tlug: distributions

["Stephen J. Turnbull" <turnbull@example.com>]

>>>>> "Shin" == Shin Maikeru <mecooper@example.com> writes:

    Shin> The latest issue of Computing Japan features interviews with
    Shin> TurboLinux and RedHat regarding who will get Japan. What I
    Shin> want to know is, must there be just one?

Of course not.  But management likes safety, and will tend to lean to
the more popular distro unless they have tech background.

    Shin> Are there concrete incompatibilities between distributions?

Yes.  For example, at least until glibc 2.2 is released the various
Japanized distributions are likely to handle locales somewhat
differently.  Very hazardous juju---see JB's thread on _Xsetlocale.

Both RedHat and TL tend to hack on their system libs to make their own
software work right.

AFAIK they're responsible about submitting bug reports/patches, so
individual such differences tend to converge with the next releases of
the libc and the distributions.  But these little idiosyncrasies can
give a RedHat-experienced admin an advantage on a RedHat system, and
vice versa.

    Shin> I know that different distr's put certain system files in
    Shin> different directories,

No problem there, the hierarchies all make pretty much sense.  You
just have to get used to navigating it.

User default configuration (especially shell profiles and rcs) is
another matter.  This varies a lot, especially as one of the main
distinctive points of each distribution is its configuration tools.
If you don't understand the config philosphy, you're likely to hose
the user's config in some way.  Usually by making impossible for them
to use the tool to change their configuration---consider a tool which
changes .bashrc, which is sourced by .bash_profile; if the default
.bash_profile overrides a variable set by the tool in .bashrc, the
tool can't do its job.

Usually this is easy enough to figure out, but an inexperienced admin
suffers a user complaint and lost time to fix; the experienced admin
gets it right the first time.  Small advantage to the experienced
admin.  The true adept, of course, analyzes the structure the first
time they hack on an unfamiliar system and also gets it right the
first time.  ;-)

Default net configuration is another one to watch out for, since this
tends to have security implications.  One complaint may be a disaster, 
here.

    Shin> but isn't the bottom line that, if I am a trained and
    Shin> competent Systems Admin or programmer for Red Hat, I can get
    Shin> work in a company that uses Turbo, no problems?

No.  _You_ can do the work, of course.  The managers are not
necessarily smart enough to know that, and if they don't they won't
interview you.  You'll have to mention them all on your resume ;-)

-- 
University of Tsukuba                Tennodai 1-1-1 Tsukuba 305-8573 JAPAN
Institute of Policy and Planning Sciences       Tel/fax: +81 (298) 53-5091
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