Re: Distribution HOWTO about to bite the dust.

[David Lawyer <dave@lafn.org>]

On Tue, Aug 22, 2000 at 10:18:54PM -0400, Eric S. Raymond wrote:
> In the last two weeks I have converted almost all the HOWTOs I
> maintain from SGML-Tools to DocBook 4.1, pursuant to the consensus at
> the Documentation Summit held in conjunction with the recent O'Reilly 
> Open Source conference.
[snip]
> The only HOWTO I'm responsible for that I haven't converted yet is the
> Distribution HOWTO.
> 
> After considering the matter for some time, I have come to believe
> that the Distribution HOWTO is obsolete.  Today, I think the function
> it serves would be better filled by a pointer from the META-FAQ and
> Installation FAQ to websites which track distributions on a regular
> basis (notably the LWN distributions list and the ports page.).
> 

While it's obsolete, I think it's needed.  There are well over a
hundred distributions and a newcomer to Linux wants to find out fast
which one s/he should get.  Reading about the latest changes and
releases in LWN is fine for those who have a lot of time to spend
selecting a distribution.  But for many (most?) people, they would like
to read a short review of the major distributions and then make a
choice.  That's what the Distribution-HOWTO is for.

> Accordingly, I request the following actions:
> 
> 1) That the Distribution HOWTO be dropped from the list of active
>    HOWTOs.

Since it's still needed, I think it should go to "Unmaintained".
> 
> 2) That the META-FAQ be updated to point to LWN's distribution page
>    and the ports page).
> 
> Of course, if anyone disagrees and wants to continue maintaining the
> Distribution HOWTO, that person is welcome to do so.

Let's look for a new maintainer.  And thanks to ESR for his work on
it.  I found it useful.  Could someone add a link to LWN's
distribution page to it so it would then be somewhat less obsolete?

> 
> I'm now one HOWTO short :-).  I see that the META-FAQ hasn't been updated 
> three years.  Mike, shall I pick it up?
> -- 
> 
			David Lawyer


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