4 ms·

That is better, actually. If it's proven for that many years why mess with it? Why assume that older is unilaterally worse?

mmirate 8y ago
Ecliptic Curve cryptography. In-tree driver modules for last year's 10Gb Ethernet cards. Python 2.7, let alone 3. Official support for kernel 4.x. I've barely been in the industry for 90 days and I've already had to deal with the lack of the above in RHEL6. (Indirectly, mind you; but I believe that the transition between RHEL6 and CentOS6 is negligible for the current topic.)
- mikec3010 8y ago
  Hypothetically, if you needed python couldn't you either compile it to binary or just install the runtime ? I don't see how a language would be coupled to the version of Linux.
  - mmirate 8y ago
    Doing so means putting all Python packages into a single opaque OS-level package. Not fun when your build system and related infrastructure, were all designed to work with OS-level packages.
    - icebraining 8y ago
      Why? You just use package dependencies to indicated that they depend on the New Python.
      - mmirate 8y ago
        Third-party dependencies. Their BRPMs will all install to the OS's old Python. Pull them from PyPI using setup.py, and we get the problem I describe; the alternative is to build our own BRPMs, which is a massive headache to set up.
    - mikec3010 8y ago
      Can't you just set PYTHON_PATH="where yoy put python" ? > all Python packages That's a weakness in the language. You trade such a simple syntax for dependency hell. Oh, you wanted XML-derp-3.5.2.9.6? Well that requires XML-slurp-2.6.5.9.77 and you only have '75, sorry bud, can't possibly work. Oh but if you upgrade XML-slurp that breaks pycairo-2.7.55-1 and all your GUI code will stop working. Fun stuff.
      - mmirate 8y ago
        Not my choice. We've had over 50kloc of Python for several years before I arrived. The packaging shenanigans still occasionally sputter.
- xyzzy123 8y ago
  Hardware appliances would generally be one place none of these things matter - you know if your gray box ships with a 10gbe card or not, customer doesn’t care about userland versions, etc. That said, I also hate working on RHEL 6.
  - Godel_unicode 8y ago
    What's better than a relatively impenetrable appliance? One that manifestly doesn't care about security and therefore uses an old kernel and vulnerable userland. If they use an old unsupported OS, what other vulnerable libraries are hiding inside?
    - zxcmx 8y ago
      RHEL 6 is supported until 2024.
      - mmirate 8y ago
        Oh, goody, just in time for the theoreticians to finally tell us that any kind of speculative execution can be made into a security flaw, and that there's nothing to do about it but to crawl back into a hole, err, I mean, back to ARM micro-controllers. :)
        mycall 8y ago
        RISCV :)
  - mmirate 8y ago
    > none of those things matter ... unless the software's needs evolve over time such as to require them. > you know if your gray box ships with a 10gbe card or not Yes; and lucky we do know. Else, our upcoming model of gray boxes that - unlike their predecessors - aren't approaching EOL but are only available with 10gbe cards ... would already be shipping with broken networking.

mmirate 8y ago

Ecliptic Curve cryptography. In-tree driver modules for last year's 10Gb Ethernet cards. Python 2.7, let alone 3. Official support for kernel 4.x. I've barely been in the industry for 90 days and I've already had to deal with the lack of the above in RHEL6. (Indirectly, mind you; but I believe that the transition between RHEL6 and CentOS6 is negligible for the current topic.)

mikec3010 8y ago
Hypothetically, if you needed python couldn't you either compile it to binary or just install the runtime ? I don't see how a language would be coupled to the version of Linux.
- mmirate 8y ago
  Doing so means putting all Python packages into a single opaque OS-level package. Not fun when your build system and related infrastructure, were all designed to work with OS-level packages.
  - icebraining 8y ago
    Why? You just use package dependencies to indicated that they depend on the New Python.
    - mmirate 8y ago
      Third-party dependencies. Their BRPMs will all install to the OS's old Python. Pull them from PyPI using setup.py, and we get the problem I describe; the alternative is to build our own BRPMs, which is a massive headache to set up.
  - mikec3010 8y ago
    Can't you just set PYTHON_PATH="where yoy put python" ? > all Python packages That's a weakness in the language. You trade such a simple syntax for dependency hell. Oh, you wanted XML-derp-3.5.2.9.6? Well that requires XML-slurp-2.6.5.9.77 and you only have '75, sorry bud, can't possibly work. Oh but if you upgrade XML-slurp that breaks pycairo-2.7.55-1 and all your GUI code will stop working. Fun stuff.
    - mmirate 8y ago
      Not my choice. We've had over 50kloc of Python for several years before I arrived. The packaging shenanigans still occasionally sputter.
xyzzy123 8y ago
Hardware appliances would generally be one place none of these things matter - you know if your gray box ships with a 10gbe card or not, customer doesn’t care about userland versions, etc. That said, I also hate working on RHEL 6.
- Godel_unicode 8y ago
  What's better than a relatively impenetrable appliance? One that manifestly doesn't care about security and therefore uses an old kernel and vulnerable userland. If they use an old unsupported OS, what other vulnerable libraries are hiding inside?
  - zxcmx 8y ago
    RHEL 6 is supported until 2024.
    - mmirate 8y ago
      Oh, goody, just in time for the theoreticians to finally tell us that any kind of speculative execution can be made into a security flaw, and that there's nothing to do about it but to crawl back into a hole, err, I mean, back to ARM micro-controllers. :)
      - mycall 8y ago
        RISCV :)
- mmirate 8y ago
  > none of those things matter ... unless the software's needs evolve over time such as to require them. > you know if your gray box ships with a 10gbe card or not Yes; and lucky we do know. Else, our upcoming model of gray boxes that - unlike their predecessors - aren't approaching EOL but are only available with 10gbe cards ... would already be shipping with broken networking.