Re: [gentoo-server] Server Packages for Gentoo

[Robert Bridge <robert@robbieab.com>]

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On Wed, 1 Oct 2008 11:55:21 +0100
"Kerin Millar" <kerframil@gmail.com> wrote:

> Well, this post turned out to be a lot longer than I had anticipated.
> But I've seen so many comments that allude to Gentoo somehow being
> unfit for purpose because it doesn't freeze off a so-called "stable"
> tree so many times that, frankly, I get fed up with it and figured
> that something had to be said. Gentoo, whilst certainly having its
> fair share of foibles, doesn't get enough credit for the things that
> it does well and the things that it does right. If one doesn't like
> the way that Gentoo does things then there are surely other distros
> out there that will meet one's expectations, such as they are.

Right, imagine a live server getting hit by the expat problem, or a
major gcc/glibc change? They hurt, they seriously hurt.

That's what the "static package" people are referring to. A server that
can be set up, and once running should need minimal updating, for
security reasons. You can't do that safely in Gentoo.

Some people are happy with regularly changing packages, restarting
services every month because a new version of the server is in tree,
dealing with the breakage induced by things like python upgrades, bash
upgrades, portage upgrades, gcc upgrades, ... 

But for a 24/7 uptime on a high load server, most people consider those
to be unacceptable. Now Gentoo can be got to not do those, but as
anyone will tell you, updating a Gentoo box after a year is painful,
and when you have to update to cover a critical security hole? Now try updating a Debian box after a year?

Don't mistake one awkward piece of software which is not supported in
the other distros for the general properties of those distros. Gentoo
is good for tweaking, it's good for doing "Your own thing", that does
not make it automagically better than Debian or RHEL, or SLES in the
high-stability stakes. And, sorry to say this, one nice anecdote
doesn't either.

YMMV
Rob.


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