Will Woods, the new test lead for the Fedora Project, has only been in his position a few weeks, but already he has a clear goal in mind. Whenever Fedora is mentioned on Slashdot, he notes, “There’s always someone who will comment that Fedora is just Red Hat’s beta test for Red Hat Enterprise Linux. It’s not true, and I want no one to have cause to say that ever again.”
New Fedora Test Lead Begins Work
29 Comments
2006-07-21 1:52 am
rhavyn
Oh yea, I’m totally tripped up. I mean, it’s not like that link was posted in the bug you linked to. But, since you bring it up, I now deem you a troll, and a really bad one at that.
2006-07-21 2:34 am
sbergman27
I would just like to confirm that 23 months of resistance to adding basic sanity checking to prevent database corruption to the package manager is a perfectly acceptable QA policy in your book.
And so is failing to respond for 5 months as long as another distro has the same problem.
And failing to ever respond at all is OK as long as not *all* radeon users are locked at 640×480.
I’d just like you to sign off on that.
2006-07-21 6:18 am
kernelpanicked
Well looks like rhavyn got tired of trying to explain this to you and wrote you off. But I’ve now read this entire comment thread and just can’t not reply to this last outburst of stupidity that you just had to post.
“I would just like to confirm that 23 months of resistance to adding basic sanity checking to prevent database corruption to the package manager is a perfectly acceptable QA policy in your book.”
This is not about basic sanity testing, it’s a freakin PEBKAC error. This numbnut mounted his /usr partition read-only and then tried to run a system update. What the hell do you expect to happen? the developer, in this case, gave this guy much more of his time than I damn well would have. Not only that, but at this point it has gone from a bug report status to a forum post “help request” but this guy doesn’t have enough sense to ask politely for help. No, he has to go ranting on about how the system should do every little bit of thinking for him and proceeds to verbally attack the developer.
“And so is failing to respond for 5 months as long as another distro has the same problem.”
I don’t know enough about the entire situation on this one to comment extensively, but it could very likely have been a duplicated report that got glossed over instead of thrown in the bit bucket for all we know.
“And failing to ever respond at all is OK as long as not *all* radeon users are locked at 640×480.”
You are absolutely right. Not *all* radeon cards had this problem. Only the ones in the posession of retards who can’t figure out how to configure X. You seem to have a problem seeing the difference between a bug report and a support request. the first, if legitimate, should be prioritized and fixed accordingly. As for the second, the Fedora developers/community have no obligation to offer free technical support. Many do offer assistance, but there is a time and a place for it. the bug list ain’t it.
“I’d just like you to sign off on that.”
You really are an arrogant little troll. there’s a place for guys like you. http://slashdot.org. Before you go on let me go ahead and spell this out for you. I’m not a “fedora defender”. Hell I’m not even a Linux user. I’m an OpenBSD user, and I’d absolutely love to see you bring one of these rants to [email protected]. Let’s just say they would be ever so slightly less receptive to your comments than the fine folks here at OSAlert.
Edited 2006-07-21 06:18
2006-07-21 6:39 am
rhavyn
I would just like to confirm that 23 months of resistance to adding basic sanity checking to prevent database corruption to the package manager is a perfectly acceptable QA policy in your book.
As explained by multiple people in the bug report, the RPM database was not corrupt. If the user had asked I’m sure they would have explained how add the entries for the packages that had been “removed.” But the user didn’t, they called people names and generally annoyed the developer.
And, FYI, if the software works according to the spec, it does pass QA in my book since that is the definition of passing QA.
And so is failing to respond for 5 months as long as another distro has the same problem.
So it’s your opinion that Red Hat should personally maintain all of the packages they distribute? Do you expect the same from every distro? Because the developer was quite clear in the bug, he didn’t have time to deal with it and it was an upstream bug. Of course, your simply dodging the point which is that that bug report does not in any way indicate that Red Hat treats Fedora like it’s a “perpetual beta.” Or, it supports the assertion that all distos treat their distro like it’s a “perpetual beta.” And, FYI, I can assure you that even with an RHEL support contract you would have ended up with the same response on that bug, it’s an upstream issue and it’ll get dealt with later.
And failing to ever respond at all is OK as long as not *all* radeon users are locked at 640×480.
Ah, now I’m sure you just have a reading comprehension problem. I say 1%, you say all. I mean, even the non math majors among us could see how 1% == all. Obviously. And I’m sure that the X developers have nothing better to do than to help a dozen people figure out how to correctly configure X. I mean, it’s not like there aren’t hundreds or even thousands of people using FC5 with a radeon card quite successfully. I must be imagining that I am not only using a radeon card at a higher res than 640×480, I’m using Xinerama at 3200×1200.
I’d just like you to sign off on that.
You are a really bad, dumb troll.
2006-07-21 12:04 am
sbergman27
So if only some people’s suposedly well supported video cards are not usable above 640×480 with no workardound, it is perfectly acceptable to completely ignore the bug for 4 months and counting?
Also, it seems that you are arguing that Fedora can shovel out packages, but if there is anything wrong in any of the packages that is not due to a FC patch, it is in no way their problem?
I can’t believe that you are actually claiming that either of the above situations is not an indication of FC’s “perpetual beta” status.
I could have believed a claim that they are “exceptions” and not the rule. But actually *defending* total radio silence when users have gone to the trouble of providing *good* bug reports and follow up information?
That’s hard to take seriously.
Finally, I’m perfectly aware of the relationship between FC, RHEL, and CentOS. However, RHEL gets a lot more QA attention from “largely the exact same set of people” than FC. That’s the point.
Time is divided between “furious development on FC” and “RHEL QA and support”. Little to nothing is left for FC QA and support.
Believe me. I have used both FC and CentOS at numerous client sites, and the difference *is* drastic.
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rhavyn
So if only some people’s suposedly well supported video cards are not usable above 640×480 with no workardound, it is perfectly acceptable to completely ignore the bug for 4 months and counting?
Are you seriously that out of touch with how large software projects work? Guess what, if you’re the only (or one of less than 1% of the userbase) who is seeing a problem, you mostly likely aren’t going to have your problem addressed. There are much bigger issues which affect large portions of the userbase. If radeon cards in general didn’t work it’d be fixed by now. I can assure you that radeon cards do work with FC5 however, seeing as I have one that works.
Also, it seems that you are arguing that Fedora can shovel out packages, but if there is anything wrong in any of the packages that is not due to a FC patch, it is in no way their problem?
Would you like to quote where I said that? Oh wait, I didn’t. I simply pointed out that one of your three problems that “proves” that Fedora is in “perpetual beta status” is not even a Fedora bug, it’s a bug that affects every distro that uses that version of that package. Kinda a big leap of logic there, eh?
I could have believed a claim that they are “exceptions” and not the rule. But actually *defending* total radio silence when users have gone to the trouble of providing *good* bug reports and follow up information?
Of your three reports, two of them received what I would consider pretty prompt replies. Whether you like the response or not, a response would make your “complete radio silence” comment complete crap. The third is an issue which doesn’t even affect two dozen users based on the number of comments, hardly something which is going to get triaged very high.
You can call me a “Fedora defender” or whatever, but seriously, come up with an actual problem that the Fedora developers have ignored. You know, something that affects at least 1% of the user base and is an actual bug, not a design flaw or a PEBCAK.
2006-07-20 6:31 pm
DrillSgt
Fedora IS Redhat’s beta, as openSuse is Novell’s SLED Beta platform. Whether the work station can be used or not is irrelevant.
When Fedora starts actually accepting bug reports from users and correcting issues, then I may use it again. Currently if you are not one of the elite, they tell you they will not fix a bug, I have the emails to prove it. Is getting as bad as the debian and slackware “community”.
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2006-07-20 8:05 pm
bosco_bearbankI’m certainly not “one of the elite,” but my bugs do get fixed (and in a timely manner)
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2006-07-21 12:32 pm
manuYes, I think it’s truely is beta. Or why else is current FC5’s evolution connector broken for over one month now?
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2006-07-21 2:09 pm
2006-07-20 7:04 pm
TommyD
I have shied away from Fedora strictly due to how buggy the releases were. I remember telling someone that the Network Update utility didn’t work in a particular release. The Fedora guys I knew just chuckled and said “Everyone know that! Real men don’t use it!” I found that to be a poor attitude for a released product. There are many examples like that. If releases were more stable, I would be MUCH more inclined to use Fedora.
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netpython
If releases were more stable, I would be MUCH more inclined to use Fedora
Just curious,have you tried FC5?
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TommyD
Just curious,have you tried FC5?
Yes, and I really wasn’t trying to diss Fedora. I think the point of the article is that this is an acknowledged problem at Redhat – the release-testing methodology. To get back to the article, it will be awesome to have the same great testing tools use for RHEL available for Fedora. This can do nothing but benefit Fedora. I do believe (don’t shoot me PLEASE) that some other distros CURRENTLY have better release-testing methodologies. This move appears to bring the possibility of better release-testing tools to ALL distros. Woo hoo!
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2006-07-20 8:17 pm
RahulI do believe (don’t shoot me PLEASE) that some other distros CURRENTLY have better release-testing methodologies
Can you list those distributions and show the documents describing their testing methodology?
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TommyD
Can you list those distributions and show the documents describing their testing methodology?
That’s why I said “I believe”. I am basing that from my own personal experience (as described above). Based on my highly-subjective feelings, I feel Ubuntu,Mandriva and Debian seemed more stable at release that Fedora. Perhaps foolishly (I think not), I attibute that to their release testing. Please do not be legalistic.
don’t shoot me PLEASE
Good thing I ducked!
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Rahul
Perhaps foolishly (I think not), I attibute that to their release testing. Please do not be legalistic.
I havent heard any of community distributions doing daily automated build testing yet as Fedora is planning to do
http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/FedoraTesting
https://testing.108.redhat.com/
Not being legalistic. Just curious.
Edited 2006-07-20 20:28
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TommyD
I havent heard any of community distributions doing daily automated build testing yet as Fedora is planning to do
I wasn’t limiting myself to community distro’s (E.g., Mandriva). I would hope Suse and Mandriva (perhaps Linspire) would have some of these tools. But if not, this release by RedHat should help everyone. I am a developer, and I often suffer from a lack of testing. Ad Hoc testing never really cuts it. To be honest, neither does automated testing. Test scripts are only as good as the designer. It takes all of the above!
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2006-07-20 7:40 pm
Don T. BothersI strongly disagree with you. And considering that Fedora is only behind Red Hat in terms of webhosting, and that combined they control over 70% of the Linux market, I would say many people, far more experienced in the field than you, also disagree with you. I don’t know what kind of Fedora guy you know, but he must not be that good.
I will admit that migrating servers to the newest Fedora immediately after a release might be foolish, but this is true with almost any software. As Windows users like to say, wait until Service Pack 1 comes out. Being a little patient with Fedora is also good practice. While it is very stable during this time, it is not worth the risk of the business. Just wait about six months after the release, respin the CDs with all the latest patches, and be ready for a very, very stable release with only minor updates coming your way. And then be prepared to be supported for many years (RedHat 9 released Mar 31 2003 and RedHat 7.3 released May 6 2002 are still supported) afterwards thanks to the Fedora Legacy project.
In the meanwhile, while waiting for the Fedora release to settle down, install it on a few workstations and on a few test servers and make sure everything runs well. During this time, they make great desktops.
2006-07-20 9:00 pm
Shkaba
Have been the alternative OS on my notebook ever since FC3 was released. They did require some initial tweaking but in all very stable. I have to add that with each new release I was getting more and more impressed. Currently though I am testing SLED 10 as a viable replacemant for one of our companies, mainly because of openoffice tweaks that novell has done, but I still remain a big fedora fan
2006-07-20 9:47 pm
buff
I have been a Fedora user since FC2 and for the most part I like it. I think some of the impression of Fedora being beta software as a testing ground is due to the instability of updates. Take for example the other day I updated FC5 and printing stopped working, Firefox started crashing. Some changes were made to SELinux that required me to make config changes. I wish there was a safe security upgrade for current Fedora versions. It is hit or miss after upgrading if something will break. I think before they post updates they should test the update on a common desktop configuration, Nvidia board, Intel/AMD chip, HP printer and really test out if the update breaks applications and servers. Granted there are a lot of possible hardware configurations but it would be possible to determine the most common configuration and rate say the 50 most common applications and run automated tests against them, collect log files, and fix any major failures. Instability is the price you pay for being on the bleeding edge. I am using FC6 test 1 currently and it is working nicely, though my GDM DE selection window is broken. I tried to fix it for the last 2 days but gave up and am waiting for test 2 to fix the problem, such is the Fedora way.
Edited 2006-07-20 21:53
2006-07-21 4:49 pm
stodge
I agree with you on the Yum bug but ATI driver bugs and GNOMe bugs? Should they not go to ATI and the GNOME developers? Rather than asking Fedora to fix them?
He’s so damn right. Everyone says Fedora is a big beta, but me (and a lot of colleagues) use it for daily desktop usage and it’s GREAT (and getting better with EACH release) and stable. Sure there are some issues although mostly thats because 2.6 kernel problems. IMHO ….. (whatever you like, my dear troll) and fedora are the best linux distros out today! Men I can hardly wait to upgrade my workstation
Cheers
Edited 2006-07-20 18:18
but me (and a lot of colleagues) use it for daily desktop usage and it’s GREAT and stable.
Ium too very satisfied with FC5.After having used SuSE 10.1 retail,ubuntu dapper and a few others i’m keeping an eye on FC6.
Speaking about FC6, that version will have a new icons theme to replace the aging Bluecurve.
Remember the AIGLX? It is now part of Xorg 7.1 so enable some effects like transparencies will be much easier. Current Nvidia drivers don’t support it yet, hopefully Nvidia will ship before the Final release of FC6.
All my maschines runs Fedora Core… daily usage… 24/7… no problems – no crashes – no beta. Best Distribution on market… imo
I used it from FC1 through FC4. But I found both the quality of the distro and the attitude of the developers to be deteriorating badly and moved myself and my customers to CentOS.
Here are some bugzilla threads which I find to be depressingly typical of the Fedora developers ever worsening attitudes toward QA.
Note in particular the response times of 5 months, or no response at all. (One presumes that Radeon cards being limited to 640×480 resolution with no workaround is not considered sufficiently important to deserve their attention.)
One of these took 23 months to get resolved with the assignee berating the other participants in the thread the whole time.
https://bugzilla.redhat.com/bugzilla/show_bug.cgi?id=186689
https://bugzilla.redhat.com/bugzilla/show_bug.cgi?id=163799
https://bugzilla.redhat.com/bugzilla/show_bug.cgi?id=119185
Edited 2006-07-20 21:15
The radeon issue has all of 12 comments. If it was actually a widespread problem and not PEBKAC you can be sure there’d be more than 12 comments. More than 12 people use radeon’s with FC.
The second is an issue with an upstream package, it’s not limited to FC. Seems you should be complaining about the nautilius-cd-burner people, not the Fedora people.
The third wasn’t a bug. And if the issue was assigned to me, I’d have acted the same way. Calling someone a moron because you did something stupid and they pointed out that it was your own stupid actions which caused the problem, not a bug in the software, is not a way to get changes made.
Finally, I hope you realize that CentOS^wRHEL packages are maintained by largly the exact same set of people as the Fedora packages are so it’s not like things are going to be drastically different.
“””The third wasn’t a bug. And if the issue was assigned to me, I’d have acted the same way. Calling someone a moron because you did something stupid and they pointed out that it was your own stupid actions which caused the problem, not a bug in the software, is not a way to get changes made.”””
Tripped you up on that one. I figured someone would actually be pro-fedora enough to try to defend it.
So I kept this link in reserve. It’s by the support person from that bugzilla thread, writing under a pseudonym. Defend this:
http://www.kuro5hin.org/story/2006/6/5/101431/9311
Tripped you up on that one. I figured someone would actually be pro-fedora enough to try to defend it.
So I kept this link in reserve. It’s by the support person from that bugzilla thread, writing under a pseudonym. Defend this: