>
> How much different are Caldera and RedHat? I was hoping to
> run the same OS at home as on the server.
Linux is and isnt...
There is the core, a kernel. And there are a number of standard
tools, like cat, more, df, du, etc. that come with the general
distribution. They are rather the same between distributions, and there
are not many real changes between releases, though ps now tells you that
it does not what a minus sign before the arguments so that in future
releases, if you use the minus sign, you will get a slightly more "unixy"
flavor response than if you don't.
Next, there are a number of shells, which are command line
processors. You run those either on the consoles, or via X Windows. Many
use Bash for their shell, though some prefer the Korn shell. I use Tcsh
for my shell, but Bash for my script files. Each is a little different,
and not all Unix machines have the same shells available. My Indy, which
runs IRIX, has Tcsh. My Sun, running Solaris, does not, much to my
dismay... On it and my ISP, I think I use Bash. I am supposed to be
flexible, as when I walk in the door on a new assignment, I have no idea
what they will have available. I type it one way, and if it does not do
what I want, I type it another way. Sooner or later, my fingers grasp
which shell I am running on, and off they go.
There is also some variation between distributions on where they put
various configuration files and such, at least beyond the usual ones in
/etc. Less variation than use to be, as there are some standards now.
Then there are other utilities, like the web server Apache, Sendmail,
X-Windows, Netscape, PERL, ELM, and other things that do vary some what;
but in many cases the variations are more the way they are set up than
what is included. Apache can be set up to give you various kinds of logs,
with IP numbers or domain names of visitors, restrict or allow CGI-BIN
files in each directory, etc. Sendmail can be set up to allow internal
mail forwarding or not, etc. X-Windows will vary with your hardware, and
which versions you pick. (I've always had trouble running Red Hat's
favorite, Metro, so I run other versions... when they are compatible with
the hardware I am using. Two of my machines, including this one, don't
run X, and I don't much care for it except when I need graphics, as for
Netscape, which I run on one notebook, the Indy, and I have Sun's Hot Java
browser on the Sun, which runs like cold molasses. Mostly, I run the
text-only browser, Lynx, in large part because I find black backgrounds
far less tiring on my eyes; it is also faster. When you live on the CRT
like I do, believe me, black backgrounds make a difference!)
Beyond that, are a slew of optional tools and utilities, like Squid,
which can allow you to proxy the web to your other LAN'd machines, as I do
for my Indy, Sun, and two notebook machines. Those extra tools and
utilities, you will have to select yourself. (Squid was added to Red Hat
in 5.1, but was available in SuSE perhaps a year earlier.) Netscape,
various databases, and a LOT of other tools are included.
And what is not on your CD, can be found somewhere on the web if you
want to go looking for it.
So, is it the same operating system? Yes. But you probably won't
set it up quite the same way. Nor do you need to.
Which is the best distribution? I don't know. All I know is that
Caldera has a reputation for producing a rock stable distribution; though
in the past, they have not used the latest kernel releases. My
understanding is that they tweek their distribution fairly heavily,
whereas others don't do as much.
Since I write a lot of my own stuff, I don't really care much which
distribution I use, save that the older SuSE setup and adjustment tools
didn't respect your settings. Don't yet know if it is true with the
latest SuSE 5.3, but should find out as soon as I start tinkering with the
older notebook again.
I wouldn't worry too much about it.
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