CentOS Forks Off Almost
Monday, 3 August 2009
The open source community are sometimes their own worse enemy.
Which distro should I use and what is the difference between them? Well the answer is complicated. One size doesn't always fit all even if Microsoft Windows is very popular. In the corporate world supported distros are king which is why Red Hat is such a bit hit (really?) And what about Fedora? It is Red Hat without the cost of support. And where does Ubuntu figure in all of this?
Well the problem is that all Linux distros are good. They are based on the rock sold Linus Torvalds kernel. However the perception is that Linux is a fragmented and therefore unreliable OS which does have the reliability and predictability which big business demands. This is also true. This article about the threat to CentOS being forked (aka destroyed) just because their founder went on holiday and was off grid for a few days (I exaggerate) is a great example of what open source communities are worse at: P.R.
"Let's stick with Windows because we know what we are getting".
Two days after a core group of developers posted an open letter to primary admin Lance Davis, threatening to fork the open source OS if he didn't discuss his apparent disappearance from the project, Davis has answered their call - and he seems to have quelled their complaints.
