Re: [tlug] Red Hat Linux end-of-life

[Jim Breen <Jim.Breen@example.com>]

Charles Muller <acmuller@example.com> wrote:
>> I recently received this from Red Hat.
>> 
>> > Dear acmuller,
>> > 
>> > Thank you for being a Red Hat Network customer.

* Dear jim_breen,

* Thank you for being a Red Hat Network customer.

>> So now, as a Red Hat user, I am going to have to make a major
>> decision--between following along with Red Hat in their new course, or
>> taking this opportunity to perhaps try another distro. I am thinking
>> that at this point, I may have built up enough Linux skills to give
>> Debian a shot. I would be very happy if I could hear from anyone who has
>> a significant amount of experience with both Red Hat and Debian who
>> might be able to outline some of the differences in terms of demand in
>> technical skills for handling the two systems.

The RHN (Redhat Network) mailing lists are in meltdown over this. A lot
of *very* angry people. The angriest are people who had paid for a
subscription and appear to have been cut off (e.g. from end-December for
RH7.3) In my own case, my subscription expired in September. I emailed
RedHat's billing twice asking for renewal details, and have never heard back.
My automatic update checking, etc. is still running.

I intend to keep running 7.3 for a while yet, especially as there appear
to be a few groups  setting up to keep a supply of security, etc. rpms
going. After that, well I might try Fedora if it is successful and still
going when I next install/upgrade. I usually only do that after a
disaster (robbery, disk crash, etc.) so I don't exactly have a schedule.
Certainly 7.3 has been the most stable and consistent release I have
ever had.

I think I can understand what RH is doing. It has established itself as
a sound supplier of commercial servers, and that's where the majority of
its income is coming from. The move to migrate the low-end cheapies like
me to a totally free "fedora" version might be a good strategy, but from
a PR point of view it has been terribly handled.

Cheers

Jim

-- 
Jim Breen                                http://www.csse.monash.edu.au/~jwb/
Computer Science & Software Engineering,                Tel: +61 3 9905 9554
Monash University, VIC 3800, Australia                  Fax: +61 3 9905 5146
(Monash Provider No. 00008C)                ジム・ブリーン@モナシュ大学