Mailing List Archive

On Tue, 2005-06-07 at 13:56 -0400, Aron Griffis wrote:
> I spend *at least* 1/3 of my time working on Gentoo. Without getting
> into a salary discussion, that's hp donating tens of thousands of
> dollars per year.
>
> Now whether you all consider my involvement to be worth that much is
> a different matter, of course. No comments from the peanut gallery,
> please. ;-)

...and you *still* haven't gotten an ia64 livecd built? For shame!

*grin*

--
Chris Gianelloni
Release Engineering - Strategic Lead/QA Manager
Games - Developer
Gentoo Linux

Chris Gianelloni wrote: [Tue Jun 07 2005, 06:38:41PM EDT]
> ...and you *still* haven't gotten an ia64 livecd built? For shame!

SO TRUE.

--
Aron Griffis
Gentoo Linux Developer

On Tue, 2005-06-07 at 18:38 -0400, Chris Gianelloni wrote:
> ...and you *still* haven't gotten an ia64 livecd built? For shame!

He's getting close.. Just got some more hardware put into dolphin last
week, and it has a spindle of blanks sitting right on top of it. so
umm, yeah, that's a start :)

-C

--
gentoo-dev@gentoo.org mailing list

Chris Gianelloni wrote:

>On Mon, 2005-06-06 at 19:55 -0400, Aron Griffis wrote:
>
>
>>Also I find it amusing when people say that Gentoo exists for the
>>users. I think that is wrong. Gentoo exists for the *developers*.
>>
>>
>
>This is the reason why *I* use/develop Gentoo. I love it. I could care
>less if every single user we have drops us for Ubuntu. I would still
>develop Gentoo so long as it is still fun.
>
>
>
You might reconsider this statement.

Suppose the entire user base will migrate to Ubuntu. The direct
consequence will be that the active dev corpus will grow thin, which
will lead to a dramatic decrease of distro's merits.
The dev and user communities are very close tighted together, but if
analyze who needs whom, you'll realize that dev community depends on
user community, not the other way around. No dev is irreplaceable, as
long as we have our cluefull user base in place.

Not every gentoo dev has a selfish motivation (at least not as selfish
as "having fun" or "being cool" motivations). For example, my reason to
becoming dev was to maintain unpopular (in dev world, of course)
packages and keep b.g.o as clean as I could. I ended up taking care of
100+ ebuilds, from which only 2 (ppp and squid) interests me as a person.

On Wed, 2005-06-08 at 08:14 +0300, Alin Nastac wrote:
> Chris Gianelloni wrote:
>
> >On Mon, 2005-06-06 at 19:55 -0400, Aron Griffis wrote:
> >
> >
> >>Also I find it amusing when people say that Gentoo exists for the
> >>users. I think that is wrong. Gentoo exists for the *developers*.
> >>
> >>
> >
> >This is the reason why *I* use/develop Gentoo. I love it. I could care
> >less if every single user we have drops us for Ubuntu. I would still
> >develop Gentoo so long as it is still fun.
> >
> >
> >
> You might reconsider this statement.

Absolutely not.

I feel no reason to restate something simply because someone wants to
tear it apart and make it literal.

My point still stands. I work on Gentoo because I *love* it.

I, too, work on things I personally don't like/use, but the reason that
I do it is because I love doing Gentoo development as a whole, not
because some suit somewhere *told* me to do it. Like I said, I do
Gentoo development because it scratches my personal itch. The fact that
thousands of other people can benefit from my work is an added bonus,
but it is not my reason for doing it. I truly enjoy that our users not
only benefit from my work, but many times help with my work through
their contributions.

--
Chris Gianelloni
Release Engineering - Strategic Lead/QA Manager
Games - Developer
Gentoo Linux

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----
Hash: SHA1

Aron Griffis wrote:
> In my humble opinion, Gentoo is missing too many points to be an
> enterprise Linux. We commit to a live tree. We don't have true QA,
> testing or tinderbox. We don't have paid staff, alpha/beta/rc cycles.
> We don't really have product lifecycles, since we don't generally
> backport fixes to older versions, requiring instead for people to
> update to a more recent release. We don't have, and probably will
> never be able to offer, support contracts. We support as wide a range
> of hardware as the upstream kernel, plus hardware that requires
> external drivers; we don't have access to a great deal of the hardware
> for which we provide drivers. We understand when real life gets in
> the way of bug-fixing, because all our developers are volunteers.

Using your list there would be two types of enterprise 'requirements':
process requirements and support requirements.

Improving and working towards the process requirements (sane commits,
better QA, etc.) doesn't mean that Gentoo would have to be any less fun.
And just because the Gentoo Foundation isn't in a position to provide
the support requirements (paid staff, support contracts, etc.) doesn't
mean that someone else couldn't provide those (or that Gentoo would make
it particularly hard to do so).

> Also I find it amusing when people say that Gentoo exists for the
> users. I think that is wrong. Gentoo exists for the *developers*.
> It's our playground, and it's the reason we use a live tree rather
> than switching to an actually sane approach. The users are cool
> because they point out bugs, help solve problems on bugzilla, suggest
> enhancements, provide patches, and notify us of package updates.
> Sometimes they become developers. But the truth is that Gentoo sees
> improvement and maintenance in the areas that appeal to the
> developers. And that is why Gentoo exists for the developers first,
> the users second.

I would suggest that:

1) this is a pretty common belief in any software developement project,
commercial, community led, or otherwise

2) its a bit wrong headed for various reasons, IMHO (see below)

and

3) I personally find it amusing. ;)

What developers seem to forget, is that they too are end-users. For
instance, a particular developer's responsibilities may be Baselayout,
Epm, Gentoo/Alpha, Gentoo/IA64, Keychain, Mozilla, Mutt, Vim, and such.
That makes him/her an end-user for everything else thats installed on
their system. In other words, developers are just a subset of the user base.

Secondly, polishing things for developer's sake doesn't preclude
polishing things for user's sake, and visa-versa.

So if it were up to me, it would be users first , which would encompass
everyone, including the developers!

Nathan

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE-----
Version: GnuPG v1.4.1 (GNU/Linux)
Comment: Using GnuPG with Thunderbird - http://enigmail.mozdev.org

iD8DBQFCp2bZ2QTTR4CNEQARAqTcAKCOa/cBOlWV7z7f7UOB6lr5uCVpbACglB3/
4Fm35UBwetXvSY7jFy8276I=
=w0yb
-----END PGP SIGNATURE-----
--
gentoo-dev@gentoo.org mailing list

Nathan L. Adams wrote: [Wed Jun 08 2005, 05:44:58PM EDT]
> Using your list there would be two types of enterprise 'requirements':
> process requirements and support requirements.

Thanks for pointing that out. I'm not good at seeing distinctions
like that.

> What developers seem to forget, is that they too are end-users. For
> instance, a particular developer's responsibilities may be
> Baselayout, Epm, Gentoo/Alpha, Gentoo/IA64, Keychain, Mozilla, Mutt,
> Vim, and such. That makes him/her an end-user for everything else
> thats installed on their system. In other words, developers are just
> a subset of the user base.

Nah, I don't use any of that stuff.

Waaaiiit a minute, that list looks awful familiar... ;-)

Regards,
Aron

--
Aron Griffis
Gentoo Linux Developer

> There have been some really interesting points brought up recently
> about "where is Gentoo going?"

It feels like this topic comes up every year :)

> I have been wondering that myself.
> Some people seem to think that Gentoo has the potential to be an
> enterprise player.

Maybe, maybe not ... but I don't see why we couldn't do a little bit
more to make it easier for others to use us as a base.

Isn't that what *we're* about - being a metadistribution?

> I think that attempting to take Gentoo in the "enterprise" direction
> is a mistake. I think that we are a hobbyist distribution. This
> doesn't mean that we should not strive to meet some of the enterprise
> goals. Those things can be important to hobbyists too. But I don't
> think we should be aiming for corporate America.

We have groups focusing in other directions. If there's a group of
people who want to make Gentoo enterprise-friendly, why not let them do
so?

> I don't even understand why that goal appeals to people.

An enterprise-friendly Gentoo appeals to me personally because I find
those problems interesting. They're problems that I enjoy learning
about, and trying to solve. I have enterprise experience both technical
and managerial, and I find the whole domain fascinating.

> Let other distros go there!

If you mean let other distros go to the place with suits and support
contracts and backporting, I agree. I want to see an
enterprise-friendly Gentoo, but I want to see the corporate risks and
costs taken on by third-parties outside the project.

> I want Gentoo to run in people's homes, in student
> dorm rooms, etc.

Well, yes, to a point, but (without intending to offend anyone) you can
learn a lot more by learning to setup a web server cluster than you can
running a web server in your bedroom. F.ex, in the bedroom, /home/httpd
seems as good a place as any to put your website. It's only when you
learn how to build larger systems that you can understand the merits of
moving to /var/www/<FQDN> or better still the /srv tree.

Part of my motivation is educational.

I believe that Gentoo can play an important educational role in people's
lives. I want a Gentoo distribution that can grow with a user's
experience and needs, not one that the ultimately have to move away from
because someone decided for those of us who are interested that we're
not going there.

And I think Gentoo can play an equally important educational role in
developers' lives too.

> Places where people want a fun distribution that
> they can tailor and work on easily.

Amen. I never want us to lose any of those points.

> I'd like Gentoo to be a place where neat things are developed.

Aren't we really a place where neat things are packaged up?

> Also I find it amusing when people say that Gentoo exists for the
> users. I think that is wrong. Gentoo exists for the *developers*.
> It's our playground, and it's the reason we use a live tree rather
> than switching to an actually sane approach. The users are cool
> because they point out bugs, help solve problems on bugzilla, suggest
> enhancements, provide patches, and notify us of package updates.
> Sometimes they become developers. But the truth is that Gentoo sees
> improvement and maintenance in the areas that appeal to the
> developers. And that is why Gentoo exists for the developers first,
> the users second.

I agree that it's our developers who drive Gentoo, and not really our
users - simply because it's the developers who volunteer their time to
work on the things that interest them.

But I'm personally not comfortable with "it's our playground" being the
accepted approach to *everything*. I've been away from Gentoo for
awhile, and on coming back, I've been shocked and disgusted with what
seems to pass as acceptable treatment of users these days.

I think Gentoo needs a little more "it's about the users" than we have
right now just to keep us from collectively going off the rails.

Best regards,
Stu
--
Stuart Herbert stuart@gentoo.org
Gentoo Developer http://www.gentoo.org/
http://stu.gnqs.org/diary/

GnuGP key id# F9AFC57C available from http://pgp.mit.edu
Key fingerprint = 31FB 50D4 1F88 E227 F319 C549 0C2F 80BA F9AF C57C
--

Stuart Herbert wrote: [Thu Jun 09 2005, 06:32:04PM EDT]
> > I'd like Gentoo to be a place where neat things are developed.
>
> Aren't we really a place where neat things are packaged up?

Hopefully both! :-)

Regarding the rest of your email, I don't disagree. I think that if
you read my follow-ups in the thread, you'll find that I addressed or
responded to a number of the same ideas. I'll be the first to admit
that my initial thoughts were not a complete picture of the world,
just a limited perspective and some food for thought...

Regards,
Aron

--
Aron Griffis
Gentoo Linux Developer

Stuart Herbert wrote:
>>There have been some really interesting points brought up recently
>>about "where is Gentoo going?"
>
> It feels like this topic comes up every year :)

I'd say it should come up a little more often :)

>>I have been wondering that myself.
>>Some people seem to think that Gentoo has the potential to be an
>>enterprise player.
>
> Maybe, maybe not ... but I don't see why we couldn't do a little bit
> more to make it easier for others to use us as a base.
>
> Isn't that what *we're* about - being a metadistribution?

If we follow the "metadistribution" trail we should have a set of
high-level tools that really help people manage their own binary
packages building and deployment. We (all?) know that the underlying
technology is already in Gentoo, but there are still no authoritative
tool(s) to :

1- help rolling your own distribution based on Gentoo
- tool to maintain frozen Portage trees
- tool to roll out a software update pack including config files
- ...

2- help centralizing packages deployment on several workstations
- help test software update packs on gold systems
- push packages to multiple systems
- do accountability on what's installed on systems
- ...

I'm not talking about releasing an "Enterprise-oriented" flavor of
Gentoo, I'm just talking about enabling people to do so and the minimal
deployment tools needed in a 5+ machine network.

The size of the Portage tree gives us a definitive advantage : you can
have 100% Portage-packages systems, so what's-in-this-box accountability
is not the nightmare it can be with other systems that heavily rely on
third-party RPMs. We should exploit that advantage.

--
Thierry Carrez (Koon)
--
gentoo-dev@gentoo.org mailing list

I think the actual idea of what Gentoo does is much larger than people tend to realize it. When Linux first came out, it was a hacker's choice and has now expanded into something much greater than Linus himself I think had ever anticipated.

Now, when this whole idea of "distributions" came to play, I think the general goals of Linux became slightly distorted. In my opinion, the goal of Linux distributions is to get people to move to Linux.

Now, each distribution does this differently. I think Gentoo mainly comes down to customization (note, NOT SPEED). In a sense, this is why we are able to work so well with the embedded ports, because we can trim things down with that level of customization. Knoppix does it through a ready made CD that users can see what linux looks like. Fedora does it through a binary package system and automated hardware detection. Debian does it through a binary packaging system as well as a somewhat well monitored release system. All in all, everyone's got their own means to meet the same goal, getting people to move to Linux.

In the end I think that's why it's sometimes frustrating when I see x sucks and y sucks, just to say they suck. Now, saying "I think you should choose x over y because z and z best meets your goals" is something far better.

So to sum it up, it's not really (for me maybe) about enterprise v. hobbyist, it's about moving ANYONE over to Linux, period.

Chris White

> So to sum it up, it's not really (for me maybe) about enterprise v. hobbyist, it's about moving ANYONE over to Linux, period.

Actually, I rather like to think that Gentoo is one of the very few
distributions that cares more about meeting existing Linux
[power]users' needs rather than getting any new users to Linux. I
mean lets face it, a distro that's largely DIY is hardly a good first
Linux, but an excellent second Linux and indeed thats the very reason
why I use Gentoo. Let Redhat/Fedora/Mandrake do the initial user
grab, that's what they're good at.

Athul

--
gentoo-dev@gentoo.org mailing list

Athul Acharya wrote:
>>So to sum it up, it's not really (for me maybe) about enterprise v. hobbyist, it's about moving ANYONE over to Linux, period.
>
>
> Actually, I rather like to think that Gentoo is one of the very few
> distributions that cares more about meeting existing Linux
> [power]users' needs rather than getting any new users to Linux. I
> mean lets face it, a distro that's largely DIY is hardly a good first
> Linux, but an excellent second Linux and indeed thats the very reason
> why I use Gentoo. Let Redhat/Fedora/Mandrake do the initial user
> grab, that's what they're good at.
>
> Athul
>

OTOH, most computer users are unable to or uninterested in installing/configuring an OS. All they need is someone to setup Gentoo for them and they can basically use it like they would an MS Windows "appliance".

Zac
--
gentoo-dev@gentoo.org mailing list

* On Sun Jun-12-2005 at 01:33:02 PM -0700, Zac Medico said:
> Athul Acharya wrote:
[...]
> > I mean lets face it, a distro that's largely DIY is hardly a good
> > first Linux, but an excellent second Linux and indeed thats the very
> > reason why I use Gentoo. Let Redhat/Fedora/Mandrake do the initial
> > user grab, that's what they're good at.
>
> OTOH, most computer users are unable to or uninterested in
> installing/configuring an OS. All they need is someone to setup
> Gentoo for them and they can basically use it like they would an MS
> Windows "appliance".

[Sorry, I've gone OT with this...]

I have a friend who is clueless when it comes to computers. I've set up
Gentoo for him -- after Mandrake, of all distros, was a pain to get
working with his pc -- and he's just stoked that he doesn't have to
worry about websites ruining his PC with ads and spyware. I have to
maintain it, but Gentoo makes that a breeze since I can log in from home
and update as necessary.

Gentoo draws a line between user and admin, while most OSs try to get
rid of this line. I think it's an important line to have for now. There
may not be as much danger in using a computer as driving a vehicle, but
it's still a machine which requires knowledge to safely operate well.
Most users simply aren't willing to learn what they should know since
they only see the computer as a means to an end. I don't think there's
anything wrong with that, but I sympathize with users who suffer through
needless OS problems just because they are in the habit of clicking OK
to the 100 message boxes they see pop up daily. Even if that message box
is really just a web page with a graphical link that runs some ActiveX
code...

I got sidetracked; my main point was that Gentoo is a great OS for even
the most careless user, as long as there is an admin to keep the system
running safely and smoothly.

Many thanks to the Gentoo devs, who have made this solid distro a
pleasure to run for everyone from server admins to PDA users.

(Note: I don't have Gentoo running on my PDA yet... but as soon as I can
boot the kernel that'll be my next goal)

--
Sami Samhuri

Aron Griffis wrote:

>This is kinda bloggish, because it's basically a transcription of an
>IRC monologue. My apologies if it's hard to follow...
>
This thread started out garnering cheers of elitest developer
sentiment. There was even some mention of "if they don't like it they
can run something else".

Then, that notion was reeled in, the developers are part of the user
community.

There is an open debate as to the meaning of support for 'enterprise',
'cluster', and 'hobbyist';

does gentoo mean any of these?

In this thread I posted a suggested hack which must surely have been
suggested before my reading/perusal of gentoo-dev, but also addresses a
tangible element, growth.

-- Portage's power is too great in one place, it should be forged in the
hottest fires into the form of many rings for the leaders among gentoo,
with one ring to bind them.

Gentoo portage is growing, gentoo's communication network is growing in
complexity, and gentoo's organization is growing.

I saw it interesting that this is what describes the rise and fade of
FIDO net.

First there were hobbyist, later came zealots, some with bad attitudes,
and eventually a full fledged organization devoted to handling the
politics, which grew large enough for division into zones. There were
online businesses thriving from its value as well as the very
resourceful and isolated folks who had no other means of communicating
among the world at large.

One of fido's most interesting feature was its initial recognition that
its growth needed structure, and that structure was formed. fido's own
politiks from around the world failed to vote for survival of the
IFNA(International FidoNet Association). So fido dissolved its official
entity, and continuted to grow. Fido became a concept which spun off
saplings and intertwined with the net, but in majority of years it was
run by the folks with the biggest toys.

I mention fido because of one similarity which is uncannily familiar.
"only" 26% of the potential voters recently cast a vote for the gentoo
metastructure. we saw some puzzlement, bordering on grumbling, and some
amusement: "eeeyup that must be us!".

sooo. back to growth...

does the portage design foretell a single monolithic repo growing ad
infinitum? this is the common watering hole which draws every single
participant to the same well.

it's gotta work, 'emerge world' has gotta fly. does tinderbox
indicate this is a predictable outcome with a stable margin of error, as
t approaches infinity?

if not, where goes gentoo?


--
gentoo-dev@gentoo.org mailing list

Jim Northrup wrote:

>Aron Griffis wrote:
>
>
>
>>This is kinda bloggish, because it's basically a transcription of an
>>IRC monologue. My apologies if it's hard to follow...
>>
>>
>>
>This thread started out garnering cheers of elitest developer
>sentiment. There was even some mention of "if they don't like it they
>can run something else".
>
>Then, that notion was reeled in, the developers are part of the user
>community.
>
>There is an open debate as to the meaning of support for 'enterprise',
>'cluster', and 'hobbyist';
>
>does gentoo mean any of these?
>
>In this thread I posted a suggested hack which must surely have been
>suggested before my reading/perusal of gentoo-dev, but also addresses a
>tangible element, growth.
>
>-- Portage's power is too great in one place, it should be forged in the
>hottest fires into the form of many rings for the leaders among gentoo,
>with one ring to bind them.
>
>Gentoo portage is growing, gentoo's communication network is growing in
>complexity, and gentoo's organization is growing.
>
>I saw it interesting that this is what describes the rise and fade of
>FIDO net.
>
>First there were hobbyist, later came zealots, some with bad attitudes,
>and eventually a full fledged organization devoted to handling the
>politics, which grew large enough for division into zones. There were
>online businesses thriving from its value as well as the very
>resourceful and isolated folks who had no other means of communicating
>among the world at large.
>
>One of fido's most interesting feature was its initial recognition that
>its growth needed structure, and that structure was formed. fido's own
>politiks from around the world failed to vote for survival of the
>IFNA(International FidoNet Association). So fido dissolved its official
>entity, and continuted to grow. Fido became a concept which spun off
>saplings and intertwined with the net, but in majority of years it was
>run by the folks with the biggest toys.
>
>I mention fido because of one similarity which is uncannily familiar.
>"only" 26% of the potential voters recently cast a vote for the gentoo
>metastructure. we saw some puzzlement, bordering on grumbling, and some
>amusement: "eeeyup that must be us!".
>
>sooo. back to growth...
>
>does the portage design foretell a single monolithic repo growing ad
>infinitum? this is the common watering hole which draws every single
>participant to the same well.
>
> it's gotta work, 'emerge world' has gotta fly. does tinderbox
>indicate this is a predictable outcome with a stable margin of error, as
>t approaches infinity?
>
>
>
The portage team has tons of great ideas up their sleeves to make
portage better, multiple repos being just one of the many. I'll let
them preach their stuff for now, lest I let slip ideas that never see
the light of day ;) Regardless changes are coming and they definately
make me very excited.
-Alec Warner
Ajec

--
gentoo-dev@gentoo.org mailing list

On Wed, 2005-08-03 at 13:55 +0200, Sven Köhler wrote:
> > In my humble opinion, Gentoo is missing too many points to be an
> > enterprise Linux. We commit to a live tree. We don't have true QA,
> > testing or tinderbox. We don't have paid staff, alpha/beta/rc cycles.
> > We don't really have product lifecycles, since we don't generally
> > backport fixes to older versions, requiring instead for people to
> > update to a more recent release. We don't have, and probably will
> > never be able to offer, support contracts. We support as wide a range
> > of hardware as the upstream kernel, plus hardware that requires
> > external drivers; we don't have access to a great deal of the hardware
> > for which we provide drivers. We understand when real life gets in
> > the way of bug-fixing, because all our developers are volunteers.
>
> QA is a problem. Bugs get fixed, but often they are only fixed in ~x86
> versions, not in the stable x86 series. For example baselayout: there
> are lot of ~x86 - miles ahead of that is marked x86. Maintainers think,
> it's sufficient to only fix the most recent version. How do they
> legitimate that?

This one is easy. A stable package's ebuild should not change. Period.
To "fix" the stable version, means that a new revision of the latest
stable version would need to be made, and that revision would need to be
tested, before it would go to stable. The only real exception to this
is security bugs. Also, in many cases, the bug in question requires
changes that are simply not feasible easily in the current stable
version, but quite easy in the latest version. It really boils down to
this: If you're having an issue with a package in Gentoo and it is
fixed in the latest ~arch version, then you should *use* the ~arch
version (remember, it doesn't mean "unstable" it means "testing") and
you should report back to the maintainers that this is working for you
so that they can get it moved into stable quicker. We don't have the
staff or the time to backport every fix to every stable version.
Remember that in many cases the "latest stable" version varies between
architectures.

> And yes, Gentoo does not backport patches to older version. But is it
> Gentoo's responsibility? If there's a bug in Postgresql 7.x and 8.x, and
> the PostgreSQL people only fix it 8.x-series - well: Debian and Redhat
> will backport the patches propably. They is a big reason why all the
> distrubutions with precompiled packages do that:
> - the updates has to be binary compatible with the old one

I don't feel that this is our responsibility. While we sometimes do
backport patches, we just don't have the manpower to make it policy.

> Gentoo doesn't suffer from that limitation. Gentoo offers ways to
> migrate a system from openssl 0.9.6 to openssl 0.9.7 for example. Other
> distributions doesn't offer that - although they could with better
> package managers.

Right.

> Administrating a Gentoo system takes time - much time, but ...

This is something that I think most people forget. Running Gentoo makes
you a Linux Systems Administrator. Sure, you're only being the
administrator for your machine, which might only have one user, but
you're the admin. With some of the other distributions, *they* are the
admin, and you're just a user. They make assumptions for you and limit
what you can and cannot do (without an enormous amount of work to bypass
their limits). This is especially apparent in the many cases where
users expect Gentoo to do everything for them, when it doesn't.

> ... writing my own packages for - let's say Redhat - takes more time
> than writing an ebuild for Gentoo. If you have to maintain a system with
> very special software, i would recomm Gentoo.

I would agree with you. Professionally, I work on Red Hat. I have to
build custom RPMs on a daily basis, and I can say that the simple syntax
of ebuilds is a tremendous advantage.

> Just some days ago, someone reinstalled a Server where we had PostGreSQL
> 8.0 running. He chose to install Debian - which offers PostGreSQL 7.4 -
> so what did he do? He compiled PostGreSQL 8.0 himself, to be abled to
> use our existing database. This will become hell the more packages you
> have to compile on you own. Any configure-make-install-like package,
> Perl-Module, etc... can be easy installed by using an ebuild.

You aren't "supposed" to compile packages on your own on Debian. You're
supposed to make your own DEB package and install that. Otherwise, you
are working outside the package manager. This is no different than on
Gentoo, just for many people, an ebuild is easier to write than creating
a DEB/RPM.

> In addition Gentoo is the only distribution i know, that supports
> installing multiple Java-version etc...
> A must-have for every real java-developer.

Agreed. This is also very true for proprietary applications that rely
on java.

> So i'd say: use Debian, if you have a relativly normal system to
> maintain, use Gentoo if you have the time - and never ever use Redhat or
> SuSE.

Gentoo tends to be more flexible with a smaller amount of work. This
makes it an excellent development platform, which is another reason why
many people say that Gentoo is "for the developers" first. I also think
that it is a wonderful end-user platform. My girlfriend runs Gentoo and
loves it. I started her off on Red Hat, and she found lots of little
things that bugged her, so I showed her Gentoo, and she was hooked,
since it was so easy for her to change those little peculiarities, not
to mention she knows a lot more about what it going on behind the scenes
then with those little redhat-config-* apps.

I personally hope that Gentoo never changes. I'd like to see quality
improve, but that doesn't require any major changes to Gentoo itself.
As far as enterprise support, I think a fork is honestly the best
answer. Not a fork that becomes completely independent, but a fork
focused on providing the enterprise features, like a slower release
cycle and backporting fixes, and rolling what it can back into Gentoo.
I think this sort of symbiotic relationship is really the only way to
successfully move Gentoo into the enterprise.

--
Chris Gianelloni
Release Engineering - Strategic Lead/QA Manager
Games - Developer
Gentoo Linux

I think it's value is that gentoo is for the developers.
: )

--
Riverfor [A chinese, a gentoo user, a programmer]

Interesting thread. I have used Gentoo in enterprise situations very
successfully, and I think the whole QA/live-tree argument is moot. In
an enterprise environment, you might have a backup/testing machine to
run your updates on first before they went live. You also wouldn't run
new packages unless they passed your own QA tests first.

Given the incredible flexibility of portage to support local mirrors,
binary package preparation, and localized versions of packages
(portdir_overlay), I would say that Gentoo is quite a contender in the
enterprise environment.

Perhaps we need some enterprise documentation to help people realize the
full potential of portage?


-Eric

--
gentoo-dev@gentoo.org mailing list

On Thu, 2005-08-04 at 09:04 -0400, Eric Brown wrote:
>
> Interesting thread. I have used Gentoo in enterprise situations very
> successfully, and I think the whole QA/live-tree argument is moot. In
> an enterprise environment, you might have a backup/testing machine to
> run your updates on first before they went live. You also wouldn't run
> new packages unless they passed your own QA tests first.
>
> Given the incredible flexibility of portage to support local mirrors,
> binary package preparation, and localized versions of packages
> (portdir_overlay), I would say that Gentoo is quite a contender in the
> enterprise environment.
>
> Perhaps we need some enterprise documentation to help people realize the
> full potential of portage?

I think you've missed some of the idea of "enterprise" support. See,
for starters, every person shouldn't have to create their own
implementation of everything. Perhaps a better solution would be a
package that when installed, builds up a local mirror, a binary package
repository (with revision control), an automated update system, a system
for updating rolled out machines without forcing the use of etc-update
on each machine, a slower moving stable tree capable of being certified
with applications, and most likely a phone number of someone to call
when the shit hits the fan.

While I will completely agree that Gentoo *can* be used in the
enterprise successfully, that does not make it "enterprise-ready", in
any sense. Many people also seem to misunderstand the concept of
"enterprise" when we are referring to it in this manner. We don't mean
"I'm running it on 10 servers in production" or anything like that. We
mean "I'm running this as our production platform for Linux services
across our entire enterprise, that could be hundreds or even thousands
of servers" instead. While it might be possible to maintain a handful
of Gentoo servers, it is next to impossible to maintain an army of them,
without spending significant up-front manpower to design, test, and
implement your own set of management tools. Gentoo has no real
management tools. There are a few here and there that do specific
tasks, but there isn't anything designed to really take control over
your network of systems. To be fair, Red Hat doesn't have anything like
this, either. Their "Satellite Server" product is good for initial
builds and for updates, but falls short on the management aspects.
Novell's offerings are probably the best examples of what we really
need. Of course, most people would be happy with even rudimentary
management capabilities, as currently, we have none. We don't have any
form of update server. You have to build one yourself. We don't have
any form of "jump-start" or "kickstart" for rapid automated deployments.
You have to build one yourself. Now, we do have the Gentoo Linux
Installer project, which has this as one of its goals, so we will have
this component at some point in the future.

Last, there's the "Our servers just went belly up, and I want to call up
someone on the phone and give them a piece of my mind" issue which gives
managers a warm, fuzzy feeling, that we cannot provide. If something
goes wrong with RHEL or SLES, you call up Red Hat or Novell and get them
to work on the problem. If something goes wrong with Gentoo, you hop on
IRC, or file a bug, and hope that somebody can help you in the time you
need it done in, and not in 3 weeks when the maintaining developer gets
back from his tour of the African Dung Beetle in it's own environment.
Liability is a big selling point for the enterprise.

I work for a telecommunications company, and we run Linux and Solaris.
For our Linux, we run Red Hat, even though they have, on staff, one of
the people that understands Gentoo's deployment capabilities better than
most, via catalyst and the GLI. Why do we run Red Hat? When something
breaks with one of their packages, we call them, and expect them to fix
it. It is also a name that gives upper management the warm fuzzies.
Gentoo has neither the brand recognition, nor the support capabilities
to be a good sale to management.

I'm not denying that Gentoo is very powerful, flexible, and gives the
power back to the administrator, but that doesn't make it enterprise
ready or friendly. A few success stories from a few people isn't much
to support the position, when we are lacking in so many simple and
obvious ways. Remember, if a manager can think of multiple ways to
knock down the use of Gentoo, like the ones I've given above, what are
you going to do to refute his claims?

I want to see Gentoo as an enterprise-capable distribution myself, but I
also understand that it is a long, hard road ahead of us, and there will
still be some things we simply cannot provide as a community
distribution, which was my reasoning behind the "fork". There would
need to be an entity that is responsible, liable, if you will, when
something goes wrong, and that has the manpower and resources to fix it.

--
Chris Gianelloni
Release Engineering - Strategic Lead/QA Manager
Games - Developer
Gentoo Linux

>On Thu, 2005-08-04 at 09:04 -0400, Eric Brown wrote:
>>
>> Interesting thread. I have used Gentoo in enterprise situations very
>> successfully, and I think the whole QA/live-tree argument is moot. In
>> an enterprise environment, you might have a backup/testing machine to
>> run your updates on first before they went live. You also wouldn't run
>> new packages unless they passed your own QA tests first.
>>
>> Given the incredible flexibility of portage to support local mirrors,
>> binary package preparation, and localized versions of packages
>> (portdir_overlay), I would say that Gentoo is quite a contender in the
>> enterprise environment.
>>
>> Perhaps we need some enterprise documentation to help people realize the
>> full potential of portage?
>
>I think you've missed some of the idea of "enterprise" support. See,
>for starters, every person shouldn't have to create their own
>implementation of everything. Perhaps a better solution would be a
>package that when installed, builds up a local mirror, a binary package
>repository (with revision control), an automated update system, a system
>for updating rolled out machines without forcing the use of etc-update
>on each machine, a slower moving stable tree capable of being certified
>with applications, and most likely a phone number of someone to call
>when the shit hits the fan.

Every business application of Gentoo I've done has been different. I don't think I could generalize my needs into a single ebuild. Although generally I have used rsyncd and apache, I never use them in the same way. What's so hard about using the default rsyncd config, and adding distfiles to your apache document root? (what 90% of people would use).

About automating updates and etc-update: you can rsync your config file sometimes and just bypass all of the portage stuff. You could mount some config dirs over nfs even. You could even remove config_protect on some dirs and roll your own custom packages.

About a slower moving portage tree for enterprise users: Great idea, I think there's a GLEP about that. I think it's best handled by third parties who can spend the money/man power on that kind of QA.

This brings me to your last point about calling someone when there are problems: There are companies that provide Linux services, even Gentoo specific services. Some of these companies might even provide enterprise-grade portage mirrors with support for the packages they maintain there.

>
>While I will completely agree that Gentoo *can* be used in the
>enterprise successfully, that does not make it "enterprise-ready", in
>any sense. Many people also seem to misunderstand the concept of
>"enterprise" when we are referring to it in this manner. We don't mean
>"I'm running it on 10 servers in production" or anything like that. We
>mean "I'm running this as our production platform for Linux services
>across our entire enterprise, that could be hundreds or even thousands
>of servers" instead. While it might be possible to maintain a handful
>of Gentoo servers, it is next to impossible to maintain an army of them,
>without spending significant up-front manpower to design, test, and
>implement your own set of management tools. Gentoo has no real
>management tools. There are a few here and there that do specific
>tasks, but there isn't anything designed to really take control over
>your network of systems. To be fair, Red Hat doesn't have anything like
>this, either. Their "Satellite Server" product is good for initial
>builds and for updates, but falls short on the management aspects.
>Novell's offerings are probably the best examples of what we really
>need. Of course, most people would be happy with even rudimentary
>management capabilities, as currently, we have none. We don't have any
>form of update server. You have to build one yourself. We don't have
>any form of "jump-start" or "kickstart" for rapid automated deployments.
>You have to build one yourself. Now, we do have the Gentoo Linux
>Installer project, which has this as one of its goals, so we will have
>this component at some point in the future.

I'm sorry, I never ran 1000 Gentoo machines in production like that, I thought enterprise meant this (answers.com):

en·ter·prise (ĕn'tər-prīz') pronunciation
n.

1. An undertaking, especially one of some scope, complication, and risk.
2. A business organization.
3. Industrious, systematic activity, especially when directed toward profit: Private enterprise is basic to capitalism.
4. Willingness to undertake new ventures; initiative: “Through want of enterprise and faith men are where they are, buying and selling, and spending their lives like serfs” (Henry David Thoreau).

Doesn't this just go to show that in business, everyone wants something different from Gentoo? What does Novell offer to manage large numbers of linux boxen? Are you sure projects like OpenMosix don't have tools you could use to manage such a large number of machines?

Maybe we can't rely on portage so much in scenarios where replication is the goal...

>
>Last, there's the "Our servers just went belly up, and I want to call up
>someone on the phone and give them a piece of my mind" issue which gives
>managers a warm, fuzzy feeling, that we cannot provide. If something
>goes wrong with RHEL or SLES, you call up Red Hat or Novell and get them
>to work on the problem. If something goes wrong with Gentoo, you hop on
>IRC, or file a bug, and hope that somebody can help you in the time you
>need it done in, and not in 3 weeks when the maintaining developer gets
>back from his tour of the African Dung Beetle in it's own environment.
>Liability is a big selling point for the enterprise.

Of course, I'm sure you can't call Red Hat or Suse if you don't pay them some way or another. If you don't pay, could you find such a supportive community on IRC or in forums? (I think not)

There are lots of Gentoo gurus who will gladly accept your money to help you fix your problems =)

>
>I work for a telecommunications company, and we run Linux and Solaris.
>For our Linux, we run Red Hat, even though they have, on staff, one of
>the people that understands Gentoo's deployment capabilities better than
>most, via catalyst and the GLI. Why do we run Red Hat? When something
>breaks with one of their packages, we call them, and expect them to fix
>it. It is also a name that gives upper management the warm fuzzies.
>Gentoo has neither the brand recognition, nor the support capabilities
>to be a good sale to management.

Sounds like FUD to me. Use what works for you though. If you managers really need that big brand name with that 800 number, that's just how you'll have to do it. Perhaps I've been lucky at the places I work where I am simply responsible myself for keeping certain systems up, and that's that.

>
>I'm not denying that Gentoo is very powerful, flexible, and gives the
>power back to the administrator, but that doesn't make it enterprise
>ready or friendly. A few success stories from a few people isn't much
>to support the position, when we are lacking in so many simple and
>obvious ways. Remember, if a manager can think of multiple ways to
>knock down the use of Gentoo, like the ones I've given above, what are
>you going to do to refute his claims?

I wouldn't refute my manager's claims if he controlled my paycheck :D
But in my professional opinion, as someone who has had to manage up to 10 Linux servers at a time, Gentoo was by far the best choice. That's what I'd say to my manager if he ever asked me why I want to use Gentoo.

>
>I want to see Gentoo as an enterprise-capable distribution myself, but I
>also understand that it is a long, hard road ahead of us, and there will
>still be some things we simply cannot provide as a community
>distribution, which was my reasoning behind the "fork". There would
>need to be an entity that is responsible, liable, if you will, when
>something goes wrong, and that has the manpower and resources to fix it.
>

Ever consider founding a company that specializes in Enterprise Gentoo deployment and support? It sounds like there could be quite a demand for such services :)

>--
>Chris Gianelloni
>Release Engineering - Strategic Lead/QA Manager
>Games - Developer
>Gentoo Linux

--
gentoo-dev@gentoo.org mailing list

On Thu, 2005-08-04 at 11:48 -0400, Eric Brown wrote:
> Every business application of Gentoo I've done has been different. I don't think I could generalize my needs into a single ebuild. Although generally I have used rsyncd and apache, I never use them in the same way. What's so hard about using the default rsyncd config, and adding distfiles to your apache document root? (what 90% of people would use).

You completely missed the management aspect here. I'm talking about
some form of actual enterprise-ready management framework for
controlling a set of Gentoo servers centrally from deployment to
maintenance and upgrades.

> About automating updates and etc-update: you can rsync your config file sometimes and just bypass all of the portage stuff. You could mount some config dirs over nfs even. You could even remove config_protect on some dirs and roll your own custom packages.

You can... You can... You can...

All I heard here was a bunch of excuses about how a person can take the
time to implement something that's been implemented by countless other
people, because Gentoo does not provide a framework for doing this. The
whole idea of being enterprise-ready is having a drop-in solution that
works right off the bat, with minimal to no configuration for basic
services. All of your solutions requires manpower to accomplish that
not every enterprise can afford to spend. Once again, this is why
Gentoo is currently not used in these situations.

> About a slower moving portage tree for enterprise users: Great idea, I think there's a GLEP about that. I think it's best handled by third parties who can spend the money/man power on that kind of QA.

Yes, there is a GLEP about this. This is also the first step to being
able to provide any level of enterprise-readiness. You simply cannot
tell someone to upgrade glibc to some new version if something is wrong
with the current one. They want a patch for the current one. Think
bug-fixes only with absolutely zero new features between whatever form
of releases are created.

> This brings me to your last point about calling someone when there are problems: There are companies that provide Linux services, even Gentoo specific services. Some of these companies might even provide enterprise-grade portage mirrors with support for the packages they maintain there.

I don't think I would stake my company's infrastructure on the reliance
on Bob and Joe's Gentoo Support Hotline, sorry. Not to mention you
haven't actually given a single example of someone who can provide this
level of enterprise support. There's a reason why you haven't given an
example. None exists.

> I'm sorry, I never ran 1000 Gentoo machines in production like that, I thought enterprise meant this (answers.com):
>
> en·ter·prise (ĕn'tər-prīz') pronunciation
> n.
>
> 1. An undertaking, especially one of some scope, complication, and risk.
> 2. A business organization.
> 3. Industrious, systematic activity, especially when directed toward profit: Private enterprise is basic to capitalism.
> 4. Willingness to undertake new ventures; initiative: “Through want of enterprise and faith men are where they are, buying and selling, and spending their lives like serfs” (Henry David Thoreau).

Wow. A dictionary definition that is completely out of context and
doesn't account for the word enterprise being used as a technical
representation.

I've got a few "enterprise" definitions for you, too.

The Enterprise type is a two-man hiking sailing dinghy with a
distinctive blue sail and no spinnaker. Despite being one of the older
classes of dinghies, it remains popular and well used for both cruising
and racing. It has a combination of stability, size and power which
contiues to appeal to all ages, and to sailing schools.

...or...

Star Trek: Enterprise is a science fiction television series set in the
Star Trek universe.(Until the third season its title was simply
Enterprise, and it is often abbreviated as ST:ENT or ENT).The series
follows the adventures of the crew of the Enterprise (NX-01), the first
human interstellar ship that can achieve Warp 5.Enterprise premiered in
the United States on September 26, 2001, and is presently in its fourth,
and final, season.

...though the one I am looking for, and the one that fits the scope of
this conversation is this one:

In the computer industry, an enterprise is an organization that uses
computers. In practice, the term is applied much more often to larger
organizations than smaller ones.

We are using this in practice. Therefore, we are speaking of large
organizations, and not just *any* organization.

> Doesn't this just go to show that in business, everyone wants something different from Gentoo? What does Novell offer to manage large numbers of linux boxen? Are you sure projects like OpenMosix don't have tools you could use to manage such a large number of machines?

Not really. It does go to show that you'll go to great lengths to try
to prove a point, even when you're grasping at straws. Everybody
wanting something from Gentoo has zero to do with the single goal of
providing an enterprise-ready version of Gentoo, which is the topic that
we are discussing.

Novell has several tools, that when used in combination, form a cohesive
framework for deploying, managing, and upgrading systems. What's even
better, is it isn't just limited to Linux, but I'll leave that as an
exercise for the readers... ;] Novell uses a combination of these
components, such as eDirectory and ZENworks, to form this framework.

> Maybe we can't rely on portage so much in scenarios where replication is the goal...

Portage really has nothing to do with deployment or management. In
fact, the only thing it really does is package management, which is
probably why it is called a package management tool, and not an
enterprise resource manager.

> Of course, I'm sure you can't call Red Hat or Suse if you don't pay them some way or another. If you don't pay, could you find such a supportive community on IRC or in forums? (I think not)

Of course not, nobody ever claimed that you could, nor implied it.

Nobody has ever mentioned *anything* about our community, because it has
exactly zero value in the enterprise, especially as a support medium.
Try telling some upper manager that he needs to download an IRC client,
then connect to irc.freenode.net, then join #gentoo and ask his question
in the channel, along with all the other noise, then hope that someone
answers his question. Try explaining to him that this is the standard
form of support for your deployment, and watch as you get laughed out of
the office and off to the unemployment line.

> There are lots of Gentoo gurus who will gladly accept your money to help you fix your problems =)

Sorry, but I'm not calling vapier and listening to him tell me about his
wang when I have an issue with LDAP replication that I need resolved
immediately as my customers are starting to call in quite irate. I
would want a company with a dedicated staff on-hand to support my needs
that is available when I need them.

> >I work for a telecommunications company, and we run Linux and Solaris.
> >For our Linux, we run Red Hat, even though they have, on staff, one of
> >the people that understands Gentoo's deployment capabilities better than
> >most, via catalyst and the GLI. Why do we run Red Hat? When something
> >breaks with one of their packages, we call them, and expect them to fix
> >it. It is also a name that gives upper management the warm fuzzies.
> >Gentoo has neither the brand recognition, nor the support capabilities
> >to be a good sale to management.
>
> Sounds like FUD to me. Use what works for you though. If you managers really need that big brand name with that 800 number, that's just how you'll have to do it. Perhaps I've been lucky at the places I work where I am simply responsible myself for keeping certain systems up, and that's that.

Ooohh... FUD. Amazing how someone telling the truth is immediately
labeled as FUD, especially when it goes against the misconceptions and
bold-faced lies that someone that is a bit overzealous in his devotion
is trying to push. My managers are normal managers, just like you would
find all over the enterprise. They want to know about risks and costs,
and are damn well and ready to pay for support if it means that their
ass won't be on the line when something breaks. It is starting to sound
to me that your idea of "enterprise" is "production" when the two are
far different. Think of enterprise as an order of magnitude or more
greater than production. If you're thinking 10 servers, think 100, or
1000.

> I wouldn't refute my manager's claims if he controlled my paycheck :D

Haven't you ever been in a meeting? You know, where they ask your
opinion. Are you a drone? Do you just do everything that you're told
and question nothing?

If so, then you're *perfect* for a middle manager position in any large
enterprise corporation. Start puckering your lips now, it's a position
you'll get used to quite quickly. For the rest of us out here, we
actually give our managers our opinions, and when we're trying to use a
product, we fight for it.

> But in my professional opinion, as someone who has had to manage up to 10 Linux servers at a time, Gentoo was by far the best choice. That's what I'd say to my manager if he ever asked me why I want to use Gentoo.

I don't mean to offend you, but 10 servers is nothing like an enterprise
deployment. I have more than 10 servers at my house, and I surely don't
consider that any kind of enterprise. Instead, think about managing
1000 geographically dispersed servers. This is more the scale that
we're talking about, not the local Baptist church's IT needs.

Gentoo is currently unmaintainable at this scale without a significant
investment in infrastructure and development to make the system
manageable. Think of it this way, if I can pay 4 developers to work on
this project for 6 months, and each developer makes $50,000 a year, or I
can pay Novell $100,000 and have the system in place in 2 weeks, which
do you think I would do? This is the exact reason why Gentoo is not
used in the enterprise more. There is simply too high a barrier of
entry into making a usable and manageable Gentoo deployment.

> Ever consider founding a company that specializes in Enterprise Gentoo deployment and support? It sounds like there could be quite a demand for such services :)

Yeah, I considered it. Then I came down from the acid trip and realized
how hateful it would be. I'm sorry, but I definitely don't want to
spend my time being restricted to working only on the problems that some
large corporation deemed was important to them, being harassed and
stressed to meet their deadlines. I work on Gentoo because I enjoy it,
not because I gain from it financially. I have no problem adding
enterprise features or improving enterprise support, but I get enough
stress at my day job, why should I get even more from my hobby?

--
Chris Gianelloni
Release Engineering - Strategic Lead/QA Manager
Games - Developer
Gentoo Linux

050804 Chris Gianelloni wrote:
-- long interesting account of life in the enterprise snipped --
> I want to see Gentoo as an enterprise-capable distribution myself,
> but I also understand that it is a long, hard road ahead of us
> and there will still be things we cannot provide as a community distro.
> There would need to be an entity responsible when something goes wrong
> and that has the manpower and resources to fix it.

There's no way a volunteer organisation like Gentoo could undertake that.
What would be essential is a company with capital invested
& probably an insurance policy somewhere in the background,
which employs Gentoo-knowledgeable staff to build & fix systems.
It would probably have its own mirror with a selection of Gentoo packages,
which it is prepared to guarantee as reliable & safe to use,
& would develop all the enterprise-level management tools you describe.
Hopefully, it would give something back to the underlying volunteer Gentoo
by way of free staff time & some tools all of us might benefit from.

The first step is a visit to your friendly neighbourhood bank manager (smile).

--
========================,,============================================
SUPPORT ___________//___, Philip Webb : purslow@chass.utoronto.ca
ELECTRIC /] [] [] [] [] []| Centre for Urban & Community Studies
TRANSIT `-O----------O---' University of Toronto
--
gentoo-dev@gentoo.org mailing list

Long one kiddies... responses inlined, bit more interested in
discussion of what's required/desired then "your definition of
enterprise sucks"... (throws on the flamesuit)...


On Thu, Aug 04, 2005 at 02:35:08PM -0400, Chris Gianelloni wrote:
> On Thu, 2005-08-04 at 11:48 -0400, Eric Brown wrote:
> > Every business application of Gentoo I've done has been different. I don't think I could generalize my needs into a single ebuild. Although generally I have used rsyncd and apache, I never use them in the same way. What's so hard about using the default rsyncd config, and adding distfiles to your apache document root? (what 90% of people would use).
>
> You completely missed the management aspect here. I'm talking about
> some form of actual enterprise-ready management framework for
> controlling a set of Gentoo servers centrally from deployment to
> maintenance and upgrades.

Elaborate on what you explicitly want out of portage please- the
domain concept (aside from being useful design wise) *should* allow
groupping of boxes (groupping of domains really) behind it, so you can
effectively have a set of boxes, pushing changes to each.

Mind you no code written, but current design is intended to allow
remote chunks to be swapped in/out of portagelib on the fly
(including the actual portage configuration).

> > About automating updates and etc-update: you can rsync your config file sometimes and just bypass all of the portage stuff. You could mount some config dirs over nfs even. You could even remove config_protect on some dirs and roll your own custom packages.
>
> You can... You can... You can...
>
> All I heard here was a bunch of excuses about how a person can take the
> time to implement something that's been implemented by countless other
> people, because Gentoo does not provide a framework for doing this. The
> whole idea of being enterprise-ready is having a drop-in solution that
> works right off the bat, with minimal to no configuration for basic
> services. All of your solutions requires manpower to accomplish that
> not every enterprise can afford to spend. Once again, this is why
> Gentoo is currently not used in these situations.

Better angle of discussion rather then "we aren't there yet" is the
specifics of what is needed to *get* there in peoples opinion.

It's not an overnight thing, glep19 (stable portage tree) addresses a
chunk of concerns when/if it's implemented, but I'm a bit more
interested in the the other tools people desire alongside.

Re: a drop-in solution, considering that gentoo is effectively all
over the map (seriously, look at the tree), define the profile for the
drop-in; drop-in ftp, drop-in web server, drop-in mosix node... etc.

Specifics...

Hell, I have yet to see what I would define as a proper solution for
config manamagent for N gentoo boxes. NFS solution possibly, but that
seems a bit hackish to me.

> > This brings me to your last point about calling someone when there are problems: There are companies that provide Linux services, even Gentoo specific services. Some of these companies might even provide enterprise-grade portage mirrors with support for the packages they maintain there.
>
> I don't think I would stake my company's infrastructure on the reliance
> on Bob and Joe's Gentoo Support Hotline, sorry. Not to mention you
> haven't actually given a single example of someone who can provide this
> level of enterprise support. There's a reason why you haven't given an
> example. None exists.

Moot point frankly, considering we're all volunteers; someone
*could* get off their butts and start up an attempt to provide hand
holding (effectively what you're coloring the management arg as)
services, but even if they did, the followup arg would be that you
can't yet trust this new support company, because they're new.
Etc.

Basically, we don't have control over that portion, so... what
can be mangled that we *do* have control over, and has an effect?


>
> [snip]
> In the computer industry, an enterprise is an organization that uses
> computers. In practice, the term is applied much more often to larger
> organizations than smaller ones.
>
> We are using this in practice. Therefore, we are speaking of large
> organizations, and not just *any* organization.

That's a really crappy description, rather nebulous. :)
And... nobody probably cares about loose definitions, 'cause loose
definitions are moving targets. Again, specific suggestions/requests
would rock.

Mentioned management tools, well, get into specifics; pxe network
installs/imaging? Single tree/cache for N servers? Ability to push
updates out to a specific box, or set of servers? Integration of
portage contents db with IDS tools?


> Novell has several tools, that when used in combination, form a cohesive
> framework for deploying, managing, and upgrading systems. What's even
> better, is it isn't just limited to Linux, but I'll leave that as an
> exercise for the readers... ;] Novell uses a combination of these
> components, such as eDirectory and ZENworks, to form this framework.
>
> > Maybe we can't rely on portage so much in scenarios where replication is the goal...
>
> Portage really has nothing to do with deployment or management. In
> fact, the only thing it really does is package management, which is
> probably why it is called a package management tool, and not an
> enterprise resource manager.

Any enterprise resource manager is going to have to fool with pkgs at
some point- that's my line of interest in this.


> Sorry, but I'm not calling vapier and listening to him tell me about his
> wang when I have an issue with LDAP replication that I need resolved
> immediately as my customers are starting to call in quite irate. I
> would want a company with a dedicated staff on-hand to support my needs
> that is available when I need them.

See bit above about being (effectively) outside of our control (a
niche someone with a brain could exploit also).

Besides, it would be pointless to call vapier to hear wang tales; just
stick your head in #gentoo-dev, you get them for free there...

> > I wouldn't refute my manager's claims if he controlled my paycheck :D
>
> Haven't you ever been in a meeting? You know, where they ask your
> opinion. Are you a drone? Do you just do everything that you're told
> and question nothing?
[snip]

If it's going to descend into a bit of flaming (has it already?), I'll
gladly go back to poking at portage- I'd rather see something constructive out of this,
you obviously see areas where gentoo isn't up to snuff (as do I)...
so... what would be useful to implement *now*, what would be required
*down the line*, etc.

Mind you, our hands aren't bound, their are areas that work can be
done in.


> Gentoo is currently unmaintainable at this scale without a significant
> investment in infrastructure and development to make the system
> manageable. Think of it this way, if I can pay 4 developers to work on
> this project for 6 months, and each developer makes $50,000 a year, or I
> can pay Novell $100,000 and have the system in place in 2 weeks, which
> do you think I would do? This is the exact reason why Gentoo is not
> used in the enterprise more. There is simply too high a barrier of
> entry into making a usable and manageable Gentoo deployment.
Or, you find a collection of trained coder monkeys who are oddballs
who might have an interest in implementing this stuff on their own
time, and try to nudge them in the correct direction; no, this isn't a
solution, but again, having an ent. solution (going by your statement)
isn't going to be funded by anyone.

Ok, fine. So it goes.

Meanwhile, reiterating my point, I'd rather see a discussion of what
people *want* in the way of tools, then "we aren't there yet".
Generally known that you have to roll your own somewhat for tools,
well, would rather know what people want then see then another round
of kicking the dead horse.


~harring

I think Brian is right, we should stick to being constructive.

Let's start an enterprise project on Gentoo.org
Goals:
1) provide documentation on existing tools and practices for
business/enterprise users.
2) try to enhance the set of tools to build a comprehensive
framework that makes it easy to use and deploy Gentoo in a
business/enterprise environment.
3) provide information so that concerned parties can find
companies that specialize in Gentoo deployment/management/support.


Any ideas?


--Eric

--
gentoo-dev@gentoo.org mailing list