On Sun, 2003-07-27 at 10:27, Marcel Weber wrote: > Debian could be made of a base installation (glibc, etc.) that is the > same for all stable plattforms. On top of this one could put context > specific application distros. During install you could choose what the > context of your installation is: > > - Hardened server: Just the most important and very secure packages > - Application server: More server packages, but still conservative and > optimized for stability > - Workstation: All the newest ports and packages, that everybody loves > having on his / hers desktop > > What do others think of my idea?
Well, to be honest. Hogwash. It is already there. Hardened Server == Stable with a Proper Admin understand Listening processes and services offered (and networking and hardware tweaking and so on). This is the Paradigm that Stable is built upon. Application Server == Stable with a slant towards usability which means a few back ports i.e. Alternative .deb archives. *AND* a Proper Admin. Workstation == Testing/Unstable/Experimental... Yeah Yeah, I know "But it breaks all the time". No, No it does not. A good workstation build ONLY has the things you need... and IF those things are Not in Stable... You get to help out the continuum. File those bug-reports, with workarounds you have found (if you have them). Since reportbug does all the work for you... it is easy and takes only a couple of minutes. Also, let's compare say... Mandrake and/or RedHat to Debian on a purely theoretical basis. My money would make Mandrake(current version) *AND* RedHat(current Version) in terms of Quality Control, usability, package availability and stability to be == Unstable. Or here is another way to express it: Mandrake(current) == Unstable with far fewer packages available RedHat(current) == Unstable with far fewer packages available Sure, installing from source is an option for any package, but MOST of the time Sid has it, and it only a "few days" old or back from official releases. Sure exceptions are abound, but sometimes even THAT is a good thing. There are reasons Debian is the way it is. It is all about the Policy behind the Distribution. Not dpkg v. rpm. Poliay and Granularity of packaging is what makes the difference for Debian. FYI, I currently run all my workstation with my Default version being Experimental... I get to run all the Coolio stuff and regularly find that we have very very good packing policy. Once in a while things are broken that the only workaround is to us a different Environment (Xfce or blackbox or windowmaker) but gosh... the last time that happened was nearly 6 months ago. And it was only for 5 or so days once it was sorted out by the packagers.
