4 ms·

I don't think either of those points are correct. 1. Fedora is not a rolling release, so you don't get every single kernel point release like you do in Arch.

by awill 5y ago

I don't think either of those points are correct. 1. Fedora is not a rolling release, so you don't get every single kernel point release like you do in Arch. 2. Steam does not want to do a full Fedora 30 to 31 upgrade every six months. They want to roll. It's a better model, especially when kernel/drivers are improving gaming quickly. 3. Arch has a stable base and gets small updates every day. Regular software services tell us this is a better model than infrequent large updates. Things like RHEL are the exception, but take years of QA, and leave you with old drivers in between releases.

Conan_Kudo 5y ago
> 1. Fedora is not a rolling release, so you don't get every single kernel point release like you do in Arch. Wrong. The kernel and mesa stack rolls and is rebased regularly throughout the life of a Fedora release. Fedora is prepping for a rebase to Linux 5.13 for both Fedora 33 and Fedora 34 now: https://fedoramagazine.org/contribute-to-fedora-linux-kernel-5-13-test-week/ https://fedoramagazine.org/contribute-to-fedora-linux-kernel...
- awill 5y ago
  Bingo, the kernel updates through the life of the fedora release. Then it stops. The life of a console is 8+ years. This needs to be supported for that long. Valve don't want to do multiple dist-upgrades over that time. They just want roll
  - Conan_Kudo 5y ago
    I suspect they're not going to do that with SteamOS. They'll likely freeze the tree and do effectively the dist-upgrade style process themselves.
dralley 5y ago
> 1. Fedora is not a rolling release, so you don't get every single kernel point release like you do in Arch. Fedora rolls the kernel. I'm on Fedora 33 (a full release behind), and yet I still have kernel 5.12.15, the exact same as Arch currently has. I don't have any custom repos configured. On rare occasions Fedora even gets new kernels faster than Arch, but usually it's less than a week behind. >2. Steam does not want to do a full Fedora 30 to 31 upgrade every six months. They want to roll. It's a better model, especially when kernel/drivers are improving gaming quickly. Fedora gets constant Mesa updates as well, it's not pinned. Admittedly it's 2 months behind Arch (21.0 vs 21.1)
- foobar33333 5y ago
  Fedora updates everything that isn't a breaking change in between releases. Stuff like major gnome versions or replacing core components with similar but incompatible components gets held back for a major release.
- oehtXRwMkIs 5y ago
  A distro where only the kernel is rolling and cutting edge while the rest is slower paced sounds like the worst of both worlds to me. My favorite part of Arch is the rolling packages and my least favorite is the rolling kernel. I dislike having to reboot so often.
  - foepys 5y ago
    You can add the 2 kernel packages to the ignored packages list of pacman and update them manually if needed. Pacman will warn you that it ignored a package update including the currently installed and new package version. You will not get security and bug fixes but that's what's bothering you, I think.

by awill 5y ago

Conan_Kudo 5y ago

> 1. Fedora is not a rolling release, so you don't get every single kernel point release like you do in Arch. Wrong. The kernel and mesa stack rolls and is rebased regularly throughout the life of a Fedora release. Fedora is prepping for a rebase to Linux 5.13 for both Fedora 33 and Fedora 34 now: https://fedoramagazine.org/contribute-to-fedora-linux-kernel-5-13-test-week/ https://fedoramagazine.org/contribute-to-fedora-linux-kernel...

awill 5y ago
Bingo, the kernel updates through the life of the fedora release. Then it stops. The life of a console is 8+ years. This needs to be supported for that long. Valve don't want to do multiple dist-upgrades over that time. They just want roll
- Conan_Kudo 5y ago
  I suspect they're not going to do that with SteamOS. They'll likely freeze the tree and do effectively the dist-upgrade style process themselves.

dralley 5y ago

> 1. Fedora is not a rolling release, so you don't get every single kernel point release like you do in Arch. Fedora rolls the kernel. I'm on Fedora 33 (a full release behind), and yet I still have kernel 5.12.15, the exact same as Arch currently has. I don't have any custom repos configured. On rare occasions Fedora even gets new kernels faster than Arch, but usually it's less than a week behind. >2. Steam does not want to do a full Fedora 30 to 31 upgrade every six months. They want to roll. It's a better model, especially when kernel/drivers are improving gaming quickly. Fedora gets constant Mesa updates as well, it's not pinned. Admittedly it's 2 months behind Arch (21.0 vs 21.1)

foobar33333 5y ago
Fedora updates everything that isn't a breaking change in between releases. Stuff like major gnome versions or replacing core components with similar but incompatible components gets held back for a major release.
oehtXRwMkIs 5y ago
A distro where only the kernel is rolling and cutting edge while the rest is slower paced sounds like the worst of both worlds to me. My favorite part of Arch is the rolling packages and my least favorite is the rolling kernel. I dislike having to reboot so often.
- foepys 5y ago
  You can add the 2 kernel packages to the ignored packages list of pacman and update them manually if needed. Pacman will warn you that it ignored a package update including the currently installed and new package version. You will not get security and bug fixes but that's what's bothering you, I think.