[OFF-TOPIC] Re: [XML-SIG] Are you interested in bug reports?

[Nicolas Chauvat]

<off-topic>

>   Except a rant, is there anything productive we could extract from your
> message. I.e. what exactly went wrong ? What could have fixed it ?

Part of it is clearly a rant. I forgot to add the <rant/> tag, though.

What went wrong is that once a box is installed, it is a pain to maintain
it and upgrade the software that's there. And adding new software is
harder than it is with other distros.

What could have fixed it is something like RH-Update combined with
http://www.logilab.org/newrpm, combined with frequent updates of packages.

I eventually realized that what I was after when writing newrpm was in
fact called Debian and had been working for a long time.

>   I can't make sense of "your software repository is absent".

Using the network to keep my installed software up to date, I cannot just
go to rpm.org and download what I need for it's too messy. I would have to
pay for a rh-update service to keep my software up to date after
installation. This is not the case with Debian.

> It is clear that Red Hat is focusing on professionnal computing
> services where the goal is to provide a clearly identified set of
> working packages who have been tested, and does not try to integrate
> every possible package. The goal is to select and cleanup, not to
> aggregate an infinite set of package without the possibility to do
> quality insurance.

Fine. I won't spend more time advocating Debian here, it's not the right
place for that and others would do it better than me. RedHat is great, I
used it for most of my Linux years so far, but I found something that
better fits my needs. End of the story (for me).

</off-topic>

-- 
Nicolas Chauvat

http://www.logilab.com - "Mais oł est donc Ornicar ?" - LOGILAB, Paris (France)