On Mon, May 21, 2007 at 10:11:37AM +0200, [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: > > >you cant support source only packages and let your users compile them > >anyway they want, there are simply too many variables to consider. I > >think you actually void the support from redhat if you dont use one of > >the provided kernels. > >imho, source code availability is a plus but to your regular sysadmin > >is just one tiebreaker > > > I am confident that the 0.1% number is an accurate upperbound > of Linux users actually looking at or using source. > > If that were not the case, the Linux market would be much smaller indeed. > > I've worked in places where system administrators hacked source code > which was available (BSD Unix, source licenses). > > Invariably, it is a *bad* idea; but that point is never driven home > until one of the administrators does leave or is hit by a truck.
All of the large international financial institutions roll their own packages from source and distribute internally in their preferred manner (though the definition of a package may vary. Many do not try to use solaris packages having decided they're useless - tarballs or golden masters + rdist/rsync is sometimes the chosen way). So, for example, until very recently no-one would even consider using the Solaris sendmail. The challenge in the past was not having patches replace the proper sendmail.cf (which is not a problem when using rpms or debs unless you go out of your way to break your own packages). This is across all of the major survivors of the unix wars - solaris, hp/ux, aix and linux - that I've seen used. Having been the linux maintainer at one of these institutions with responsabilities to back-up the maintainers of products on other platforms, I've been exposed to the mind-numbing stupidity of how the packages on these platforms work, and their limitations. Building packages for a linux distro is a pleasure compared to building sun/hp/aix packages in every way. -Peter -- The 5 year plan: In five years we'll make up another plan. Or just re-use this one. _______________________________________________ opensolaris-discuss mailing list [email protected]
