[CentOS] [CentOS-announce] Release for CentOS Linux 7 (1503 ) on x86_64

Thu Apr 2 18:08:03 UTC 2015
Phelps, Matthew <mphelps at cfa.harvard.edu>

On Thu, Apr 2, 2015 at 12:22 PM, Les Mikesell <lesmikesell at gmail.com> wrote:

> On Thu, Apr 2, 2015 at 10:56 AM, Karanbir Singh <mail-lists at karan.org>
> wrote:
> >
> > os-release has been at /7/ since the first CentOS 7 release - what extra
> > value does having 7.1 in there bring ? At best it just says that your
> > centos-release rpm has not been updated and/or there is no system level
> > state change that required metadata in that file.
>
> If you know that some feature was added or bug fixed in RH 7.1,  or
> more relevant, your boss or security officer or application developer
> knows that, there is very much value in being able to say that  CentOS
> 7.1-whatever includes the same features/fixes, and that your automated
> inventory database will show which machines have been updated to that
> version.   Otherwise you'll spend the rest of the day discussing how
> fix x is done in package-revs-n1 fix y is in package-rev-n2 and how to
> check for it.   Sometimes you need the latter detail, but mostly not,
> especially for the application guys.
>
>
This is the crux of the issue in my mind. The complete departure from the
upstream
naming conventions, weather they are "correct" or "relevant" or not, is a
major change
and is becoming a major hassle, maybe not from an engineering point of
view, but from
a practical, day-to-day one.

Change is fine, but it requires work to deal with. And most of us don't
have time to deal
with major changes. This is a major change from past practice for CentOS,
and there are
many operational implications of it that apparently haven't been
considered.


-- 
Matt Phelps
System Administrator, Computation Facility
Harvard - Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics
mphelps at cfa.harvard.edu, http://www.cfa.harvard.edu