Fedora Core 6 review (Software In Review)

[Posted November 8, 2006 by corbet]

Just in case any of you were looking for a thoroughly hostile review of Fedora Core 6: here's one in Software In Review. "The Fedora Project has failed six consecutive times to produce a viable desktop operating system. I say pack up, move on, and let Fedora Core die, but remember it fondly as the last of the holdouts from an era when desktop GNU/Linux meant missing out on most Web media while struggling to get network drivers installed and configured." The reviewer, clearly, would rather be running a proprietary system.

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Fedora Core 6 review (Software In Review)

Posted Nov 8, 2006 20:27 UTC (Wed) by horen (guest, #2514) [Link] (18 responses)

"The reviewer, clearly, would rather be running a proprietary system."

The way it reads to me, the reviewer would clearly like Fedora Core 6 to function -- during and after installation -- as well as s/he finds the Ubuntu distribution to function. No mystery here.

I've been using RedHat since 1996, and installed-and-used all prior versions of Fedora Core. However, Fedora Core 6 gave me several problems during installation, not the least of which was it crashing mid-way through the procedure (graphical), and "hosing" my RAID-1 system array. Not inconsequential, and it happened twice (yes, the MD5 checksum for the downloaded ISO image matched, and "Check Media" succeeded).

I chose to not "beat a dead dog", and moved onward to Debian Etch. Haven't had reason to look back...

Fedora Core 6 review (Software In Review)

Posted Nov 8, 2006 21:11 UTC (Wed) by wolfi (guest, #41576) [Link] (1 responses)

I too used RH since ages, and currently run a mix of FC4/FC5.
FC4 and FC5 is no masterpiece in innovation, but it WORKS FINE.
(stable and there are enough repos to get whatever you want)

But FC6 - is an exception - in a negative sense.

Installing within a vmware first:
(trying to use all the features - I would use on a physical machine)
-XFS-installs go through the installer - then don't boot. :-(

Then trying to install it on a REAL-HW (Dell-D620) just failed:
(note that this machine works fine with FC5 so far)

a.) the Xserver won't start up (for known reasons - but FC5 worked well)

b.) the install crashes/hangs at random points. - NEVER finishes.
(squashfs corruption - but media-test IS fine/passes)

...at this point - I gave up (waste of time) - and will stay w. FC5.

And now reading the review and some forums - I'm not alone.

So regardless whether it's free or not:

It simply doesn't install on MY hw, which runs happily FC5.

Fedora Core 6 review (Software In Review)

Posted Nov 8, 2006 22:43 UTC (Wed) by davej (subscriber, #354) [Link]

installing to XFS has always been fragile. There's a reason why we make you jump through hoops just to enable it.

the squashfs problem is news to me, I've not noticed it in bugzilla.
If you've pointers, I'm curious to see backtraces.

Fedora Core 6 review (Software In Review)

Posted Nov 8, 2006 22:50 UTC (Wed) by davej (subscriber, #354) [Link] (14 responses)

The way it reads to me, the reviewer would clearly like Fedora Core 6 to function -- during and after installation -- as well as s/he finds the Ubuntu distribution to function. No mystery here.

Here's how I read the 'review'.

"binary drivers for my hardware work in ubuntu but not in Fedora. wah wah wah".

Fine. Go use Ubuntu.

Fedora never has, and never will bend over and grab its ankles for the benefit of furthering binary drivers. If they work for you fine, otherwise, I have no interest whatsoever in "fixing" anything to make them work. We have enough real problems in code we can fix. I won't waste my time changing code for the sole benefit of people interested in stealing my work.

There seems to be this misconception that Fedora somehow has to play 'catch up' with Ubuntu's "lead" in making binary drivers work. For as long as I'm involved with Fedora, that isn't going to happen.

Fedora Core 6 review (Software In Review)

Posted Nov 8, 2006 23:01 UTC (Wed) by bojan (subscriber, #14302) [Link]

> Fedora never has, and never will bend over and grab its ankles for the benefit of furthering binary drivers.

Unthinkable, eh? ;-)

Fedora Core 6 review (Software In Review)

Posted Nov 8, 2006 23:42 UTC (Wed) by bignose (subscriber, #40) [Link]

> There seems to be this misconception that Fedora somehow has to play 'catch up' with Ubuntu's "lead" in making binary drivers work. For as long as I'm involved with Fedora, that isn't going to happen.

Thank you. This is exactly the kind of forward thinking we need. Let others stay back in the realm of proprietary drivers, while practical distributions like Fedora and gNewSense and Debian forge ahead into a free future.

Fedora Core 6 review (Software In Review)

Posted Nov 8, 2006 23:46 UTC (Wed) by bronson (guest, #4806) [Link] (4 responses)

Um, doesn't the two month delay to shore up nvidia/ATI problems count as "grabbing your ankles"?

http://lwn.net/Articles/195351/

Fedora Core 6 review (Software In Review)

Posted Nov 9, 2006 0:27 UTC (Thu) by ofeeley (guest, #36105) [Link]

Not entirely. As someone that was irked by the presentation of this and would rather that it had been handled otherwise there was a definite reluctance by the Fedora Board to simply prostitute the distribution to the whims of proprietary hardware purchasers and the Board was divided on the issue. The statement issued on whether or not an update of the Xorg packages was warranted clearly noted that there was a balance between slightly increased functionality for Free Software users versus avoiding breakage for those unlucky enough to be saddled with proprietary hardware.

I think that the discussion around this issue showed that the Fedora community and its representatives on the Fedora Board are doing anything but bending over in the way that the short-sighted reviewer would like. I'd like to add my thanks to DaveJ and others for having the clarity of thought to resist the impulse to go the Ubuntu root.

Fedora Core 6 review (Software In Review)

Posted Nov 9, 2006 0:28 UTC (Thu) by davej (subscriber, #354) [Link] (2 responses)

ATI/Nvidia problems was never a reason for slipping.
The delays in getting FC6 out were completely unrelated.
(Largely due to Xen)

Fedora Core not bending to proprietary drivers

Posted Nov 9, 2006 13:38 UTC (Thu) by rvfh (guest, #31018) [Link] (1 responses)

That's not what the poster meant: Xorg 7.1 was released back in May and did not appear in FC until months later (September?), because proprietary drivers from ATI and nVidia were not ready for it.

Fedora Core not bending to proprietary drivers

Posted Nov 9, 2006 19:28 UTC (Thu) by JoeBuck (guest, #2330) [Link]

But there was no delay: the very next major Fedora release had 7.1.

The only thing Fedora chose not to do was to upgrade the Xorg in the already shipping Fedora release, and I think that this was the right decision.

Fedora Core 6 review (Software In Review)

Posted Nov 8, 2006 23:46 UTC (Wed) by Ed_L. (guest, #24287) [Link] (4 responses)

Well, as long as DaveJ is on this thread and I don't have mail access at present to use Bugzilla, I'd like to add my two cents r.e. FC6.

1. I *do* use FC6 in a production environment. Of course, my personal idea of *production* is HPC code development. Which means mixed C++ and hoary-old-fortran. Which also necessitates the very latest from gcc.org. Which in turn either means Fedora *or* interminable rebuilds of gcc to /usr/local, matching libraries in makefiles, etc. Which is certainly possible and I've certainly done it in the past. But keeping Fedora uptodate is certainly easier.

2. I noted two installation issues:
(a) If I configured and enabled the network during installation (a good idea, thanks) AND enabled "extras" during installation, Anaconda would crash -- apparently because we use static IP addressing on our LAN and the "extras at install time" feature had only been tested with DHCP. I'm not really complaining, as *I* didn't do that testing either. Nor could I figure out why on earth I needed "extras" at install time, for this installation (due to previous hard disk failure under FC5) was a fresh install rather than an upgrade).
(b) Due to aforementioned hard disk failure, the new install was to a raid 1 array. I configured a software raid because, while I'm brave, I'm not so brave as to trust my data to some jive ATi hardware raid controller. (I don't care how fast it can scramble my bits...) The Anaconda/Disk-Druid disk partitioner/raid-conjuger worked well enough, but I couldn't help but notice a certain, er, lack of editing capability for raid paritions once they had been entered: I either got them all right the first time (hah!) or started over from scratch. This is purely a human interface issue in the installer. What it does, it does fine. Would like a raid apparition editor, though.

And those were the only problems I saw, both on new Anaconda features. On some positive notes: (a) the Xorg 7.1 works fine. When I built it last March I configured this workstation with an Abit AT8 mobo and PowerCooler x700 video card 'cause I read somewhere (prolly LWN:) that a free driver was well underway for the ATI r300 chipset, and in FC6 that native radeon driver works just great: first time I've ever gotten Xinerama suppport from dual-view on a single graphics card with a native driver. (I've run triple-head Xinerama for years on an old FC-1 box, but that was with three vid cards.) I don't miss nvidia or fglrx one bit. (b) GCC/Gfortran/Gdb play together just great, which is what I need this box for. (The RealTek ALC 882D ALSA support is sure nice, though.)

The only repos I enable are fedora-[core-devel-legacy-updates-extras] 'cuz so far them's all I's needed. Yum has kept them all straight enough.

So yeah, I'm satisfied with FC-6. Happy, even. Thanks, props, kudos, etc. to all concerned.

Ed Leaver

Fedora Core 6 review (Software In Review)

Posted Nov 9, 2006 0:34 UTC (Thu) by davej (subscriber, #354) [Link] (3 responses)

2a is very strange. As long as the static IP you give it is valid, along with the right gateway/nameservers, the package install phase should be completely ignorant to whether you're using static or dhcp.
If packets get from a to b, it should work, why would it care how you were assigned an IP ?

2b yes, the raid interface is a bit icky. I'm not a big fan myself either. I Believe the phrase the anaconda team uses is "Patches welcomed" :)
(however, kernel folks writing python is a scary thought, so I should probably stay away).

Glad you're happy with the dual head working. It's always good to hear that the radeon driver is actually working for a change :-)

Fedora Core 6 review (Software In Review)

Posted Nov 9, 2006 3:29 UTC (Thu) by Ed_L. (guest, #24287) [Link] (2 responses)

"the package install phase should be completely ignorant to whether you're using static or dhcp."

And I've no doubt the package install is so ignorant. If it got that far. The problem appeared to be with the anaconda gui (python code?). I regret to have misplaced/pipe-13'd my install notes, I had intended to send them to Fedora, but couldn't get into Bugzilla without a mail account, which our IT guy seems to have managed to disable. My recollection is it appeared the gui form code itself choked. Do wish I could find my notes of the exact error message. If they turn up I'll let you know.

Yeah, I realize I lucked out on the radeon driver. But I took care to enable no options that the X --configure script didn't set, save xinerama. I only require a stable multi-monitor development environment, and 3D performance isn't an issue. Proprietary blobs cluttering up kernel space are, and I hope competition from INTEL will prompt DAAMIT to release (or at least give data spec support for) FOSS drivers for their integrated graphics and similar low-end discreet cards.

Anyway, its back to the code mines. Thanks again for all the ~~fish~~ cool tools.

Fedora Core 6 review (Software In Review)

Posted Nov 9, 2006 13:29 UTC (Thu) by skvidal (guest, #3094) [Link]

The issue in the installer with using a static ip is known.
http://bugzilla.redhat.com/bugzilla/show_bug.cgi?id=212018

thanks,
-sv

Fedora Core 6 review (Software In Review)

Posted Nov 12, 2006 6:06 UTC (Sun) by routester (guest, #41631) [Link]

Incidently, error (failing install process, again no trace available but appeared to be from gui\python code) also occurs if dhcp is selected but dhcp is unavailable (ie - some coffee lacking individual failed to connect the cable at patch panel). Admittedly, this is a user issue, but imho it should not bail install completely but gracefully state something to the effect of "dhcp assignment unsuccessful, would you like to try again?" or perhaps "dhcp assignment unsuccessful, please beat the individual responsible for cabling the machine".

Fedora Core 6 review (Software In Review)

Posted Nov 10, 2006 9:24 UTC (Fri) by tajyrink (subscriber, #2750) [Link] (1 responses)

> Fedora never has, and never will bend over and grab its ankles for the
> benefit of furthering binary drivers.

It's not the binary drivers - Ubuntu does come with a few wireless firmware blobs, but eg. closed ATI/NVIDIA drivers are not used by default (though kernel modules are installed). I myself run Ubuntu with the "restricted"-component (about 5 packages all in all) removed, because I don't want to have any non-free software.

Ubuntu is IMO at least currently quite finely committed itself into Free software, while making it a not-too-hard to install proprietary addons for those lazy people who need them - but they are not including those proprietary software pieces in Ubuntu. The proprietary software they include is exactly limited to have install working on machines where it wouldn't otherwise work - basically the idea of "no harm done" I think, though of course one might disagree. And with the door to "restricted" open in Ubuntu, one has to always be vigilant for any possible cases where Ubuntu would be travelling to non-free paths.

The only thing currently I think Ubuntu could improve on this front, would be not to enable restricted component when installing on a computer where none of it is needed for the installation. Of course, if those are not needed, they are not used for anything either - those few firmware blobs are just lying around in some directory.

Fedora Core 6 review (Software In Review)

Posted Nov 10, 2006 15:44 UTC (Fri) by davej (subscriber, #354) [Link]

This is the case _now_, but wasn't always the case.
I was unaware that this policy had changed in edgy.

binary-only wireless daemons are just as bad as binary-only drivers however, which continue to be shipped in edgy.

Fedora Core 6 review (Software In Review)

Posted Nov 11, 2006 3:36 UTC (Sat) by vonbrand (subscriber, #4458) [Link]

In my experience people that switch distributions (radically at that) at the drop of a hat either never really learned how to handle one or never will.

Fedora Core 6 review (Software In Review)

Posted Nov 8, 2006 20:42 UTC (Wed) by mcastell (guest, #12226) [Link] (10 responses)

"The reviewer, clearly, would rather be running a proprietary system."

Agree with the comment made by horen. It's not so simple: it'not (again) free software against proprietary software. The reviewer, instead, with a well documented line of reasoning, compare Fedora with other distribution such Ubuntu.

As a whole, it seems to me that such arguments need a careful understanding, and maybe some comprehensive answers... Is Fedora really good for a desktop use? I'm not so sure, I must say...

Fedora Core 6 review (Software In Review)

Posted Nov 9, 2006 1:30 UTC (Thu) by davej (subscriber, #354) [Link] (8 responses)

> compare Fedora with other distribution such Ubuntu.

The point is that Ubuntu ships not-upstream drivers, and enables proprietory software, and Fedora doesn't.

Comparing the two as if they were on a level playing field isn't realistic.
They have completely different goals.

One of the objectives of Fedora is to try and get as much content as possible upstream, so we just 'inherit' rather than accumulate a gazillion patches to packages. Ubuntu seems to have the complete opposite intention.

Fedora Core 6 review (Software In Review)

Posted Nov 9, 2006 5:05 UTC (Thu) by Burgundavia (guest, #25172) [Link] (3 responses)

Ubuntu only enabled those drivers absolutely needed to get up and running, such as networking drivers. "Up and running" does not include ATI or Nvidia binary drivers.

As for the upstream issue, Ubuntu does care. I invite you to look at https://lists.ubuntu.com/archives/ubuntu-devel/2006-Octob... and https://wiki.ubuntu.com/DesktopTeam/UpstreamDelta

Fedora Core 6 review (Software In Review)

Posted Nov 9, 2006 5:44 UTC (Thu) by rahulsundaram (subscriber, #21946) [Link] (2 responses)

As long as distributions continue to install proprietary drivers without even the explicit consent of the users while superficially claiming to support free software, the situation is going to remain just the same. The goal should be to collectively resist that. When hardware people lose market share to competition due to the absence of Free sotware and open source drivers, they will open up the specs or even participate in the kernel development process. Many kernel developers consider distribution of such proprietary drivers a violation of the GPL license as well.

The upstream delta reduction work pointed out seems to be focussed on the desktop while Fedora there is usually low number of patches on the desktop components and the following upstream as much as possible is considered a distribution wide policy.

Fedora Core 6 review (Software In Review)

Posted Nov 9, 2006 6:12 UTC (Thu) by Burgundavia (guest, #25172) [Link] (1 responses)

If you read the first link I sent, it is clearly aimed at the entire distribution. The DesktopTeam link is merely an example.

Fedora Core 6 review (Software In Review)

Posted Nov 9, 2006 6:52 UTC (Thu) by rahulsundaram (subscriber, #21946) [Link]

I will believe it when the number of distribution specific patches in the kernel, GNOME and other places actually go down.

Posted Nov 9, 2006 13:23 UTC (Thu) by rsidd (subscriber, #2582) [Link] (3 responses)

Comparing the two as if they were on a level playing field isn't realistic.

Enough already with the Ubuntu-bashing. I use Ubuntu and Debian not for binary drivers but because they just work. And, in particular, I'm talking about updating individual software packages and upgrading to a new release. I still have nightmares about Red Hat, and it looks like Fedora hasn't changed much. To this day, Fedora apparently recommends backup, reformat and reinstall as the upgrade procedure.

If you don't like Ubuntu, fine, but how about making your own fork of Debian that takes advantage of others' good work and lives up to your ideological requirements? Debian solved the package management and upgrade problem years ago. And the smarter new distros noticed and based themselves on Debian. There is no excuse for a modern distro not having a sane updating and upgrading procedure.

Fedora upgrade procedure

Posted Nov 10, 2006 1:53 UTC (Fri) by kheine7 (guest, #41582) [Link] (2 responses)

> To this day, Fedora apparently recommends backup, reformat and reinstall as the upgrade procedure.

Gee I must be luck. I have taken my laptop through Fedora Core 1 -> Fedora Core 6 over time with no problem with upgrades. And this is not the only machine I have done with with. So to say the only way to upgrade Fedora is through a re-install is rubbish and I have my laptop to prove it.

> Debian solved the package management and upgrade problem years ago.

To bash Fedora Core/Extras about other 3rd party repos not working is like saying to the Ford that my car does not work anymore since I took it to the local mechanic. I bet not all Debian/Ubuntu repos work 100% with the main system all the time.

> There is no excuse for a modern distro not having a sane updating and upgrading procedure.

You are 100% right and I couldn't agree with you more BUT please check what you right is 100% right before you start saying things that dont agree.

PS. Please check the post at slashdot about Ubuntu 6.4 -> Ubuntu 6.10 upgrade not working. (http://linux.slashdot.org/linux/06/10/28/239258.shtml)

Fedora upgrade procedure

Posted Nov 10, 2006 20:12 UTC (Fri) by sbergman27 (guest, #10767) [Link] (1 responses)

"""
> To this day, Fedora apparently recommends backup, reformat and reinstall as the upgrade procedure.

Must be. And that's a good thing, because otherwise I'd have to call you on a bald-faced lie. ;-)

Few upgrade through 5 releases of any OS without a problem. Least of all Fedora users, where easy upgrades are not a particularly important goal. (At least Fedora Unity is doing some respins, in stark contrast to the traditional Fedora policy of "This horrendous installation problem will be fixed in FCx+1, but we don't do respins.)

And this is most especially true on a laptop, where you can't just run out and buy a card with a supported chipset and then simply fib a little about how things "just worked".)

You are, indeed, one lucky guy... because I know you wouldn't lie.

Fedora upgrade procedure

Posted Nov 16, 2006 8:21 UTC (Thu) by Pc5Y9sbv (guest, #41328) [Link]

> Must be. And that's a good thing, because otherwise I'd have to call you on a bald-faced lie. ;-)
>

I don't know about using the install media in "perform an upgrade" mode, but I upgraded a laptop from FC3 -> FC4 -> FC5 simply by using rpm to install the new fedora-release package (switches versioning metadata for yum) and then running yum to pull in and upgrade all of the packages. I'd do an upgrade to FC6 right now as a test, but that old machine developed bad blocks and I reinstalled FC5 on a new harddrive since this episode...

I followed one of the how-tos I found in a quick websearch for "fedora remote upgrade yum", which documented a couple of gotchas and pitfalls. It worked very nicely, such that I was able to do it remotely from another continent with only two hiccups:

1) running out of disk during FC3->FC4 yum upgrade! had to delete some packages to make space, delete a few stragglers of the old FC3 packages, re-run yum upgrade, and get back to good working order

2) had to arrange for someone to plug it into ethernet since I wasn't feeling up to the task of trying to build new atheros drivers (out of kernel) in lock-step with each reboot into a newer kernel.

Truth be told, I suspect this method may be more reliable than the install media method... my experience with Fedora is that the brand-spanking-new release is always a bit fragile. This method, when applied carefully, allows you to upgrade directly to the later maintenance updates and avoid running the earliest versions of packages in the new release.

BTW, if you shopped carefully and got a Thinkpad that had good hardware support in the kernel, you wouldn't find it surprising to have newer versions of Fedora continue to work well with the same machine. ;-)

Fedora Core 6 review (Software In Review) Desktop use and more

Posted Nov 9, 2006 9:51 UTC (Thu) by lsatenstein (guest, #34741) [Link]

My work day is spent using a propriatory operating system. I have linux at home.

Does Fedora or any Linux distribution provide a good desktop operating environment? I have only one answer. Definitely.

Here are a few additional comments, and it comes down to human behavior.

When you start with a distribution, and work with it for a while, you become a loyal fan. I tried UBUNTU, SUSE10, Mandriva and a few others, but except for one distribution originating from Japan, I could not find a compelling reason to switch. I did not remain with the Japan/English version, simply from a concern about support. Yet this distribution tackled an area that is lacking in all the distributions mentioned in this response. That area was the "network neighbourhood" concept, and guified easy samba use.

Now, I can throw eggs at any distribution. I can complain about broken YASTs, broken Yums, about other installation programs writing onto disks that I unchecked from the install list, about installing an incompatible version of GRUB, and so many other disturbing distinctions. Yet we all know that once one overcomes certain hurdles, that we become accustomed to the screen layouts, to the strengths (and shortcomings) of that distribution.

I love Fedora Core6. It does everything for me. True, I have two or three web sites to thank for handholding my initial efforts at installing "non-public" multi-media interfaces, for helping me install databases and for giving me an insight into linux capabilities.

Fedora Core6 and its two predecessors have never crashed my system. The preoccupation with testing, and with ensuring that any "extras" package integrates well should be appreciated. Give praise to the developers and support staff.

Regarding UBUNTU, it too is a fine distribution. Had I started with it first, I would possibly still be with it. But I started with Fedora Core4, and have entire satisfaction. Why change 4 quarters for a dollar.

I write code for a living. I do have a technical background. Yet, my grandaughter (age 5) knows how to log onto the system, to start the games she enjoys, and also to use firefox to visit her prefered web sites. She cannot as yet read or write. So, is Fedora, or for that matter, any Gnome based system ready for the desktop? I think that my answer again is a "definite yes".

Go easy on Fedora, it's beta-quality software

Posted Nov 8, 2006 20:49 UTC (Wed) by pr1268 (guest, #24648) [Link] (2 responses)

The Fedora Core Linux distribution is regarded as not production-worthy by:

Red Hat and the Fedora Core team
Most users who run it on their desktops/laptops
Most readers of LWN.net who post on these pages (my perception)

That being said, I think Mr. Matzan should consider exactly what Fedora Core's role is in the grand realm of things. FC isn't afraid of being a cutting-edge, state-of-the-art Linux distribution with the latest packages and software. It is the very idea of enticing a significant share of Linux users (and perhaps a fair percentage of Windows/Mac/BSD/Other Unix users as well) to their distribution so as to gain valuable feedback on the usability, stability, and reliability of all the FLOSS projects that come together at the Fedora Core distribution.

I think Mr. Matzan's review is unfair to say that Fedora hasn't got it right after six releases. Fedora probably won't get it right in FIFTY releases! But that's not the issue. It's a journey, not a destination.

I've jokingly said that anyone who runs the Fedora Core Linux distribution should wear the words "Beta Tester" in big scarlet letters written across their shirt.

Go easy on Fedora, it's beta-quality software

Posted Nov 8, 2006 21:10 UTC (Wed) by mspevack (subscriber, #36977) [Link]

The Fedora Core Linux distribution is regarded as not production-worthy by:

* Red Hat and the Fedora Core team
* Most users who run it on their desktops/laptops

I disagree with that statement.

http://interviews.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=06/08/17/177220 -- see question #8

https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-list/2006-October/msg03138.html -- a thread entitled "are you using Fedora in a production environment"

Go easy on Fedora, it's beta-quality software

Posted Nov 9, 2006 0:09 UTC (Thu) by ronaldcole (guest, #1462) [Link]

Fedora Core 6 installed easily enough on my Inspiron 8500 laptop and even "did the right thing" with the widescreen display under X. Heck, even without an "install everything" option I installed all the RPMs on the DVD and all the dependencies were fine (although I did feel that the 200M of updates for a release that was two days old was a bit excessive).

What ticked me off about FC6

Posted Nov 8, 2006 21:14 UTC (Wed) by yodermk (subscriber, #3803) [Link] (7 responses)

There is apparently no way, after installation, to install more packages from the DVD, except with the "rpm" command line, which forces you to *manually* resolve dependencies!

Let me get this straight -- I spend 3 days downloading the whole DVD over my 256k DSL (I live in a small town in the jungle in Ecuador). The installation no longer has the "install everything" option and no longer gives you much of anything in terms of software choices. As far as I could tell, there was no way from the installation even to install KDE.

No problem, I thought, I'll go to Pirut, the package installation tool. It refused to see the DVD, and wanted to download everything from the Net! So I cd to the RPMS directory on the DVD. "rpm -ivh kde*" Nope! Tons of dependencies! "yum localinstall kde*" Better -- it would have used the local copies of the KDE rpms, but all the dependencies would have been downloaded. Determined not to re-download, I spent I don't know how long manually resolving the dependencies.

Why on earth do they distribute 3.2GB DVD images if they're going to send people through this kind of hell?

I think FC5 had the same problem, but I "resolved" it by
# cd /media/cdrom/Fedora/RPMS
# rpm -ivh --force *.rpm

;-)

It worked, but it made me download so many useless updates that I didn't want to do it again.

IMHO, the *first* think they need to fix -- NOW -- is make Pirut use local media. To not do so is extremely ridiculous.

I honestly think this will be the last FC version I even download, but we'll see.

What ticked me off about FC6

Posted Nov 8, 2006 21:49 UTC (Wed) by dowdle (subscriber, #659) [Link]

I'm not sure why you think you can't install KDE from the install. Worked for me.

Getting rid of install everything... and Pirut not doing local media... again... aren't bugs but features... as are recent statements about Fedora skipping Firefox 2.x and waiting for Firefox 3.x instead. You might not agree with them... but that's how it is.

I doubt you are interested now but here's how I make FC easy to update and install anything. It takes a bit of disk space but I feed several machines so it is worth it:

1) Make your own base and extras repo. Basically, copy all of the RPMs from the install DVD to a web accessible directory and then run createrepo. Download all updates to a directory, run createrepo. Download all extras to a directory, run createrepo.

2) Make a script to keep your updates and extras repos updated... it can be as simple as using wget but there are other tools I've not investigated for that. Add a third-party multimedia repo... and create your own "addons" repo with acrobat reader, sun jdk, flash... etc... if desired.

3) Make your own .repo and move the stock ones to /etc/yum.reposd/factory

Now you can install anything on the local machine lightning fast... and you can also install everything over the LAN almost as fast. I think the complaints people have about YUM being slow are related to the mirroring system and having overloaded mirrors. yum flies when everything is either local or LAN based. Running your own repos you can even exclude certain updates if desired.

Granted, that's a lot of disk space and a lot of bandwidth to keep those repos current... but if you have a small fleet of machines, it is well worth it and fairly simple to do.

What ticked me off about FC6

Posted Nov 8, 2006 22:08 UTC (Wed) by rahulsundaram (subscriber, #21946) [Link] (3 responses)

Pirut out of box support for media is a planned feature. Meanwhile you can workaround it as listed in http://www.city-fan.org/tips/YumRepoFromImages.

KDE is definitely a choice during installation when you click the customize now button in the default selection screen and you can even select other desktop environments like XFCE from Fedora Extras in Fedora Core 6

http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Tours/FedoraCore6/007_Insta...
http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Tours/FedoraCore6/005_Insta...

What ticked me off about FC6

Posted Nov 8, 2006 23:09 UTC (Wed) by yodermk (subscriber, #3803) [Link] (2 responses)

I saw that createrepo script but didn't feel it was worth messing with for one box.

I clicked "customize later" I believe. I figured I'd have the same opportunity to install stuff from local media after installation. It should be made more clear that you can't.

I can see that there would be a problem with Pirut using local media after a yum update -- there may be local packages that conflict with an update. But it should absolutely still be possible to do that before an update.

What ticked me off about FC6

Posted Nov 9, 2006 0:14 UTC (Thu) by thebluesgnr (guest, #37963) [Link] (1 responses)

You could try creating symlinks between to the RPMS on the disc on the directory yum looks for packages - /var/cache/yum/core/packages/ if I remember correctly.

It sucks that yum still ignores CD's and DVD's, but it looks like it might be a planned feature for the next Fedora release. But I still wonder why Red Hat went with yum instead of the other more complete solutions.

What ticked me off about FC6

Posted Nov 9, 2006 0:36 UTC (Thu) by rahulsundaram (subscriber, #21946) [Link]

What would those complete solutions be? Apt-rpm was unmaintained at that time, written in complex amount of code and did not support multi lib. Now the situation there is much better and Apt-rpm has been revived to even support yum repository metadata format. Smart didnt exist or wasnt as well known when Fedora moved into using yum.

Yum was more of a natural replacement for up2date since it is in python (recent version of metadata parser in C) which Red Hat engineers are already very familiar with and and uses the same rpm bindings and has plugin capabilities to extend it further which is useful for prototyping things or RHN support.

What ticked me off about FC6

Posted Nov 9, 2006 0:39 UTC (Thu) by ronaldcole (guest, #1462) [Link]

On my i686, after the install, but before any yum updates, I did:

# cd '/media/FC_6 i386 DVD/Fedora/RPMS'
# (
# rpm -qa --queryformat "%{name}-%{version}-%{release}.%{arch}.rpm\n"
# ls *.rpm
# ) | sort | uniq -u >/tmp/snafu

I had to hand edit /tmp/snafu to remove the i386 rpms of glibc and openssl and the i586 kernel packages at this point (which I didn't have to do on the x86_64 ISO). Then I did:

# rpm -Uvh --nosignature $(< /tmp/snafu)

and took a coffee break.

What ticked me off about FC6

Posted Nov 15, 2006 19:31 UTC (Wed) by MikeyCarter (guest, #41686) [Link]

I have to laugh about the part where you can't install off the DVD after the installation. I went through a few tries to figure out a solution.

1st was to set up a web server which pointed to the DVD. That was a hasle and a half... then it hit me... (after hours of playing around with that idea)

file://

The fedora DVD is set up with the same structure as the mirrors. So just chnage the baseurl like to have file://media/dvd... whatever and your done.

It was so simple I was hitting myself in the head repeatedly... ;)

Fedora Core 6 review (Software In Review)

Posted Nov 8, 2006 21:31 UTC (Wed) by dowdle (subscriber, #659) [Link] (5 responses)

I guess the dude just ran into a combination of hardware that FC6 (or the kernel it uses) didn't like. It happens... but even with that he said some things I just didn't get:

1) It won't let you add other OSes to the grub boot menu - I imagine there might be some combos it doesn't recognise but for me it has always seen other OSes and added entries for them.

2) Conflicting repos... comflict. Who would have guessed?

3) Fedora Core doesn't support proprietary, patent encumbered multimedia codecs. DUH. That's a feature, not a bug. If you are waiting for a version of Fedora Core to do that, give up. <http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/ForbiddenItems>

Now, having said that, it is easy enough to add one of the popular, third-party repos to get all of that.

4) Ubuntu is far from perfect... and supposedly 44% of recent upgraders had significant failures. I'm not trying to bad mouth Ubuntu but those are the facts. Want multiple desktops on Ubuntu? I installed the previous release of Ubuntu then added KDE and Xfce. The boot screen said one flavor, the graphics boot said another... and then the graphical login said the third. Why does supporting multiple desktop environments need separate sub-distro release projects? That must be one of their features rather than a bug.

Other comments to this article remind me of /. comments. Fedora Core is beta test only? Oh, really. Max Spevack (Fedora Project Leader) says that is the biggest myth he is trying to dispell.

What Red Hat Linux has always been... and Fedora Core after it... is an early adopter of technology... trying to get it as right as possible... and then getting wider use by the masses help weed out the bugs. As with Red Hat's sponsorship of kernel, gcc, Xorg, gnome, etc... development... they produce a lot and all of the other distros benefit. While Novell/SUSE has a few big developers too, no one currently matches Red Hat for their contributions to the community... yet they are constantly badmouthed. You don't like Fedora Core... ok fine... but give Red Hat and the Fedora developers props. In a way, that makes Fedora Core "beta-test" but not any more than a Red Hat Linux .0 release was. This means that the Fedora Core end user has to contribute more than your average distro user... with bug reports and feedback... that's the community part of community distro.

Fedora Core is one of the most actively developed distros out there. I mean, heck there are approximately 370 updates to the FC6 install media... and several more hundred updates to Extras... and there will be thousands over the lifetime of FC6. The vast majority aren't security fixes... but bug fixes and version updates... much of it coming from upstream. Where are the props for all of that work? I mean, they upgraded KDE 3.5.4 to 3.5.5 pretty quickly. How many KDE/GNOME upgrades have fallen within the lifecycle of FC5? Release early and often... ring a bell for anyone?

Sometimes it can be hard to keep up... but that is why Linux has been advancing so fast. Fedora is more of a multi-purpose distro than just a desktop distro. It has contained some major features for several releases that most other distros will probably never adopt... and keeps adding them. SElinux, Xen, etc.

Is Fedora Core for everyone? No. No distro is for everyone... but I hope everyone can agree that they are happy Fedora Core is helping to advance the technology and indirectly improving other distros.

Fedora Core 6 review (Software In Review)

Posted Nov 8, 2006 22:40 UTC (Wed) by alonso (guest, #2828) [Link] (1 responses)

This is all true, I'm using FC6 (I just switched from opensuse, sad story...) and I like it.... but witch distribution is good for my gran mother?

Fedora Core 6 review (Software In Review)

Posted Nov 10, 2006 3:13 UTC (Fri) by kheine7 (guest, #41582) [Link]

>but witch distribution is good for my gran mother?

I can tell you a story. My mother inlaw (or is that outlaw? - sorry mum) was using Windows 98 and she had lots of problems. She brought a new computer (well a second hand one) and I installed Fedora Core 4 on it and I have had hardly any problems with her since. The only real issue I have is the stupid Lexmark Printer/Scanner/Fax, she can use it as a printer and the scanner works ok (yes but not as easily as windows). So yes there are people who can do simple email/browse the web/type up word docs and there are no problems using Fedora/Linux

Fedora Core 6 review (Software In Review)

Posted Nov 9, 2006 0:11 UTC (Thu) by thebluesgnr (guest, #37963) [Link] (2 responses)

I agree with most (if not all) of your comments regarding Red Hat and Fedora, but let me clarify a few things about Ubuntu that you got wrong:

1) To say that 44% of recent upgrades had failures is wrong. It's not a "fact".
And the reason some people have failed upgrades is because they installed unsupported software that caused conflicts later on. Any distribution may suffer from this problem.

2) If you install XFCE or KDE on Ubuntu, it won't change any of the splash screens or themes. However, if you install Xubuntu and Kubuntu on Ubuntu, you will.

Fedora Core 6 review (Software In Review)

Posted Nov 9, 2006 12:30 UTC (Thu) by lysse (guest, #3190) [Link]

> To say that 44% of recent upgrades had failures is wrong. It's not a "fact".

Hmm. Two contradictory assertions, neither one supported or sourced. Which one do I believe...?

(Please, if you're going to make claims of the nature of either "X is true" or "no it isn't", back them up with something - otherwise your claims are worth less than your silence would have been.)

Fedora Core 6 review (Software In Review)

Posted Nov 9, 2006 23:56 UTC (Thu) by at2000 (guest, #20920) [Link]

> 2) If you install XFCE or KDE on Ubuntu, it won't change any of the splash screens or themes. However, if you install Xubuntu and Kubuntu on Ubuntu, you will.

Untrue. You can try to apt-get install xubuntu-default-settings and then reboot. The gdm splash will change.

Fedora Core 6 review (Software In Review)

Posted Nov 8, 2006 22:14 UTC (Wed) by charris (guest, #13263) [Link] (1 responses)

Shrug.

The fedora releases go up and down in quality. IMHO, fc3 and fc5 were excellent, fc4 was a bit glitchy, and fc6 was released too early. That said, fc6 has some nice improvements on fc5.

Ubuntu quality also goes up and down. I can't comment in detail because, while I install all of the releases, I don't end up using them much because fedora works just a bit better for me. Same for Suse, for which I keep having high hopes as it was once my favorite.

As too the review, I clicked away after the first paragraph. I'm tired of political rants after all these months, the election is over, and I just want to kick back for a while. The review sounded too much like an ugly political scream fest, so it was buh-bye.

Fedora Core 6 review (Software In Review)

Posted Nov 9, 2006 1:35 UTC (Thu) by davej (subscriber, #354) [Link]

> fc6 was released too early.

After slipping for ~2 months? :-)

Seriously, if you have genuine complaints/problems, we do actually listen to bugzilla reports. (It may not seem so sometimes, because we're almost constantly buried alive in bugs, but they all get looked at, even if they don't have any follow-ups).

Fedora Core 6 review (Software In Review)

Posted Nov 8, 2006 22:23 UTC (Wed) by russell (guest, #10458) [Link] (7 responses)

Now that some of my family are using FC, since that's what I've been using. I'm starting to realise how unfriendly the distro really is. For instance, it's nice to have the updates appear on the desktop and be easily installed, BUT, because of the lack of driver support, if a kernel update is in the mix, it breaks everything. Was not a problem for me, but now I'm spending a lot more time fixing everyones problems. For example (just one), consider how long the IPW3945 driver has been around and how much hardware is out in the real world. The answer is a long time and a lot of hardware. And it's not uncommon for the FC kernel source API to break the compilation of ipw3945.

How hard would it be to add some of these out of tree drivers to extras?

Use exclude

Posted Nov 8, 2006 22:36 UTC (Wed) by dowdle (subscriber, #659) [Link] (2 responses)

On some machines that I have proprietary drivers installed on, I exclude the kernel (and xorg as well on some) updates (add "exclude=kernel*" to /etc/yum.conf). Just add an exclude and then you don't have to worry about a kernel upgrade breaking stuff.

I don't recommend proprietary hardware... but when you are stuck with it... what can you do?

I don't recommend you exclude the kernel forever... especially if there is a big security fix in a newer kernel... but delaying it until you are ready to do it... or skipping a few kernels upgrades that weren't of much value to you... doesn't hurt.

Your comments reminded me of when Windows users tell me how hard Linux is to use... and how easy Windows is to use. Anything is easy once one learns HOW to use it. Most folks who think Windows is easy to use somehow have forgotten that period of time where they didn't know how to use Windows... and the frustrations they went through to learn it. Take some time to learn Linux and you'll see just how easy it is to use too. :) That last sentence isn't addressed at the author of the comment but non-Linux users in general.

Use exclude

Posted Nov 9, 2006 14:51 UTC (Thu) by salimma (subscriber, #34460) [Link] (1 responses)

Very true. Get one of those person who says Windows is easier than Linux, give him a Windows install CD, and tell him to get his system up and running (and up to date) and see who finishes first.

Bonus point if the system has an unsupported SATA controller and no floppy drive.

Use exclude

Posted Nov 9, 2006 16:19 UTC (Thu) by NRArnot (subscriber, #3033) [Link]

Even better, give your Windows user a hard disk extracted from a PC that was happily running Windows XP before its motherboard broke down (say an old AMD Athlon), and a new PC (say an Intel Core Duo 2), and tell him to get back to where he was before the breakdown.

He'll need good tech skills to sort out HAL. And good people skills to avoid paying Microsoft for another copy of Windows. (If it was an OEM copy originally, he *will* have to pay for another copy of Windows!). Point out to him that while he's on hold listening to muzak, he's paying a premium rate and Microsoft is getting half of it, which is why they aren't in any sort of hurry to eventually let him talk to someone in Bombay with an imperfect grasp of English.

It's even less fun with a Windows server.

Then show him the same job with Linux. I've done this several times. Yank the disk, install it in a new PC, boot, usually that's it. 10 minute job. Even if by some chance it won't boot (hardware too new for old kernel?) , userdata is safe in separate /home partition (and system config safe in /etc for inspection and re-use as appropriate). You can get quick access to your data with the latest Knoppix CD or go find an older new PC, it won't have scrambled your disk.

Heck, that Knoppix disk should have been the first thing that your Windows user reached for!

If he needs further convincing get him to make McAfee anti-virus start working again after it auto-updated itself into non-functionality. I spent most of yesterday sorting that one out on about 30 PCs. sadly I'm not in an all-Linux environment.

Fedora Core 6 review (Software In Review)

Posted Nov 8, 2006 22:39 UTC (Wed) by davej (subscriber, #354) [Link]

When they're encumbered by binary only blobs, or licenses that prevent redistribution, very hard.

ipw3945 is eventually going to get better, but it's a few months off from getting solved.

Fedora Core 6 review (Software In Review)

Posted Nov 8, 2006 22:49 UTC (Wed) by bojan (subscriber, #14302) [Link]

> How hard would it be to add some of these out of tree drivers to extras?

I think this is probably waiting for inclusion in vanilla kernel. You can ask on Fedora Devel list.

This LKML thread has a bit more info on the current status of the driver:

http://marc.theaimsgroup.com/?l=linux-netdev&m=116223...

In the meantime, see if this helps (I don't use wireless, so I didn't test this):

http://atrpms.net/dist/fc6/ipw3945/

Fedora Core 6 review (Software In Review)

Posted Nov 9, 2006 14:49 UTC (Thu) by salimma (subscriber, #34460) [Link] (1 responses)

For binary drivers in general, if you get it from a third-party repo, you normally have to hold off your kernel upgrade only for a couple of days, until they have a corresponding version.

For ipw3945 in particular, there are repos out there that uses dkms to package it, so when you boot a new kernel it will automatically recompile the driver's kernel interface for that. Not giving any direct link, but searching for dkms-ipw3945 might help.

Fedora Core 6 review (Software In Review)

Posted Nov 9, 2006 18:49 UTC (Thu) by smoogen (subscriber, #97) [Link]

I will say freshrpms is the BEST for getting ipw3945 stuff for your system. I put a dkms module and the regulatory daemon on and it worked.. had to change my kernel and bang dkms rebuilt the daemon for me and all was well.

WOW! What a statement

Posted Nov 8, 2006 22:31 UTC (Wed) by bojan (subscriber, #14302) [Link] (2 responses)

> A software distribution is meaningless if it does not include all of the software that the target userbase expects to use.

I mean, what can you say to this? I guess the conclusion would be that all operating system distributions, including Mac OS X, Windows, Solaris, FreeBSD etc. are meaningless, as they sure don't include all of what target userbases expect.

WOW! What a statement

Posted Nov 9, 2006 5:05 UTC (Thu) by dgilmore (subscriber, #40144) [Link] (1 responses)

As someone who supports Windows, OSX and Linux for a living. I'll post
some of my thoughts.

Windows and OSX both require me to first remove alot of crap that I don't
want nor need. then I need to go through the hellish process that is
updating and installing the software that I want. The big ones that
stand out is a lack of productivity suites and pdf reader/writer.

Linux installs are a much simpler process and the finished system
generally has all That is needed on it. its a one step process to get
updates. and simple to install what other software i need. I can if i
want do a kick start install and ensure i have everything i need
including updates at the end of the install.

The reviewer is entitled to his opinion and i strongly disagree with it.
Yes there are some bugs in the installer. yes there are bugs in all
software. But Fedora does a very good job of responding to them when
filed in the right place. Namely bugzilla.

WOW! What a statement

Posted Nov 9, 2006 13:06 UTC (Thu) by cpm (guest, #3554) [Link]

As someone else who also supports Windows, Linux and OSX for a living.

I strongly echo the orig sentiments.

Fedora Core 6 review (Software In Review)...NOT a review !

Posted Nov 10, 2006 18:22 UTC (Fri) by jmmc (guest, #34939) [Link]

I wish LWN had put this under 'Opinion'...this is not a review.

I get a bit in and see this...

"The installation procedure is inferior to every other desktop GNU/Linux distribution I've used. Partitions can't be resized, the default partitioning scheme is a terrible mess involving logical volumes and groups and such, the boot loader configurator doesn't recognize other operating systems on the same computer, and trying to add extra software repositories results in an unrecoverable crash. Adding software repos after installation must be done from the command line."

This is ridiculous - I'm in (shock and) awe ;)
What is "...install inferior to every other..." nonsense ? As far as I could tell - it was the same basic anaconda format I've seen since RH7 (but I use text install for FC mostly, as I've had better luck with it, and I'm a longtime Slack guy - text install gives me the 'warm fuzzies', I guess ;). About partitioning, I was actually GLAD when I did the install, accepted the default disk configuration, and saw LVM configured by default (woohoo !). If JEM understood a _single thing_ about LVM, you'd know you DO want it, not this so called 'terrible mess' (what the ?) he mentions. I love Slackware (the only other distro I use), but try upfront LVM configuration on SW - sure, doable, but a bit more to handle. GRUB had no trouble seeing my Slack install on sda1 and worked smoothly. And how in the Creator's name did you manage to paint using the command line in such a negative light (the way you positioned it in this paragraph just seethed of negativity) ?. No !...command line, now that's a 'good thing' (right, Martha ?) ! I considered that a PLUS, Jem.

I've never seen FC as anything closely competitive to Ubuntu (or Suse, etc.). The missions are entirely different.

Jem, just say what worked for you, and what didn't, what you found useful and what you did not find useful - that would actually HELP people. Everything you painted in a negative light I actually found the opposite to be true (for me), which is why I say your review is more _opinion_ than real, technical observation/analysis.

But most importantly, THANK YOU Dave Jones, and the crew at RH - and thanks always for keeping FC 'unencumbered' (perhaps FCs BEST feature ;)

Fedora Core 6 review (Software In Review)

Posted Nov 11, 2006 20:07 UTC (Sat) by cj100570 (guest, #41627) [Link] (1 responses)

All this bickering back and forth about proprietary and non proprietary drivers is a waste of time. The fact of the matter is that if Linux does not avail itself to being easier to install and configure it'll always be a niche operating system. As someone who was new to Linux 2 years ago I would've never made the switch from Windows had my distro of choice, SUSE, not benn easy to get up and running. We as a community need to put things in perspective. We all want Linux to gain ground by bringing new people into the fold right? In order to do this we need to make it easier for them to make the switch. If that means adding a few proprietary drivers to the mix, video, wifi, etc., I think it's worth it!

Fedora Core 6 review (Software In Review)

Posted Nov 12, 2006 20:29 UTC (Sun) by heksys (guest, #41569) [Link]

I think that it's true, Linux Distributions have to make it easier for new
users, I still remember the time I made the switch I thought about it for
a bit just because my internet settings didn't work and the only way for
me to get help was on the internet, so I thank God I had 2 hard drives
(one with windows and the other with linux) so for me to be able to fix
the problem I had to switch over. Till this day I have try all Fedora
versions and never liked it for that reason, nothing never works and it
takes you a lot of time to fix the problems, thats if I ever get to fix
it. I have always wonder how the hell it's supposedly the most used Linux
flavor. How? In my opinion Fedora should just let it rest for good.