[CentOS-devel] CentOS 7 and release numbering

Mon Jun 9 08:12:52 UTC 2014
Ljubomir Ljubojevic <centos at plnet.rs>

On 06/09/2014 02:55 AM, Stephen John Smoogen wrote:
>
>
>
> On 8 June 2014 17:01, John R. Dennison <jrd at gerdesas.com
> <mailto:jrd at gerdesas.com>> wrote:
>
>     On Sun, Jun 08, 2014 at 05:20:47PM -0400, Carl Trieloff wrote:
>      >
>      > I've read through the the responses so for and the main concern
>     seems to
>      > be understanding the linkage between upstream and CentOS. Am I
>     correct
>      > in that?
>
>     That and the fact that it has been stated repeatedly that the CentOS
>     core product will _not_ change and what is being discussed here is a
>     change to that same core product.
>
>
> Well I think this is more about defining what people think of as change
> and no change. Being the internet I am sure there are some set of people
> who will define any new release as being a change in the core product
> and thus a breakage. And there will be people who are at the other end
> of the spectrum and ok with all the change in the world as long as the
> name is CentOS and the first number is similar to the RHEL name. And
> then there are a ton of definitions of what is change and what isn't in
> between.
>
> So a better discussion is I think people defining what they would accept
> as being 'change' and what is not change. The board has stated their
> view of change and various users are defining in a piecemeal way what is
> their definition of change. I think that it might be better if the users
> state a bit clearer so that the board has a definite idea of where the
> lines are.
> --
> Stephen J Smoogen.
>

I am main admin of the CentOS Facebook group. In about two weeks we will 
have 10.000 members. There are only 3 of us to properly respond, and we 
are on the frontline of newbie wave, those that never ever used IRC, 
forums or mailing lists. We have trouble just to explain that they need 
to upgrade to latest. Imagine the chaos that would come from date 
versioning. I think my ultimate response would be to just stop 
administering that group, period. Even now every 5-10 days I have to 
reiterate all basic steps even thou it is pinned in first post. People 
just do not read or learn anything they can get away with. They are 
lazy, and as it was previously said, every even small complication will 
repulse them away from CentOS.

AS for the "definition" of change, It was made simple by devel guys. 
There can not be no changes, beside most necessary, that distance CentOS 
from RHEL. What RHEL publishes CentOS must also publish, with only as 
minimal as possible changes. CentOS distro is not allowed to carry any 
3rd party repo files because RHEL does not have them, and CentOS project 
strives to be binary compatible with RHEL.

And then suddenly, after CentOS Project members get payed by Red Hat 
CentOS project starts looking like Fedora respins, braking with RHEL 
numeration, CentOS distro becomes experimental platform for software Red 
Hat wants to push for better market share via respins, and we are left 
explaining to every single newbie why that had to be done.

If SiG's are going to be so problematic, then they can devise their own 
versioning scheme, because if they are going to create such difference 
from core CentOS distro then just call them CentOS-like distro's and be 
done with it. They are either CentOS with 3rd party repositories or will 
be just using SOME CentOS-produced packages for better use of available 
resources. Period.


-- 
Ljubomir Ljubojevic
(Love is in the Air)
PL Computers
Serbia, Europe

StarOS, Mikrotik and CentOS/RHEL/Linux consultant