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Re: [OCLUG-Tech] Migrating to Redhat/Suse from Debian

On 12-01-12 12:32 PM, Jeffrey Taylor wrote:
Hey guys,

I have an interview for a sys admin job. They're asking for Redhat/SUSE
experience. Can anyone offer any suggestions(major differences/common
locations, etc) for 'switching' from Debian? Any common caveats, use cases,
variations or maybe even just 'FAQs' about switching. Thanks!

Jeff
613-325-1368
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I've done this transition in reverse - starting from RedHat and moving to Debian. It's a grind, and config file locations, data locations and scripting differences all need to be reviewed one-by-one. I would not trust a system I administer to someone else's transition scripts.

Unix/Linux administration is the skill set needed - not one particular distribution's methods of achieving stable system operation. When choosing a distribution, the primary factors for me are the number of professionals administering similar systems - because this is an indication of stability and commitment. I've been on the commercial vendor bandwagon, and they have a nasty habit of changing the rules midstream and asking for subscriptions to formerly free services, or changing policies on source availability of required code. Commercial vendors answer first to shareholders and second to the user base. As soon as a vendor goes down the for-profit commercial road, the risk they will implode gets way higher than not-for-profit distributions. Look at OpenOffice, MySQL, Quanta etc. to see how badly things go once the original developers decide to cash out and sell to corporate America. Thank RMS (and/or whatever God you choose) for making forking projects a valid exit strategy.

It isn't the money I object to - I think people should make a profit from their work. I object to the amount of work it costed me in the past on changing platforms due to vendor instability.

--
Bill Strosberg

Maintenance and security support are critical. Packaging systems need bulletproof dependency checking and stable paths forward. I'm a .deb fan and learned to hate RPM. Working systems broke for me on routine upgrades with Redhat, and I've never had a Debian (or derivative) box die sue to upgrades.