You can only use one copy on one machine. If you have a cluster of machines - every machine needs a licensed copy. Same thing goes for failover/backup machines that may not be switched on until the primary fails.

Service is on a per-machine basis as well. Hope this helps, e. Aaron Konstam wrote: > I will make it simple. If you by a RH Enterprise distribution or RH

> distribution can you install it freely on multiple machines or do you

> for each installation? Or is the service for the installation only good

> machine but the software can be installed on multiple machines? -- e r i k w i l l i a m s o n erik(a)cpsc.ucalgary.ca system admin . department of computer science . university of calgary -- fedora-list mailing list fedora-list(a)redhat.com http://www.redhat.com/mailman/listinfo/fedora-list

Because the value of Linux is far more than just being free. Linux is great technology, and Red Hat is well supported great technology. If your only use for an OS is it being no cost, you can't be doing much that's actually important. ;-) Of course, if low/no cost *is* vital to you, then use Fedora, not RHEL.

you have several alternatives :-) - to stay with RHL 7.2, 7.3 or 9 and: x to get updates from Fedora Legacy

On Fri, 31 Oct 2003 01:02:10 +0100, Xose Vazquez Perez wrote >you have several alternatives :-) > >- to stay with RHL 7.2, 7.3 or 9 and: >x to get updates from Fedora Legacy > > What would be the easiest approach to take if one wanted to stay with RH 9 and get updates from Fedora Legacy? With up2date, one does not even need to check for updates, the icon changes to red. One click and voila, the update is done.

So, how would one know if updates are available (errata notices)?

Will all packages be supported, i.e., mysql server, vsftpd, and so on?

David Jericho wrote: > The sad thing I have to admit, is as a sane, professional, and rational > admin who has my, my users, and my employers interests at heart, 64-bit > Sun hardware and Solaris looks to be an attractive proposition. At least ^^^^^^^^^^^^ Solaris over x86 may be interesting, but SPARC servers/support aren't

> it's not a bottomless money pit for services I won't use. you have several alternatives :-) - to change to a free distribution (Slackware, Debian, Gentoo, Mandrake

- to change to a paidware distribution (SuSE, TurboLinux, SCO, Conectiva

- to buy the cheapest Red Hat EL based product: x Professional Workstation - $100 x WS - $180 x ES - $350 - to stay with RHL 7.2, 7.3 or 9 and: x to get updates from Fedora Legacy x to build yourself updates from RHEL erratas x to build yourself updates from NET sources x to paid someone to do dirty job x to do nothing and cry - to use Fedora Project distributions - to build yourself RHEL from sources

I have no objection to paying for software, and I believe Red Hat is worth decent money. Having said that, a yearly subscription is hostile, not to mention a licensing agreement that is hostile and untrusting, followed by a pricing structure that appears to be the sum process of taking the USD value and applying an exchange rate. I know of admins who are requesting things like site licenses, money in hand, and are getting brushed off by sales reps.

Attitudes like "If you can't afford it, it mustn't be a real task" only shows lack of understanding what business in the real world is like. I cannot rationally burn up the annual salary for a junior programmer on recurring subscription licenses for 10 development boxes that may sit unused for a month at a time. The sad thing I have to admit, is as a sane, professional, and rational admin who has my, my users, and my employers interests at heart, 64-bit Sun hardware and Solaris looks to be an attractive proposition. At least it's not a bottomless money pit for services I won't use.

I have actually built RHEL from the source RPMs. I even prepared a bootable install CD for myself using those RPMs. I have the afore mentioned m4d skillz. But both the replies I've seen so far are missing the point. Quality Assurance.

To illustrate my point, I'll propose a scenario. Security hole in Apache, new update to apply. Apply the RPM to the test box, works as per spec, so set about deploying it to a web farm. Apache works fine on all but one machine.

I really do want to do more with my life than chase an endless stream of machine and software quirks as I have had to do with other distributions. My experience has shown that Red Hat and RHEL has this advantage over other distributions. Part of why I feel passionately about this, is because I have to source a large number of 64-bit machines in the near future. I can afford the licensing schemes and the hardware. But I have an objection to the view that you're licensed to use the product, and have to continue to pay to use the product, rather than actually owning a copy of the product.

> Who says you can't use it after you quit paying for updates? No one. Red RedHat does. In my dealings with their sales reps, it is a "no-go" to keep using RHEL after your subscription runs out.

I think your particular RedHat salesman is mistaken. Their license speaks for itself.

The source code files can be downloaded by anyone,

I have tk-8.3.5-93, tcl-8.3.5-93 and python-2.2.3-7 installed. Tkinter was not contained within the python rpm. Does anyone know where I can find Tkinter?

People know that it's been a long, free lunch with Red Hat Linux for years.

Other thing is on *.edu, *.org and nonprofit organizations *without lucrative aims/projects* I believe Red Hat _should relax_ RHEL license or doing lower prices.

William Hooper wrote: > It has been documented on these list before that *.edu gets a very good > discount on volume licenses. I have yet to hear anyone from an *.org say one snag -> ^^^^^^ If this is true maybe RH needs to update http://redhat.com/software/rhel/purchase/ with more accuracte information because says nothing about discount on volume licenses to enterprise, *.edu, nonprofit orgs....

What business doesn't offer volume discounts? No one is going to publish their price list for it, either. As another poster said, call RH sales.

Ben Russo wrote:

> However, unlike the Red Hat Linux products before it, we will not be > making ISO images freely available for Advanced server. However, if > you are a "1337 haxx0r d00d" with "m4d ski11z" (or even a mildly > interested sysadmin with a year or two of Linux experience), and you > want to roll your own, go for it. Shadowman recommends that you might > consider reviewing our trademark policies I have actually built RHEL from the source RPMs. I even prepared a bootable install CD for myself using those RPMs. I have the afore mentioned m4d skillz. But both the replies I've seen so far are missing the point.

I will make it simple. If you by a RH Enterprise distribution or RH Workstation distribution can you install it freely on multiple machines or do you have to pay for each installation? Or is the service for the installation only good on one machine but the software can be installed on multiple machines? --

On Thu, Oct 30, 2003 at 09:39:33AM -0600, Aaron Konstam wrote: >I will make it simple. If you by a RH Enterprise distribution or RH Workstation >distribution can you install it freely on multiple machines or do you have to pay >for each installation? Or is the service for the installation only good on one >machine but the software can be installed on multiple machines? >-- > > I got the answers to my questions. I went to the horses mouth. RedHat said: If you buy one Enterprise system or Workstation system and put it on other machines you have the following three restrictions: 1. You can not update the other machines through binary updating. If they find someone rampantly distributing their licenced updates to unlcensed machines, they intend to take legal action. 2. You have to remove all references to the redhat name from the unlicenced machines. 3. Their is a propritery IBM package included which will have to be removed. If anyone on from RedHat on the list disaggrees with this analysis of RedHat's position I owuld be interested in hearing from them.

> And of course there is no */Guarantee/* that RedHat will continue to > make SRPMs > available to freeloaders. The GPL doesn't require them to provide > SRPM's to people > to whom RedHat has not given binaries. If Red Hat stop making the SRPMS available to the those who haven't subscribed to RHEL, all it takes is one paying customer to release them on their own FTP servers.

IMHO stopping to provide SRPMS wouldn't be in RedHat's interests in the first place.

On Fri, 31 Oct 2003, Emmanuel Seyman wrote: >> IMHO stopping to provide SRPMS wouldn't be in RedHat's interests in >> the first place. > >I have trouble seeing why. The software in the distribution is under a number of individual different licenses. Red Hat, like anyone else must comply with those software licenses. A lot of the software makes no requirements that source code *MUST* be available. Examples of software which there is no legal requirement that source code must be provided are: XFree86, BSD licensed code, MIT licensed code, similar other licenses. That said however, there is no benefit to Red Hat whatsoever in not distributing the source code to those software components even though there is no legal requirement to do so. Quite the opposite - Red Hat has nothing to lose, and everything to gain by making the source code available, as this promotes others to use the code, modify it, fix bugs, and contribute back stuff to Red Hat, and more importantly to the open source community at large. Other software in the distribution is under the GPL or LGPL licenses or some other license which explicitly requires that if you distribute binaries to someone, you must also make the source code be made available to them which was used to create those binaries also. The terms of those licenses vary depending on the license, however source code must be made available to whomever the binaries are made availble to, in an acceptable manner which is legally compatible with the terms of the license. IANAL, however from a purely legal standpoint, to my knowledge Red Hat has no obligation to provide any src.rpms for RHEL on the ftp site or website, as Red Hat is only obligated to provide source code to RHEL to those whom are provided the binaries for RHEL. RHEL comes with the source code included, so those people already have it and Red Hat's obligations under any of the licenses of the software are met by including the source code on CDROM with the product. The source code for erratum updates could be provided via RHN to RHEL customers only, or via CDROM as well, and meet any GPL/LGPL or similar requirements of providing the source code. However, even though Red Hat has no legal obligation to provide the RHEL src.rpm packages to the public at large, they are nonetheless there, and hopefully people out there benefit from them wether they are an RHEL customer or if they're anyone else. There is no real benefit in my opinion to Red Hat holding back the source code rpm packages to everything. I'm kindof confused as to why people would think otherwise personally, as not providing source code to people would more likely do more harm than any good. Both in terms of less people being able to access the sources and potentially fix things or use the code to improve other software, learn, advocate Linux/whatever, etc. and also in terms of negative publicity, public beatings, the slashdot effect, etc. I definitely agree with the statement "stopping to provide SRPMS wouldn't be in RedHat's interests in the first place." So.... conspiracy theorists please seek therapy or something... We're on your side. ;o) Source code good. Fire bad! ;o)

I am all for RHEL. I think it is an awesome thing. This is because I want to see big software vendors provide software for LINUX: Examples--- WindRiver (vxWorks) Big CAD/CAM companies MathCAD from the MathWorks The only thing that RedHat should not forget is that the reason SUN Micro made their OS distribution free (binaries that is) was due to distros like Red Hat Linux. Good Job. Red Hat should distribute the binaries and SRPMS for free and only charge for support!! Don't make us pay for your binaries. I don't mind paying for support.

Man , what a winding thread. I think the bottom line is their should be more flexibility in support options. The problem with this is everyone always try to fit square pegs into round holes. Say I purchase 10 ES licenses, and I make 1 tech support call in year, I then become a gravy train. Another person purchases 1 license and makes 10 tech support calls, this would be a losing proposition. Ultimately in the real world every shop is unique and some need more hand holding than others. The real problem is that it is impossible for any vendor to have the perfect fit for everyone. My past experiences have taught me that we the users are the ultimate QA. We the users must be treated as such. I have over the years been able to get some flexibility with various maintenance agreements from various vendors. From my perspective I want to pay for support, that is what keeps a vendor in revenue and in business. But I also don't want to be left with a totally inflexible maintenance agreement either. Ultimately it is the sales team that make a company go, the sales team has to be the ones to provide the right type of support for "their" customer. If they have no incentive other than to make their number, you will always end up with poop, and they will have no incentive other that to sell you what you really don't need. This is more profound in publicly traded companies that have share holders to answer to than in privately held ones. Now to end this wind storm, with what is going on today, if you stick with IBM or HP/Compaq hardware, they both will provide you with decent support for Redhat just based on the hardware purchase, I am talking server class here, not desktops. If you have something on a mission critical box, than 600$ or even 1K$ a year is chump change in the big picture.

Since the salesman won't provide what you need, the best recourse is to take them out of the loop, when the profits derived from maintenance go down, they will either adapt or go by the way side. That is how a free market economy should work. Ted On Sat, 2003-11-01 at 02:20, Mike A. Harris wrote: > On Fri, 31 Oct 2003, Ernest L. Williams Jr. wrote: > > >I am all for RHEL. I think it is an awesome thing. > >This is because I want to see big software vendors provide software for > >LINUX: > > > >Examples--- > >WindRiver (vxWorks) > >Big CAD/CAM companies > >MathCAD from the MathWorks > > > > > >The only thing that RedHat should not forget is that the reason SUN > >Micro made their OS distribution free (binaries that is) was due to > >distros like Red Hat Linux. Good Job. Red Hat should distribute the > >binaries and SRPMS for free and only charge for support!! > >Don't make us pay for your binaries. I don't mind paying for support. > > If you pay for support however, then you're getting the binaries > already, so the point is kindof moot. -- fedora-list mailing list fedora-list(a)redhat.com http://www.redhat.com/mailman/listinfo/fedora-list

You are falling into the same old trap. Support calls are not the only cost involved with supporting the product. Back-porting fixes, testing, QA, etc. are also a big part of the cost that doesn't fluctuate with have much you call. We are talking about keeping the same major version of software for 5 years and keeping it secure and stable. I'm sure there is a "break even" cost associated with calling support, but the isn't the whole picture.

You will need to rebuild every update from sources and then release it to your customers. Otherswise is a license violation.

William Hooper wrote: >>You will need to rebuild every update from sources and then release it >>to your customers. Otherswise is a license violation. > Cite the source for this "license violation". "5. NON-TRANSFERABLE. This Agreement, and all Services provided by Red Hat pursuant to this Agreement, may not be transferred, assigned or distributed without the prior written consent of Red Hat. Any attempted transfer, assignment or distribution without Red Hat's prior written consent shall terminate this Agreement, and Red Hat shall have no further obligation hereunder."

On Saturday 01 November 2003 07:16 pm, William Hooper wrote: > How are RPMs "Services"? They are available only by subscription under a license you sign and agree to that says you'll only use them on the machine you've licensed.

This has been discussed several times on this list in the past few days. The most important part of the equation is that Red Hat has publicly stated that they will go after anyone who violates this provision of their license. Reference several articles on this list this past weekend and the license itself. Jeff

William Hooper wrote: > The other poster quoted a section that said you couldn't transfer the > Service. It had nothing to do with RPMs. If you have any doubt about RHEL license consult your local lawyer, this is not a legal advice list. Period.

> And since out small business has been priced out of RHEL, there's not > a darn thing we can do about it. Well, there *IS* one thing we can do. > We've considered purchasing one copy of RHEL 3.0, stripping all of the > non-GPL stuff out of it, purposely never using the support option, and > calling it Quantum Linux. What is the difference between doing this and just using Fedora?

>> If Red Hat stop making the SRPMS available to the those who haven't subscribed >> to RHEL, all it takes is one paying customer to release them on their own FTP >> servers. > Why should that customer do that? It would threaten Red Hat's business > model. That should not be in the interest of a paying enterprise > customer. IMHO stopping to provide SRPMS wouldn't be in RedHat's interests in the first place.