CentOS 5 Released

jonesy16 writes "Only a few weeks behind the release of Red Hat Enterprise 5, CentOS announced today the immediate release of version 5 of the free derivative of RHEL 5. Torrents are available for both i386 and x86_64. New features include compiz and AIGLX support as well as better virtualization and thin-client support. Package updates include Apache-2.2, kernel-2.6.18, Gnome-2.16, and KDE-3.5."

I'd really love a ServerCD version of this

[golemwashere]

I'm a big fan of the servercd version, containing just the bare minimum for a server installation and really hope the developers will produce one even for version 5.
Centos rocks!!!

Re:

[morcego]

The ServerCD version of CentOS always take some time to show up.

That said, you can do a bare minimum install with CentOS 5 CD1 these days easily enough. Just select custom install, and deselect all package groups.

Pirates!

[vivaoporto]

Torrents are available for both i386 and x86_64.

OMG, pirates!! I'm sooo calling the BSA.

Re:

[ady1]

quick, here's the number:

1800-BULSHTALNC

Re:Pirates!

[jjacksonRIAB]

In Soviet Amerika, the BSA calls YOU!

The second best server OS

[Werrismys]

Debian is best for running non-commercial stuff on, but for most HP stuff and VMware server etc (that officially support RHEL4) CentOS is the way to go. The server install (single CD with all the stuff you need) rules, hope they make one for CentOS5 soon.

When installing for example VMware Server, all the stuff one needs is already in. Even the kernel modules load without any recompiling.

Re:

[Dalroth]

That's pretty funny. I just installed Debian AMD64 on an HP machine this week as a host OS to another instance of Debian AMD64 running under VMWare. I had no problems at all. Everything just worked.

So, do tell me, what's the problem running VMWare on Debian?

Bryan

Re:

[C_Kode]

In your house where the only critical thing you probably have is your porn is fine, when your companies business is on the line. Well, you wouldn't be working for me if you used an unsupported OS for a critical application... I use both RHEL and CentOS. (because they are the same and make management/documentation that much easier) If I'm installing Oracle, it's going on RHEL. If I'm installing LAMP or an SMTP/IMAP server, it's going on CentOS.

Re:

[IpalindromeI]

Plenty of people [debian.org] are willing to take your money to support Debian for you, if that's what you want.

Re:The second best server OS

[C_Kode]

Except the ones that count. Like Oracle. I don't need Linux support, I need enterprise application support. Some people just don't understand that. If I needed Linux support, I would just run RHEL on all servers.

Re:

[Dalroth]

That's also funny. Given that this is the primary database server for my employer. Who would've thought you'd want to build a business around Debian and Postgres? We must be doing something wrong, because it's working out very well for us and we don't need to pay for support.

Anyway, where does Oracle come into the picture? The original poster was talking about Debian, HP and VMWare. I see no mention of Oracle anywhere.

Bryan

Re:

[C_Kode]

I suppose if you are running the free VMWare server it's probably not a critical application in the first place as the free VMWare is very limited in it's abilities compared to ESX. I certainly wouldn't be running my most critical database on the free vmware. Oracle or PostgreSQL.

Btw, I use PostgreSQL also. Oracle has it's place, and PostgreSQL has it's place. RAC is a beautiful thing.

Re:

[BiggyP]

So CentOS doesn't require compilation of modules for VMWare server whereas Ubuntu does, where's the war?

In other news...

[jjacksonRIAB]

City manager of Tuttle decries more sophisticated attacks against his website, threatening legal ramifications against hacker terror networks who have targetted him for termination.

Stop Hacking!

[Mark_in_Brazil]

Dear CentOS developers,

Please stop hacking my browser. When I visit my favorite site, Slashdot, your software's name keeps appearing on my browser. If you don't stop this at once, I will be forced to call the FBI and report your hacking.

Thank you.

Re:

[hobo sapiens]

FIX IT NOW!!~!!!! THIRD NOTICE!~!

This line is just to make slashdot's lameness filter accept all the caps I just typed. Please ignore it.

Cool

[Jimbo God of Unix]

Does that make it NickelOS?

One Red Hat to Rule Them All

[Doc Ruby]

Why is there any functional difference between CentOS and RHEL? There are different HowTos for installation and operation of various SW on each of RHEL and CentOS. And how about a script that will convert either CentOS or Fedora to look exactly like RedHat for installing/running apps?

Re:One Red Hat to Rule Them All

[ePhil_One]

The only functional difference between the two is the removal of the RedHat name and logo from all packages. redhat-config-network becomes system-config-network, etc; the rest is all artwork.

Fedora is a whole other beast. While Fedora rpms will often run fine on a RHEL system (and RHEL5 makes many of the FC6 packages available as unsupported extras), its goal is to be much faster moving and bleeding edge, at the cost of reliability and long term support.

Re:

[Sketch]

The only functional difference between the two is the removal of the RedHat name and logo from all packages. redhat-config-network becomes system-config-network, etc; the rest is all artwork.

/quote>

redhat-config-* was renamed to system-config-* by Fedora. This change propogated downstream to RHEL for RHEL4, which was the first RHEL release based on Fedora (RHEL3 was based on RedHat 9).

Re:

[Antique Geekmeister]

There's also RedHat support: while their user-grade support is fairly sad compared to Google and the CentOS community, it's handy if you're running big iron with 99.9999% service level agreements and you need someone to blame when things fail. Notice I didn't say someone to fix it: I said someone to blame. In turn, installing third-party software such as libdvdcss from off-shore repositories in order to view DVD's is something that RedHat can say "we don't support that", and you're thrown back on your own.

N

Re:

[ePhil_One]

If a command has the name "redhat" in it, it would be a functional difference because a script that called that command would fail. Likewise, a script that ran a check to verify it was running RHEL 3 would fail (cat /etc/redhat-release). Dell's Open Manage Install CD is an excellent example, it checks to verify the OS CD you are loading is RHEL release 0 (it even chokes on RHEL update CD's). Also, installers that use checksums can fail because the rebuilt files might vary on a random byte, changing the chec

Direct downloads available

[RKBA]

Direct download of the i386 DVD version is available at:
http://cryptomania.info/crypt/CentOS-5.0-i386-bin- DVD/ [cryptomania.info]

By tomorrow the x86_64 DVD version will be available at:
http://cryptomania.info/crypt/CentOS-5.0-x86_64-bi n-DVD/ [cryptomania.info]

I'm trying out a new webhosting provider and am curious how they perform. Comments welcome.

Re:Does anyone even use this OS?

[phase_9]

I know you're trolling but in my last job we had CentOS running on 30+ servers (the rest were Win2k3 servers). I find CentOS to be stable, easy to maintain and navigate around, and most importantly reliable with regular and prompt updates.

Re:Does anyone even use this OS?

[Oxide]

I want an enterprise quality Linux to run a database server on it. But I don't want to pay the Redhat price tag; CentOS gives me the quality of Redhat Enterprise Linux for free. So it's running my database server and doing so quite well too.

Re:Does anyone even use this OS?

[Psychotria]

Strange. The last thing I'd want in an enterprise server is compiz.

Re:Does anyone even use this OS?

[aarmenaa]

We use Cent where I work. There's a special "Server" CD that strips out pretty much everything that's not a major requirement. I think they're taking the same path that Microsoft has with Windows: you put one version on the server, and another version on the client, and it's all tested to work very well together. In that respect, Compiz on the client might be considered a feature.

Re:

[slamb]

We use Cent where I work. There's a special "Server" CD that strips out pretty much everything that's not a major requirement. I think they're taking the same path that Microsoft has with Windows: you put one version on the server, and another version on the client, and it's all tested to work very well together. In that respect, Compiz on the client might be considered a feature.

I think that "Server" CD is something your company created. RedHat split RHEL5 into "Server" and "Client" repositories [centos.org], but Cen

Re:

[vidarh]

Apparently you haven't heard of this thing called RPM and how you can install or remove packages whenever it pleases you. Besides, if you don't actually run X on your servers, the only side-effect of having it installed is wasting some disk space.

Re:

[0racle]

Actually, if you choose to configure X the default runlevel is 5. There are other things that require the X Server and Libs, but if you do not configure X it comes up in runlevel 3.

Re:

[Afrosheen]

Actually the last thing you want on an enterprise server is X11 running. Any admin worth their weight in neoprene mouse pads knows not to run an X server on critical hardware.

  Compiz is there for the *desktop* install. Yes, Centos lets you choose and has package sets that reflect your choice of using it as a desktop or server.

Re:

[walt-sjc]

It depends on what you are doing with your enterprise server. One thing you can do with an enterprise server is run a FreeNX terminal server for many clients. Granted you don't need to run the server at runlevel 5 or run a LOCAL X-server, but having the xserver installed and usable by clients is not "always" a bad thing.

Re:

[Afrosheen]

Actually there were zero-day exploits for X.org just last week. RHEL updated their packages and CentOS followed suit a few days later.

  Better safe than sorry, just like running IIS as an external web server, you can do it but the risk isn't worth the reward and you can do nearly anything via an ssh session anyway.

Re:

[Anonymous Coward]

And it's not only enterprise-quality, but since it essentially is RHEL without the branding, all documentation for RHEL works for CentOS as well. Though the Cent OS user can't depend on support from Red Hat, he could still use something like Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5 Administration Unleashed [amazon.com] or whatever. If only all enterprise-level software was both well-documented in the public sphere and had Free versions out there.

Re:Does anyone even use this OS?

[tobiasly]

I want an enterprise quality Linux to run a database server on it. But I don't want to pay the Redhat price tag; CentOS gives me the quality of Redhat Enterprise Linux for free.

And thus the beauty of free (as in freedom) software. Red Hat takes the work of others, adds a few features, a lot of stability and testing, and sells their result with a support plan for a nifty profit. They give those changes back to the community, which then takes their work and releases a free (as in beer) version for people who don't need the support.

Everyone wins. This is no longer a zero-sum game. I don't understand why that's still so difficult for so many people to understand.

Re:Does anyone even use this OS?

[dn15]

I find CentOS to be stable, easy to maintain and navigate around, and most importantly reliable with regular and prompt updates.

Absolutely. I use Debian on servers (it's what I know and am comfortable with) but I would definitely consider CentOS and recommend it to others who are less *NIX-savvy.

Re:

[AliasTheRoot]

At our bigname hosting company the majority of Linux boxes ran RHEL apart from a few Debian machines. Anything testbed / non customer focussed was running CentOS because for all intents and purposes they are identical.

Re:

[Afrosheen]

You are absolutely right. We run RHEL on our mission-critical Asterisk server but Centos on less critical servers. Centos is a little behind Redhat with the updates but they trickle down a few days later after they've had the logos/branding removed.

  There's alot to be said for making Centos 100% binary-compatible with RHEL. Like I tell everyone, Centos is Redhat Enterprise with the stickers removed.

Re:

[reezle]

What jobs were the Cent servers doing? How well did they integrate into Windows Active Directory?
I sometimes think about adding some Linux machines to Windows networks, but worry about passing security back and forth.

Re:

[guacamole]

Given the traffic on the mailing lists, I would say yes, a whole lot of people are using it. In my organization, all desktops and secondary servers run CentOS. We keep RHEL on a few critical servers just for the sake of our (sysadmin) jobs.

Re:

[st3v]

We use CentOS at work extensively for our engineering stations and the IT dept. uses it on their Linux servers. Very stable, and compatible with our engineering tools, and the IT people don't have to worry about licensing.

Re:

[tehSpork]

I used to use CentOS for my server boxes, however version 3 left a very bad taste in my mouth. I then attempted to roll out CentOS 4 on a new box I was preparing for a customer (seeing if it was any improvement over version 3) and it had some problem that prevented it from rebooting for the first time after the install. I've switched to running Fedora 5/6 on my servers and everything has been much more stable.

Re:

[phase_9]

Wehre you trying to do a RAID-1 Mirror on a SATA controller by any chance? I have had to rewrite the grub config to the "secondary" drive more times than I care to mention

Re:

[Gerb]

You can also do:

grub

grub> device (hd0) /dev/sda
grub> root (hd0,0) (if /boot is on the first partition)
grub> setup (hd0)

and then the exact same for /dev/sdb

Then both disks are bootable via grub. After that you won't have to mess with grub.conf again.

Re:

[Punk Walrus]

We have started using CentOS as well in a primarily Red Hat environment. Before, we'd use Fedora, but we kept running into issues where the packages would be outdated too quickly, and then when Fedora-Legacy went away, that was a big problem! I mean, half our stuff was still on Fedora Core 2 because it was the last of the 2.4.x kernel, and ran parallel to the Red Hat EL 3. CentOS had matured by then, and we had looked at a lot of alternatives (PieBox, WhiteHat, etc). CentOS was great for those boxes whe

Re:

[Karzz1]

I wish CentOS had an RHN-like feature, but I guess I'll have to build one or see if someone already did.

Do you mean like yum [centos.org]?

Re:

[Antique Geekmeister]

Especially since RedHat themselves have basically thrown out "up2date", and switched to yum based package management for RedHat 5. Yum was one of the few packages CentOS stapled on top of RedHat based releases, and it's worked quite well.

Re:Does anyone even use this OS?

[arun_s]

Who uses CentOS? Well, the website of this [wikipedia.org] *ahem* rather famous city runs on it :)

Re:

[Bastard of Subhumani]

Separated at birth?

Tuttle City Manager Jerry A. Taylor [tiscali.co.uk]

Dwarf Dopey [tuttle-ok.gov]

Re:Does anyone even use this OS?

[EvanED]

About 75% of the University of Wisconsin Computer Science dept. (graduates + faculty + computer labs) uses CentOS. That's, I dunno, 400 computers?

Re:Does anyone even use this OS?

[doktorjayd]

CENTOS is ideal for any dev work that will eventually be deployed to RHEL, as its basically the same binaries with the redhat copyrighted stuff removed. ( and sans support contract ...)

we tend to set up vm's as dev and staging environments per project, last count there was about 30 dormant and 5 active on our vmware box.

as for the compiz & desktop candy.. you can thank fedora for that finding its way to centos... of course you dont have to install or even use it.

Re:

[donaldm]

I know you are trolling but yes. CentOS is great for Development were your System Admins' take care of everything and if you move the machine to production you can get a CentOS or Redhat maintenance contract.

Re:Does anyone even use this OS?

[hughesjr]

A few people use it ... well, maybe more than a few as we have had 2 million unique IP Addresses do updates against our yum repositories in the last 12 months.

Re:Does anyone even use this OS?

[Linker3000]

Yeah, sorry about that - I was doing an update to my CentOS server at home over a flaky broadband link and every time it reconnected I got a different dynamic IP address. BTW how's the other user getting on with their system?

Re:

[Linker3000]

So you have heard of NickelOS - with the core components 'Nicked' from a prominent repackager of a package produced by a prominent North American... oh you get the idea.

PS: Keep up the great work.

Re:

[Anonymous Coward]

Well, Duke University Shared Cluster Resource (http://www.csem.duke.edu/ [duke.edu], over 1,100 processors and still growing) has used CentOS for the last couple of years, and it was working just fine.

Re:

[dubonbacon]

http://www.rocksclusters.org/ [rocksclusters.org]

ROCKS cluster at our university's department of economics.
There is a couple of clusters registered on the site, too.

Wikipedia says:
"Rocks Cluster Distribution is a Linux distribution intended for computer clusters. Rocks is based on CentOS, but uses a modified anaconda installer that simplifies mass installation onto many computers."

Re:

[Michael Hunt]

The only use I see for something like CentOS is for a dev or UAT environment, when you're running the same RHEL version in production. This gives you two (three) essentially identical environments, but you've only gotta pay the man for one copy.

Re:Does anyone even use this OS?

[Hognoxious]

What about students, both formal and informal? Red Hat is the most popular distro when it comes to finding books. A free (as in beer) clone that you can work the exercises & examples on without the distraction and niggle of differences is a Good Thing(tm).

Re:

[goonerw]

What about students, both formal and informal?
For formal students, they should be able to buy the academic version of RHEL which, for v4 was $50 for AS.

Re:Does anyone even use this OS?

[sarathmenon]

If you are running RHEL in prod, then nothing in the license stops you from installing it on the dev machines. We do that, and it works great because we have to maintain only 1 distro in the whole environment.

The RHN subscription is for access to the download page, and for support. If you have two licenses, then it entitles you to have support for 2 machines, but doesn't in any way prevent you from installing on a third machine. Just an FYI, in case you weren't aware of it.

Re:

[Anonymous Coward]

https://www.redhat.com/licenses/rhel_us.html?count ry=buying+a+Red+Hat+Subscription+from+Red+Hat [redhat.com]

You need to reread section 5 if you have an RHN subscription. You MAY NOT install redhat software on a machine that does not have an RHN subscription and they MAY ask to audit you.

Re:

[ZorinLynx]

How can they enforce this if Linux is GPLed?

I thought the point of the GPL was that you could sell the software, but you can't keep your customers from making and distributing additional copies.

Redhat can ask you to be nice and not install it, but I doubt they have any real legal recourse if you do.

-Z

Re:

[Afrosheen]

Sure, you can install it on 10 machines if you want, but good luck getting RHN and updates to work on 9 of those if you only have a license for one. We just went through this and ended up using Centos 4.4 on our dev boxes and RHEL (that we paid for) on a single mission-critical server. When Redhat gives you no choice, this is what you must do if you want to run an identical environment for test builds.

Another thing that pissed me off was juggling licenses. I used to have our dev box and production b

Re:

[david_thornley]

What the GPL says, is that if you give someone a binary copy of the software, the source must either come with it, or be readily available. Now, the giving of that binary copy is still subject to normal copyright laws. If I for instance create a boxed software product, GPL it, and then put it on the shelves of Best Buy (with source on the CD), you still wouldn't necessarily be able to copy it and give it to friends, because you have no distribution rights on the binary, and therefore whether or not you must

Re:

[Stanza]

Eh, that's not quite true. It says that you may distribute the software, but if you do so, you must include the source code. What this means is you may choose not to distribute the software, but the software writer isn't restricting you to do so.

So I could sell you a box of software, and if you wanted to warez it for all your friends, you can do so provided you include the source (or allow them to get it from an ftp site, or by mail, etc). What you are not allowed to do is warez it for all your friends

Re:

[timbo234]

I don't think that's right at all. I've come across the same question in 2 different companies now and the answer has always been that you must have a RHEL subscription for every machine you have RHEL installed on. In fact have a read of the licencing agreement:
https://www.redhat.com/licenses/rhel_us.html?count ry=buying+a+Red+Hat+Subscription+from+Red+Hat [redhat.com]

Read sections 3.1 and 5.1 in particular. In 5.1 they are saying that you must notify them if the number of installed systems exceeds the number of subscri

Re:

[sarathmenon]

Thanks for the link, I see that my claims may not have been true. Still, how does this become compliant with the GPL? Redhat distributes the OS (the source form) on the terms of the GPL. This allows me full redistribution rights, as long as I comply with the trademarks and copyright laws. In other words, I can use it to clone other systems internally and can install the software as I see fit on any other server in the organisation. The problem would be when I try to sell this OS - if I use Redhat's name wit

Re:

[init100]

Still, how does this become compliant with the GPL? Redhat distributes the OS (the source form) on the terms of the GPL. This allows me full redistribution rights

You get full redistribution rights on those parts that are covered by the GPL. There are parts of RHEL that are not covered by the GPL, which is effectively those parts that CentOS strips out. That include the Red Hat artwork and Red Hat Network tools.

Re:

[sarathmenon]

You get full redistribution rights on those parts that are covered by the GPL. There are parts of RHEL that are not covered by the GPL, which is effectively those parts that CentOS strips out. That include the Red Hat artwork and Red Hat Network tools.

That's fine. What about the other stuff? I am actually surprised that the redhat legal team advises otherwise. Looking at the GPL, I am almost sure that using the same base for other systems is very much legal. I could be mistaken for all I know, IANAL :)

Re:

[Raenex]

This is where it get's confusing. I think (at a guess, IANAL and all that) that Redhat owns copyright on the distribution itself, ie. the thing taken as a whole.

Hah. The whole point of the GPL is to prevent being taken over by somebody else adding bits. The fact that Red Hat gets away with this trademark poisoning and fake copyright claims is just sad. Stallman huffs and puffs a lot about principles, but he has given free reign with Red Hat.

Re:

[Builder]

Uh, how sure are you about that ? Does that mean you aren't patching your dev servers ?

From what I remember from RH licensing (although contract negotiations were two years ago, so things may have changed by now), the definition of support support included errata. Our legal team took this to mean that you can't install Red Hat errata (new packages to patch vulns and bugs) on servers not covered under the license / contract.

Additionally, you have to pay per seat for Satellite provisioning entitlements, so a

Re:

[init100]

In short, our legal team and Red Hat both advised that we had to buy licences for our dev servers. They did discount these generously, but the mere fact that there was any cost in testing and developing on Linux while there wasn't for Windows (due to the organisation site license) was always a big black mark against Linux.

Which is where CentOS comes in. It is binary compatible with RHEL, in fact it is RHEL, but with the non-redistributable parts removed. Thus, you can very well have free dev machines that run essentially the same system as your production machines.

Re:

[Lord Ender]

Where I work, we used RHEL for "commercial" applications, and CentOS for "production" (==not directly revenue generating) applications.

I'm not sure why, but they recently declared that they will stop using CentOS entirely. Any ideas?

Re:

[Antique Geekmeister]

Security is a real concern: it's not clear that the CentOS build servers are as secure as the RedHat servers. And if they turn out not to be, whom are you going to sue when you get hacked?

Re:

[jimicus]

If you have a lot of developers, you can give each one their own environment (or virtual environment, take your pick) without having to buy 1 copy of RHEL/developer.

Doesn't take very long for that to be a substantial saving.

Re:

[Antique Geekmeister]

Try Beowulf clusters and render farms and corporate wide desktop distributions where the key management for RedHat registration actually costs more than the OS itself and adds nothing effective? I've certainly seen this, in at least one major render farm.

Re:

[rm69990]

All I see them doing is exercising their rights under the GPL using others' copyrighted code, which is, surprise surprise, exactly what Red Hat does with the vast majority of the code in their products...

Re:Does anyone even use this OS?

[rm69990]

I would lend credence to what you say, but you don't even know Red Hat's name...

His point is that most of the code in Red Hat products is not owned or written by Red Hat, as is the case with every other distro. They simply feature freeze and stabilize it, and then sell support contracts for it. They are selling support, not the product.

If Red Hat did not want this to happen, they could simply not base their product on GPL software. Of course, if they did that, they would never have become profitable in the first place, because there is no way they could have built a product as capable as RHEL5 from the ground up completely on their own and stayed in business.

Red Hat, while contributing as you point out, piggyback's on other peoples' work, and CentOS is doing the exact same thing to Red Hat. I don't see an issue here.

Re:

[rbanffy]

If Red Hat did not want this to happen, they could simply not base their product on GPL software. Of course, if they did that, they would never have become profitable in the first place, because there is no way they could have built a product as capable as RHEL5 from the ground up completely on their own and stayed in business.

They could have based their server product on *BSD, then close the source and live happily thereafter.

It's only GPL-ish licenses that prevent such behaviour

Re:Does anyone even use this OS?

[hughesjr]

Well ... it seems that the Fedora team (and Board Chairman) do not seem to share your opinion of CentOS (they must not have gotten the memo to hate CentOS before we shared a FOSDEM 2007 [fosdem.org] devroom). Also see:

LinuxFormat Article [linuxformat.co.uk]

I'm sure that Red Hat would be much better off if the people who want to install a free server did not install CentOS (which can easily run anything on RHEL later if support and a paid for OS is required) ... but instead used debian or ubuntu. Of course they wouldn't ... Red Hat benefits greatly because CentOS gets software installed that can easily move to their flag ship product when and if the time is right.

Also, take a look at the Red Hat bugzilla sometime and do a search for CentOS. The code base gets seen / installed by many more people on many more pieces of hardware, many of which would not have installed on RHEL but some other free OS if CentOS were unavailable. This allows RH to get feedback and bug reports from many more people to stablize their codebase. All the time, RH does not need to provide any real support to this group of people.

You can even argue that because of the popularity of CentOS combined with some big name 3rd party repositories like RPMForge [rpmforge.net] and KBS CentOS Extras [karan.org] that a whole new need was demonstrated, and that the EPEL project [fedoraproject.org] was created to help fill that need. Again, Red Hat and RHEL users benefit greatly because of this colaboration.

There are other numerous advantages as well ... but that is enough for now. No, Red Hat is not loosing sleep because CentOS exists ... indeed, quite the opposite.

Re:

[aztracker1]

That, or can't justify an OS that costs more than Windows does to put on a desktop machine. I mean, yes there are alternatives. Red Had does support the Fedora project after all, and they don't make money on that, other than the same way they make money on CentOS distribution.

Re:Does anyone even use this OS?

[hasbeard]

Correct me if I'm wrong, but doesn't Red Hat also make money from the contributions of others? I know Red Hat pays people to work on Linux, but don't they also benefit greatly from a lot of "free" labor from others? Not to knock Red Hat, but just trying to point out that this is the nature of the game with GPL work.

Re:

[Anonymous Coward]

It is not yet another Fedora Core 6. Fedora and CentOS have different purposes. CentOS releases are supported for seven years, while Fedora usually supports just the current release and the previous release. After that, you have to upgrade to a newer release, or have no security updates. Fedora is great to try and use the latest technology, whereas RHEL and CentOS are useful for production boxes that should run for years without pain.

Re:yet another Fedora Core 6

[hughesjr]

Except ... Fedora Core 6 will stop getting updates once FC8 is out in a year .. but RHEL5 (and CentOS) being Enterprise OSes will continue to be supported for 7 years. So, while they are the same (or at least very similar) to FC6 now, if you are installing it on your enterprise servers or desktops, you will appreaciate the support lifetime and reduced cost of totally reloading your OS every 6 months.

Re:

[rm69990]

Yeah, what are they doing releasing this? We all know that teh internet is a series of tubes that you can't just dump stuff on. All they are doing is filling up teh internets!!!

Do you have a point, or are posting out of boredom? If all it is is another FC6...well then, don't download it, while people that do find it useful will. Sound good?

Re:yet another Fedora Core 6

[jimicus]

RH admitted that 300+ packages in RHEL5 are rpms from FC6. RHEL 5 strongly resembles of FC6... it is nothing but augmented version of it anyway ...and CentOS is exactly that as well.

That's the whole point of the fedora project: to provide a base from which to produce RHEL.

The core difference, as has already been pointed out, is long-term support. If you find you need a security update for a particular package for Fedora Core 6 in a couple of years when FC9 is the latest version, good luck. Your only options are to upgrade the whole system or build the package (and any dependencies which also require updating) yourself.

You may not have a problem with that. CentOS and RHEL is intended for people who do.

Re:

[xdroop]

RH admitted that 300+ packages in RHEL5 are rpms from FC6. RHEL 5 strongly resembles of FC6... it is nothing but augmented version of it anyway ...and CentOS is exactly that as well.

Yeah, I used to think that too.

Two years later I have a Fedora Core 3 based mail server in production that doesn't have any further updates coming and is too critical to down and rebuild. (I'm sure a hardware failure will force the issue eventually -- can't come soon enough for me).

It is, however, the last one. My curren

Re:

[Karzz1]

What do you do for security patches?

And that my friend is the beauty of open source software. Just because the distributor does not release patches any longer does not mean that you can't go find the latest version of the software and install that yourself. Chances are, if it is a mail server only, there are not too many patches that really need to be considered. Hell, if you don't have to worry about installing any future rpm packages, you can simply install from source rather than make the extra effort

Re:

[hughesjr]

Right ... BUT ....

Try some some ldd compares between RHEL and startcom ... then do the same for CentOS

CentOS has nearly 200 mirrors world wide and a geoip enabled system to deliver updates and find downloads, startcom as about 10.

Though ... the more the merrier I always say ... and startcom is a fine distro too.

Re:

[C_Kode]

They are a business. To help you understand why you have to do this imagine this.

You own a Open Source company and create software and release it with your logos and branding all over it. Now, I take it because it's GPL, alter it the way I want and release it, but fail to remove your logo and branding. Someone else downloads it and installs it see your logo thinking it's your product and it complete screws up their system because of the changes I made, not you. Now, all the sudden this Company attacks y

Re:

[jZnat]

Red Hat is already protected from that via the GPL (and all other open source licenses) that explicitly state that the software comes with no warranty whatsoever of any kind. It's not in all caps just to fit in with EULAs...

Re:Red Hat and the GPL

[rayvd]

Absurd. Obviously Red Hat is going to demand the removal of their trademarks. The fact of the matter is that RH is very helpful towards the open source community. I see plenty of RH devs and employees participating in Fedora. And there is a lot of bleed-over as far as package development and work on bugs between CentOS and Fedora. It's all connected and RH has been nothing but supportive.

They're a clear force for 'good' in the world of Linux in my mind.

Re:

[bfields]

Added to that, some of their more useful software is not GPLd, and not only that, it is based on a proprietary closed source database.

Which software is that?

Re:

[Builder]

RHN Satellite which uses Oracle as its database.

RHN Proxy is also not under an open source license, but does not use a proprietary database.

Re:

[0racle]

While Red Hat do comply with the letter of the GPL (the provide the source code) they don't do it in a very friendly or helpful way

By providing SRPM's, Red Hat goes beyond the GPL requirements and makes it very easy for projects like CentOS to exist. You're really going to have to find something else to complain about.

sed, find, grep?

[bill_mcgonigle]

You really have to take it apart, remove all of their trademarks, or just go through and find the changes from the last update before you can redistribute GPL code. That seems to go against the spirit of the GPL to me.

I admit to not having looked at the CentOS build tools, but surely they've scripted this with 70's unix tools?

Re:

[Builder]

If they have scripted this, how do you explain the almost 4 week delay between the release of RHEL 5 and Centos 5 ?

Re:

[Raenex]

I've been thinking about this a lot lately, and it's been bugging me more and more.

As it should. Of course you got modded down for not following the herd.

While Red Hat do comply with the letter of the GPL (the provide the source code) they don't do it in a very friendly or helpful way.

I'd say they don't even follow the letter of the GPL. They explicitly take away the rights that GPL gave you. The whole reason for the existence of GPL was to prevent a company like Red Hat from doing what it's doing. It used to be you could buy a copy of Red Hat CD for $1 from 3rd parties. Red Hat was going to make their money from support. Well, then they changed, and started using their trademark as a way to prevent copying.

Re:

[Wdomburg]

I'd say integrated virtualization is a big feature. Likewise the updates on all the major infrastructure packages - apache, php, postgresql, mysql, etc. The inclusion of Red Hat Directory Serverer. Encrypted filesystem support. Extended SElinux support, including policy debugging. Installation on iSCSI devices. Better NUMA support. Blah blah blah, etc, etc, etc.

There's also new features on the desktop, but that's to be expected since Red Hat is pushing a desktop variant as well. (And for the record,