Red Hat Continues Pleading The Case For Its CentOS Changes

[ThoreauHD]

This conversation does not spark joy.

[NateHubbard]

The moment Red Hat took control of CentOS, people should have started paying closer attention.
The moment IBM took control of Red Hat, people should have migrated to something else.
At this point, it's kind of hard to feel sorry for them.

[finalzone]

The moment Red Hat took control of CentOS, people should have started paying closer attention.
The moment IBM took control of Red Hat, people should have migrated to something else.
At this point, it's kind of hard to feel sorry for them.

It sounds like an overreaction from that comment. Please read the details on https://fedoramagazine.org/fedora-and-centos-stream/

[NateHubbard]

It sounds like an overreaction from that comment. Please read the details on https://fedoramagazine.org/fedora-and-centos-stream/

Ok, I've read the details. That doesn't change my opinion on Red Hat and IBM.

[torsionbar28]

OR (alternate option), the people on this forum can stop assuming they know everything about a business they are not a part of

The former parent company literally would not spend money on things they absolutely were not required to. You are required to pay for Windows. You are required to pay for Mac hardware and other equipment. You are not required to pay for every Linux distribution, clone or not. Therefore, money not being spent. It's a very simple formula. We have bigger problems when it comes to staffing and people allocations than our software stack.

Fair enough, but I have never seen a company that runs critical infrastructure on a platform without vendor support. Even with top talent on staff, it's a risk to business to not have reach-back to a vendor for product support. I can see using CentOS in an academic setting, or someone like Google using it as they can do anything/everything in-house, but for the vast majority of businesses out there, CentOS is a poor choice. Water under the bridge at this point, with CentOS going away soon.

[torsionbar28]

The amount of gaslighting on this forum claiming RedHat's "legal independence" despite the truth that it is now just a tiny piece of the IBM borg is hilarious. You should look up the term "wholly owned subsidiary"[1] and see if you can grok the definition. IBM does not devour "all outstanding shares" of a corporation and then decline legal ownership.

[1] https://www.wraltechwire.com/2019/01...rger-complete/

False again. Red Hat, Inc. is its own legally incorporated entity. That entity is owned by IBM now. But it's still its own legal entity. IBM may very well be exercising management control over it, calling the shots on engineering and marketing decisions, but that's not relevant to whether or not Red Hat Incorporated exists as a legal entity. I don't think the word "legal" means what you think it means...

[onlyLinuxLuvUBack]

Ok, I've read the details. That doesn't change my opinion on Red Hat and IBM.

can someone make a parody commercial where a old blue wearing suite guy puts on a blue pimp hat and says you want this young male teen , then it aint free sucker.
... ibm linux boy commercials if you forgot how ibm cared like 10years ago: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y5po-aEeKq8

[hubick]

the move is great since RHEL is to no longer be developed behind a "firewall" but will have an open-source upstream

"thanks for all your help testing, sorry you can't afford to use the stable result of all that"

Right. GTFO. (and I say that as a current RHEL subscriber)

[f0rmat]

OR (alternate option), the people on this forum can stop assuming they know everything about a business they are not a part of

The former parent company literally would not spend money on things they absolutely were not required to. You are required to pay for Windows. You are required to pay for Mac hardware and other equipment. You are not required to pay for every Linux distribution, clone or not. Therefore, money not being spent. It's a very simple formula. We have bigger problems when it comes to staffing and people allocations than our software stack.

The former parent company may have been crappy, but the people I work with are great. We're still navigating with the new one who we will be officially 100% under on Jan 1, and they've been pretty accommodating so far.

Cheers,
Mike

Agreed. And let us not forget that the other "minor" aspects of a business - like Human Resources, Sales and Marketing, upper level Management, Physical Security, and etc. Are probably not linux gurus...indeed, most of the frontend for a lot of that software runs on Windows and/or Mac. And like it or not (and I wish it were not so), Microsoft Office IS the office suite of the corporate world - at least in the western world - and that will not run on linux. And many of the other departments simply see many IT people as the help desk or the geeks that take care of the computers. They may "know" about the importance of the server racks and/or software stack, but there is a very good chance that the main mentality is that as long as it works, leave it alone. Trying to convince the Resource Manager that you need a few servers with x number of cores server with y ram and z disk space and this many licenses for this amount of software can be difficult - especially since what you have already seems to work - and his stuff damn sure works for him.

[f0rmat]

Red Hat, Inc. is its own legally incorporated entity. That entity is owned by IBM now. But it's still its own legal entity. IBM may very well be exercising management control over it, calling the shots on engineering and marketing decisions, but that's not relevant to whether or not Red Hat Incorporated exists as a legal entity.

You are correct.

I work for a company that is a "wholly owned but unaffiliated subsidiary" of another company. In other words, we are a completely separate company with our own IP and branding, etc. We were bought by the parent for some of the products (in particular a significant software package that tracks logistics), however my company had outstanding contracts that had to be fulfilled. Taking a contract and changing "Company A" to "Company B" is a significant undertaking in that renegotiation is almost always required. The parent company decided not to do that. Instead, they began migrating over personnel and services that were not directly specified by or working in support of the outstanding contracts (e.g. HR, internal web servers, internal legal operations (not contract law), upper management, etc.). As contracts with our customers expire, the parent will either take them over (especially for said software package) or simply not bid on them (as in the case of some of the support areas - mine included). When all of that is done and all outstanding contracts and obligations are met, the parent company will then dissolve our company and we will cease to exist - but the parent will own all IP and branding - at least what they do not sell/spin-off off.

Not sure if that will happen with IBM and RedHat - but if it does, you will probably see something like "IBM RedHat" as opposed to just RedHat.