"OpenSUSE 42" Enters Development

[phoronix]

Phoronix: "OpenSUSE 42" Enters Development

The latest non-rolling release of openSUSE is version 13.2, but openSUSE 42 is the next version now under development...

http://www.phoronix.com/scan.php?pag...42-Development

[Awesomeness]

So "42" will be to SUSE Linux Enterprise what CentOS is to RHEL?

[sysrich]

So "42" will be to SUSE Linux Enterprise what CentOS is to RHEL?

In general terms, such as the 'target audience', the people we expect "42" to appeal to, I would say 'kind of, yes'

But in technical terms, most certainly 'No' - "42" is NOT a clone of SUSE Linux Enterprise, but a community distribution with SLE sources providing the base

My presentation at the recent openSUSE Conference might explain the concept better than a forum post can - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BH99TSrfvq0

[ImNtReal]

6 x 9?

[GreatEmerald]

Pretty interesting.

Historically, I've always been using the stable releases rather than Tumbleweed. That's because releases are a good time to review the data on the PC, clean it all up, start fresh, reinstall partially or completely. Also, releases typically had more stable software, and there weren't issues with all the kernel module stuff like NVIDIA and VirtualBox.

On the other hand, the releases also often didn't match my desire to clean the PC up. Often times there would be opportunities to reinstall (like disks getting full, getting a new SSD, transitioning to GPT etc.) earlier than there was a new release. In those cases I would typically jump on to a beta/RC version of the new release, because at the time the older version would get rather stale as it is (last example being Plasma 5, I jumped ship to 13.2 as soon as Plasma 5.1 was out). But that's not ideal either, because at the beginning the betas and RCs would be rather rough around the edges, and due to all the config changes and such it would start having strange bugs earlier than usual, making me want to start fresh again. So it's kind of a vicious circle.

So I guess with this new concept, I'll be switching to Tumbleweed. It seems fast enough for my tastes (it already has Plasma 5.3, while we 13.2 users only got up to 5.2 in mainline updates ), and I'll be able to reinstall whenever enough issues mount to actually warrant it. And probably soon, too, because weird issues are appearing for me already (Baloo search doesn't work, even though indexing works, it's real bizarre).

The stable release will be less interesting for me, but still marginally interesting. Among the things I do is maintaining some PCs for a small business; one of the workstations I recently installed is now running CentOS, although being primarily an openSUSE user it felt real annoying not to have the nice things like YaST and OBS. The only downside to this plan is that 3 years isn't that much. CentOS 7 will be supported for 10 years, which is real nice. Maybe a bit overkill; I'd say the ideal time would be 5 years. But one way or another, longer support is better.

And lastly, I'm also a package maintainer on OBS. How will these changes affect it? Will the build target be shared between SLE and openSUSE releases, or would I still have to enable both? The reason why I typically wouldn't enable SLE is that there was no way for me to test whether it works, but if the base is shared, then this would no longer be an issue.

[sysrich]

The only downside to this plan is that 3 years isn't that much. CentOS 7 will be supported for 10 years, which is real nice.Maybe a bit overkill; I'd say the ideal time would be 5 years. But one way or another, longer support is better.

So far I've been saying at "least 3 years". The current plan is we will support one openSUSE 42 Major Version (based on sources from a SLE Major Version) at a time, with an overlap to be determined. With SLE 13 expected in 'no less than 3 years', this is where the "at least 3 years" statement comes from. With the overlap, it's entirely possible that it might extend into 4 or possibly even 5, our limiting factor is going to be who's willing and able to keep providing maintenance updates for the full distribution (not just the SLE parts).
I don't think we have the excess capacity to maintain and produce new patches for multiple versions of openSUSE 42 for an excessively long time, but we do see 3+ years as a solid improvement on our previous offerings for people wanting something they can install for a long time.

And lastly, I'm also a package maintainer on OBS. How will these changes affect it? Will the build target be shared between SLE and openSUSE releases, or would I still have to enable both? The reason why I typically wouldn't enable SLE is that there was no way for me to test whether it works, but if the base is shared, then this would no longer be an issue.

Details are still being worked out, but my expectation is as an OBS Package maintainer you'll have a seperate build target for openSUSE 42 and SLE releases. However, if you're successfully building something for 42, it should either work on SLE or at least be immediately obvious what would be required to get it working on SLE.

We already have a seperate project for openSUSE contributors who want to get their software offered on SLE - see https://en.opensuse.org/Portal:Backports

[Cyber Killer]

I'm also looking very much forward to longer support times in OpenSUSE. I try to shift my workplace servers to OpenSUSE, so a long support period will definitely help with this. I'm hoping for times comparable with CentOS, and at least longer than failbuntu.

[DrYak]

6 x 9?

Nobody writes jokes in base 13 !

Now goodbye, and thank you for all the fish.