On Fri, 4 Sep 2009, Andrew Joakimsen wrote:
About the name. I don't know. But probably it would be best to avoid using the terms "SLES" "SuSE," etc.
That really is what I want to try and do. I really would like an indirect method of link to SUSE. Green is our openSUSE color's but really has other meaning that really out shines SUSE.
In terms of the software product itself, I think it would be inefficient to create a new distribution. What I am getting at is ideally we would be a clone of CentOS but based on SLE. Thus, for example, we can achieve binary compatibility with software for SLES. I don't think the prominence of RHEL would be what it is without CentOS, IMO the Linux market for commercial software would have been more segmented.
I personally lean in the openSLE camp. But there has been some very compelling arguments about openSUSE LTS. The big one being the great community we have. The way it appears that openSUSE get's security fixes before SLES. I am not saying openSUSE does. Just the appearence. This is fuel by the great support methods openSUSE has developed. It has a very strong case because of it. I think that is why my tally of people having expressed an opinion is 18,19 openSUSE LTS,openSLES. With 4-8 people that want to get going on openSLES right now. What I see as the biggest problem with openSUSE LTS is who will do all the back porting of Security fixes. It is a lot easier to remove and replace copyright, Trademark, branding, ... for a binary compitable OS. That is why it is so hard to make a decission. one vote more for openSLES is not enough to show clear consenous in a direction. We will make a descision after the openSUSE conference.
Is Novell really against an free (as in beer) clone of SLES, and would they do anything to stop us? What are the legal considerations, namely: what parts of SLES are not distributed under the GPL or other open licenses? How much work would it take to build such a distribution?
Red Hat makes it extremely clear on what to remove to be acceptable and avoid any legal entanglements. We would have to do this on our own. We do not have any pockets, deep or other wise should we end up on the wrong side of Novell. I have had a lawyer look over things, an his opinion was the same as you stated above, but he clearly pointed out that he does not specialist in the area and what he has said really is just his opinion. He said we really need someone who specializes in the area to make a review of the guidelines and product. Right now we do not have it. That is one of the issues with openSLE. It would be really easy to end up on the wrong side of Novell. This is just some of the things that have been presented. I have received some support from openSUSE management. Those working on this initiative have talked with the openSUSE management and we really do not see any issues with them. Also it seems that the SLES management is begining to look at the initiative in a positive light. What I have probems with is the higher levels o Novell. I have heard them say that this would be a possible thret. And would have legal watch it very closly. This is not a direct quote more a reading of what was being said. So, that is why we are taking things in a set order. That is also why it is taking so long. We have to have our guidelines fully developed and rpmlint rules in place where possible to make the initiative successful. We are right now doing the guidelines. They are in scope of what would be needed for either direction at the moment. A legal review of the guidelines will be needed. Then we should be able to start on the coding.
Further reading:
http://linux.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=07/11/04/1331247 http://dag.wieers.com/blog/why-is-there-no-open-source-sles
Thanks I have read them.
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Boyd Gerber