[WBEL-users] Wondering about RedHat

[John Hinton]

I have been running RedHat (non-graphical apache/mail/bind/mysql server 
setups) since version 5.1 or so. I've done up2date for years and only 
ever had one issue where suddenly mysql could not be run from an 
offserver client. All in all, pretty minor considering the number of 
updates over the years. My whole reason for staying with RedHat was this 
track record. Yes, I could be more of a tech head and 'research' ever 
package before installing, but gee, I just don't seem to have the time 
to do that.

That was then... this is now....

So, we do the updates and suddenly bind is totally broken, I'm getting 
those makewhatis errors via cron and email... It seems that the quality 
control has badly degraded. How on earth can you send something out that 
breaks bind?

So, I'm left wondering if their 'new' business model is creating some 
'holes'. Perhaps Fedora Core is not in fact really feeding a good 
product over the the EL section? This is just all interesting to wonder 
about. What has changed and why are they suddenly now putting out so 
many bad packages?

I'm really disturbed at this trend. I used to feel pretty darned secure 
about running up2date at any time... now???? Here I am on what is 
supposed to be the flagship product, and I now feel as though I need a 
'test' server, upon which I can attempt to precisely mirror the packages 
installed on my more loaded machines, in order to see what's broken this 
time.

Sorry to be venting here, but gee, what's going to be broken next time? 
The kernel? PAM? Something that will take my server down and leave me 
with no method to even get into it? I'm concerned.

I would like everyone to know that I am totally directing this at RedHat 
and not Whitebox, as Whitebox does appear to be following exactly as 
they should, right down to the same broken packages.

I'm left wondering though, if perhaps on these quarterly updates, if 
maybe we should create a 'beta' area, for us to test on, before throwing 
us into the den of lions, where 'stuff dies'? Maybe consider putting the 
security updates where they should be and the quarterly updates 
elsewhere, to protect us from the RedHat blunders. Or maybe even have a 
repository directory for only the security updates where we could set 
up2date to look only there and then do mass updating at other times. 
Maybe this could be done on only one repository or something... I 
know.... this is a pipe dream, but gee, for now I'd personally like to 
skip all this broken stuff and feel secure about updates again. Give 
RedHat time to put out the patched rpms for the broken stuff before 
updating. This could potentially make Whitebox more conservative, which 
it already is due to the slight time delay on updates, but even better 
than its parent.

I'm just happy for this list, where the fixes are generally posted, so 
if one does run a bit behind on mission critical servers, the fixes are 
generally posted before I get around to doing my updates.

Just food for thought....

Thanks for Whitebox,
John Hinton <who is now very happy he's not on a 'beta' EL subscription 
and is looking at these SUSE DVDs laying here>