[CentOS] Why so many updates already for CentOS 5

[Johnny Hughes]

On Sun, 2007-04-15 at 08:01 +0800, John Summerfield wrote:
> Stephen John Smoogen wrote:
> > On 4/13/07, John Summerfield <debian at herakles.homelinux.org> wrote:
> 
> >> > 1.  People want the versions of files on the CentOS to discs to match
> >> > the upstream versions for software control
> >>
> >> Some do, some don't. Some download at work and install at home. There's
> >> 75 Mbytes of updates wouldn't get to my machines at home.
> >> An updates repo in the collection would be a handy compromise, I think I
> >> suggested this a while ago.
> >>
> > 
> > It sounds nice but has too many problems in implimintation:
> > 
> > 1) Anaconda does not deal with updates during install. Upgrades need
> > to be placed in the main trees and the disk would need to be respun
> > regularly.  My memory is a bit weak here, but I think that trying to
> > add the code to deal with 'updates' during install seems to have
> > caused a lot of 'exceptions' in the Fedora code and causes anaconda to
> > be even more memory happy.
> 
> Having them present is a great start.
> > 
> > 2) Respinning the disks breaks upstream compatibility that a lot of
> > ISV software looks for to see if a system is 'supported' and will run
> > on it.
> 
> Specifically what? /updates in the root directory?
> 
> > 3) If a person installs in 3 weeks from now when say another 75-200 MB
> > of updates are available.. it doesnt help any (especially if those
> > updates cover a lot of what was on the disk).
> 
> It's a good start.
> 
> > 
> > 4) An updates iso might be possible, but it is more disk space on
> > overtaxed servers and more work for the 3-10 core people.
> 
> use of jigdo can alleviate the first. A script run weekly by crontab 
> would likely be enough.
> 
> 

OK ... maybe I am missing something here ... BUT

why can't the person in question just rsync down the updates dir for the
arch in question and make an iso out of it ... then mount that ISO
themselves?

Then CentOS doesn't have to try to spin, save, distribute, etc. all
these ISOs.

If I spin one extra CD (650MB) and distribute it to 200 mirrors (650MB x
200 = 130GB transferred) ... that ties up how much time and bandwidth
for how many people and costs how many $.  

If 30% or more of our users were using it, it might be worth all that
time and effort ... but it is also not hard to for any user to sync the
right updates directory down (it already includes all the yum metatdata
required) an burn it to ISO.

I don't see ANY major distro out there that makes this available,
because it is largely untenable to scale this to a million user
scenario.
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