[ale] Upgrade path to RH 5.0?

[Chris Ricker]

On 18 Nov, scott.lewis at ce.gatech.edu wrote:
> I'm pretty excited about the changes in RH 5.0, but I don't want to
> have to rebuild my system.  Anybody know if you can upgrade to it? 
> (Currently running 4.2, if it matters)

I'm currently running the beta of it.  The upgrade works fine on the
machines I've tried it on.

New features of note:

It has a new disk partitioning tool.  I don't really like it, but it
looks good for people new to computing / linux (certainly less daunting
than good ol' fdisk ;-).

It has Kickstart or Jumpstart or whatever they called it.  You prepare a
config file, then can do automated, unattended, customized installs. 
It'll be good for those with a large install base.  It'll be great for
when some bored Georgia Tech computer cluster UA gets tired of looking
at NT screens all day ;-).

It's glibc-based.  In spite of this, almost all my programs still
worked.  I have source for the ones that didn't (mostly molecular
genetics stuff that no one in their right mind would run anyway ;-), so
a recompile took care of those.

It has more apps.  The GIMP, for example, wasn't included in 4.2, as I
recall.  They also made the stupid NextLevel desktop configurable, so you
can at least make it feel like AfterStep or MWM instead of Win95.  Can't
really say too much about that, as my first move was to blow it away and
install WindowMaker.

Rumor has it the licensed edition from RedHat will include Bru and
RealAudio server as well as the usual commercial apps (RedBaron, etc.).

I think they've got Alan Cox's modular sound patches in as well, so
that you won't even have to recompile to use your sound card (not sure
if that's a good idea or not, since I think anyone running linux should
know how to recompile a kernel, and sound was often the motivating
factor).

The only quirk I've noticed so far is that gpm hangs the system on
shutdown or reboot.  I have to move the mouse before it can kill gpm
and proceed in the shutdown.  I'm still not sure what the deal with
that is....

later,
chris

--
Chris Ricker                                        gt1355b at prism.gatech.edu
                                                       Chris.Ricker at ipst.edu
"No brains, no service"
  --sign at Fat Matt's Rib Shack