[GLLUG] What is Enterprise Desktop Linux?

[Richard Houser]

Basically, if you are running open source stuff, avoid enterprise distros.
If you want to match RHEL in binary compatibility, do Centos.  If your work
requires you to pay someone for the OS, do RHEL.

With RHEL, I run into lots of snags and occasionally security
vulnerabilities due to outdates libraries (after accounting for back
ports).  It's really more of a host for badly built commercial software
that misuses dynamic libraries, since Linux already has a stable API since
1.0.  Applications that require specific libraries are expected to
statically link or ship those libraries.  If you run modern code, stick to
a distro built on a current codebase.
On Aug 2, 2013 8:33 PM, "Jonathan Billings" <billings at negate.org> wrote:

> On Aug 2, 2013, at 8:16 PM, "Bert W. Carrier Jr." <bertcarrier at gmail.com>
> wrote:
> > What is Enterprise Desktop Linux, and is it for me?  I've been reading
> about Red Hat and Suse Enterprise versions.  Does this mean that they come
> with a support plan that you pay for?
> >
> > Is there other differences in the software?
>
> I can't speak for the differences between SuSE and RHEL, since I haven't
> use SuSE that much.
>
> When you buy Red Hat Enterprise Linux subscriptions, you're paying for
> software updates and support from Red Hat.  If you don't want to get any
> commercial support nor pay for subscriptions, you can go with CentOS, which
> is a free rebuild of RHEL minus some minor intellectual property.  CentOS
> has community support, like many other distros, but benefits from Red Hat's
> stable API, testing and security fixes.  You can get an Evaluation
> subscription for RHEL fairly inexpensively, and there are educational
> discounts.
>
> I support RHEL in my job, and one of the reasons why we use RHEL on the
> desktop is because it has a very stable API.  This means that 3rd party
> vendors -- for us, mostly engineering and scientific software vendors, can
> provide a version of their software that can run on it.  What I mean by a
> 'stable API' is that software that ran on RHEL 6 when 6.0 came out should
> continue to run on the latest release, RHEL 6.4.  This also means that the
> version of many of the core libraries used in RHEL will appear rather
> dated, the longer the lifetime of the OS, and RHEL6 will be supported until
> 2020.  Red Hat backports security fixes to all the software they support,
> so you can focus on providing a stable platform for your user base.
>
> This model works great if you have a working platform that you don't want
> to mess with with every incremental release of every software dependency.
>  It doesn't work very well if you want to run the latest, greatest version
> some software project that requires the latest, greatest version of ten
> dependencies.  Also, some vendors (Google, for example) are so focused on
> Ubuntu and friends that they cease to support anything that hasn't been
> released in the past 6 months.
>
>
> --
> Jonathan Billings <billings at negate.org>
>
>
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