Re: SPARC Status update

On Thu, Apr 08, 2010 at 08:30:13AM -0400, Tom spot Callaway wrote:
> On 04/07/2010 10:48 PM, mat wrote:

> > God, I just re-read this and it seems like a terrible flame but I hate
> > because I love. Please, please unfuck Aurora so I can actually use it
> > again.

> You're right Mat. We should just retire Aurora. All of our work lately
> has been into getting a solid Fedora 12 release, and we're really,
> really close. (I did an F-12 GUI install on a U10, and Dennis swears he
> has auto-partitioning working.)

> The original reason I created Aurora was because Red Hat Linux dropped
> support for SPARC, and I couldn't legally call it "Red Hat Linux"
> anymore. Now, with Fedora, we have a solid infrastructure for doing a
> architecture port and permission to use the name.

> Aurora is now Fedora SPARC.
[...]

Thanks Tom for that clarification - in a way,that was overdue.
Admittedly, I didn't follow Aurora too closely over the past years
mostly due to personal time constraints, but given the slow decline of
the aurora mailing lists, it sure looked as if the whole project was
completely doomed. Heck, I even began dabbling with Ubuntu Sparc for
that very reason... ;-)
I haven't decided whether I'll give Fedora Sparc a shot yet (I've been
playing more with SGI machines recently) - somehow, Fedora never reached
the same level of "feeling at home" the "old" Red Hat had (up until
RH7.3/8/9) for me. In that regard, Aurora was a very good follow-up,
which is one of the reasons I liked it so much.

On the other hand, Linux on Sparc just got a whole lot more interesting
for hobbyists given the recent license changes that Oracle announced
(or better: Failed to properly announce) for Solaris - and the fact the
OpenSolaris does not come with frame buffer support for the older
machines does not help, either. So, I might start experimenting again at
some point... ;-)

I'd also agree with mat on mailing list vs. IRC - personally, I find the
former much more practical for the type of communication I'm involved in
as a user. Nonetheless, I can imaginge that the more online way of IRC
has advantages when developing.


> We'll take steps to make that clear in the old Aurora website, and we'll
> be closing up the mailing lists here soon. (The archives will stick
> around indefinitely, thanks to our generous hosting provider.)

Please do - every now and then I still meet people asking about Aurora
and providing clear pointers on the website would be very helpful.


> Fedora SPARC has a new mailing list, with some recent activity even:
> https://admin.fedoraproject.org/mailman/listinfo/sparc

Thanks - being curious as I am, I might just follow that one... ;-)

[...]
> ****
> To everyone who helped us out in the Aurora SPARC Linux Project, thank
> you. We outlasted Sun (barely), and we hope you'll come join us in
> Fedora SPARC. Same core people, same craziness, (some of the same bugs),
> and same fun. :)

Well, I would like to add my thanks to this list - it certainly was fun
at the time! Special thanks to you Tom and the other who initiated this!

Regards,

Thomas
-- 
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
                Thomas Ribbrock    http://www.ribbrock.org 
  "You have to live on the edge of reality - to make your dreams come true!"
_______________________________________________
Aurora-sparc-user mailing list
[email protected]
http://lists.auroralinux.org/mailman/listinfo/aurora-sparc-user
Aurora FAQ: http://www.ecs.soton.ac.uk/~mas01r/aurorafaq.html