ... just much less support.

jmstacey

07-29-2004, 10:12 PM

It can also mean less people need support :p

Nazzy

07-30-2004, 02:45 AM

nah .... happy users gather to talk about how good it is to use <insert distro here> and convert any hapless victim that wonders in to their midst ;) :p :cool:

ProWebUK

07-30-2004, 09:36 AM

Originally posted by Nazzy
oh ... heres a good reason for supporting Gentoo

#gentoo users == 876
#debian users == 738
#fedora users == 334
#redhat user == 84

Why is that a reason?

The only reason i could see anyone choosing gentoo due to them figures is to follow the sheep.

As for it meaning better support, I have to disagree - redhat is now commercial and they offer support with the product(s) they provide - if you had redhat enterprise would you prefer an official redhat support rep to help you or someone in an IRC chatroom that could be using linux for the first time today?

Chris

Nazzy

07-30-2004, 05:24 PM

Originally posted by ProWebUK
Why is that a reason?

The only reason i could see anyone choosing gentoo due to them figures is to follow the sheep.

As for it meaning better support, I have to disagree - redhat is now commercial and they offer support with the product(s) they provide - if you had redhat enterprise would you prefer an official redhat support rep to help you or someone in an IRC chatroom that could be using linux for the first time today?

Chris

Perhaps you should take a look at that room some time .... there is a fair chunk of the gentoo developers in that chatroom, plus a lot of people that know what they are talking about, all actively helping.

As for commercial .... part of the reason for using linux is the lower cost to run. Also wasn't it just in the news about a bunch of RH employees quiting and forming their own company because RH doesn't offer enough "support for custom builds" or something like that? If i wanted to be locked in to a fairly ridged and automated intaller process that all but discourages you from doing major tweaking, I may as well run windows on all my systems.

Oh and as someone with experience of working in tech suport, i'd take someone with real experience in dealing with the specific problem, than someone that is trained to be able to answer most questions quickly, and pass on any that they don't understand.

ProWebUK

07-30-2004, 05:57 PM

Originally posted by Nazzy
As for commercial .... part of the reason for using linux is the lower cost to run.

Firstly, im glad to see you put "part of the reason" there and not just reason - you pay for the support, the stability, and the redhat specifics that make redhat what it is in comparison to other distros.

Originally posted by Nazzy
If i wanted to be locked in to a fairly ridged and automated intaller process that all but discourages you from doing major tweaking, I may as well run windows on all my systems.

You can get the source for enterprise without purchasing it (how WBEL and a few others came onto the scene) - and you can certainly modify the source as you wish if you purchase it.

Just because its "commerical" doesnt mean its windows and nothing can be modified, and you dont get any source - because you do!

Originally posted by Nazzy
Oh and as someone with experience of working in tech suport, i'd take someone with real experience in dealing with the specific problem, than someone that is trained to be able to answer most questions quickly, and pass on any that they don't understand.

Id much rather the manufacturer of my car repair my car then the local garage down the street with no specific knowledge of my car in particular.

The chances are that a trained redhat support staff member will be much more experienced than someone who just started using linux today, last week, or even last month, year etc.

Chris

jlasman

07-31-2004, 09:42 AM

Originally posted by Nazzy
What is to stop the sysop making gcc root:root 700?
Nothing.

And it's a good idea. That way only crackers who gain root access to your system can compile on it.

Which is most of the crackers and most of the cracks.

Jeff

apryan

01-17-2005, 03:28 PM

I'm leaving stupid freebsd 5.x and would like to go 64bit gentoo. Mainly because 5.x has added a lot of slowness that wasn't foreseen. IT definatly is slower then 4.x is and half the programs we need at the moment don't support it properly or have bugs.

IS there any hopes that DA will be gentoo friendly? Can someone just try it for us to let us know? Plz?

jlasman

01-18-2005, 09:24 PM

Though I made a decision to not use FreeBSD to host with DA, I'm not sure it's stupid.

I think the problem lies not with FreeBSD, but rather with:

a) FreeBSD requires a lot more admin intervention than does Linux. In that way it's much more like the the Unix it is than it is like Linux.

b) DA did not create a version to use the ports system so a lot of things DA installs aren't in the place a FreeBSD purist would put them.

As far as Gentoo is concerned, I don't think you'd see any advantages to it over any other version of Linux.

The main advantage of Gentoo is that you compile everything for your server so it runs as fast is it can based on your processor, your libraries, etc.

Since DA compiles many important programs used in hosting there's not much real speed advantage in using Gentoo.

I may be in the minority but personally I'd like to see DA staff spending less time on porting and more time on finishing some projects we'd all like to see.

:)

Jeff

jmstacey

01-18-2005, 11:52 PM

Originally posted by jlasman
I may be in the minority but personally I'd like to see DA staff spending less time on porting and more time on finishing some projects we'd all like to see.

Here here!
The more Operating System's DirectAdmin adds, the slower releases come as we have already noticed.
In my opinion, DA now supports a fair ammount of Operating Systems, to the point that there is more of a market for more features. Just my opinion though

apryan

01-21-2005, 10:39 AM

Jeff, your totally wrong. I've been working with FreeBSD since it was born. You totally missed the point. 5.x is total BS when it comes to FreeBSD.

Furthermore, if DA has a problem with releasing versions on so many OS's, then it needs to hire a larger staff.

My request was to ask for DA's support of Gentoo. Thats it. Don't read anything else into it.

jlasman

01-23-2005, 01:02 PM

Originally posted by apryan
Jeff, your totally wrong. I've been working with FreeBSD since it was born. You totally missed the point. 5.x is total BS when it comes to FreeBSD.
I'm very confused here. Are you saying that 5.x BSD is BS?
Furthermore, if DA has a problem with releasing versions on so many OS's, then it needs to hire a larger staff.
Hiring a larger staff requires being able to afford that staff. In my opinion for a small company to add more staff for any reason before it can support them with the income they'd develop would only lead to the company having survival problems.

I don't want to see JBMC grow so fast that it ends up going out of business. Slow growth is often good.

Jeff