LinuxQuestions.org - Open Letter to Lance Davis(CentOS related)

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- - Open Letter to Lance Davis(CentOS related) (https://www.linuxquestions.org/questions/linux-general-1/open-letter-to-lance-davis-centos-related-743982/)

CentOS and a single point of failure

I just spotted this on OSnews (hopefully I'm not duplicating anyone else's thread topic):

CentOS Project Administrator Goes Missing-in-Action

Incredible. I know some folks who use it in the enterprise. Hopefully it all gets resolved quickly.

Hope he turns up soon. :(. He could have a genuine reason for not being contactable.

Open Letter to Lance Davis(CentOS related)

http://centos.org/

Quote:

July 30, 2009 04:39 UTC

This is an Open Letter to Lance Davis from fellow CentOS Developers

It is regrettable that we are forced to send this letter but we are left with no other options. For some time now we have been attempting to resolve these problems:

You seem to have crawled into a hole ... and this is not acceptable.

You have long promised a statement of CentOS project funds; to this date this has not appeared.

You hold sole control of the centos.org domain with no deputy; this is not proper.

You have, it seems, sole 'Founders' rights in the IRC channels with no deputy ; this is not proper.

When I (Russ) try to call the phone numbers for UK Linux, and for you individually, I get a telco intercept 'Lines are temporarily busy' for the last two weeks. Finally yesterday, a voicemail in your voice picked up, and I left a message urgently requesting a reply. Karanbir also reports calling and leaving messages without your reply.

Please do not kill CentOS through your fear of shared management of the project.

Clearly the project dies if all the developers walk away.

Please contact me, or any other signer of this letter at once, to arrange for the required information to keep the project alive at the 'centos.org' domain.

Sincerely,

Russ Herrold
Ralph Angenendt
Karanbir Singh
Jim Perrin
Donavan Nelson
Tim Verhoeven
Tru Huynh
Johnny Hughes

Whoa.. Didn't see this one coming? Thoughts?

I hope.. That these developers will continue to make a Red Hat clone that will seamlessly integrate with all the current CentOS installs out there. I could care less if the name CentOS went away, as long as the project lives on and there is support for it.

http://www.linuxquestions.org/questi...elated-743982/

Have you guys read that?

S

EDIT - yes you have; I just followed the story at osnews..

Thoughts not necessary, facts on display at http://planet.centos.org/ and http://dag.wieers.com/blog/

I'd be careful saying "facts" unless you personally have been one of the ones attempting to contact Lance Davis.

As for me I see no reason to doubt what I've seen written but am always mindful of the difference between what I "think" and what I "know".

You mean I should wonder if I should doubt mr Wieers to know the difference between what he "thinks" he knows and what he "knows" he knows?

I have merged the two threads that discuss the same issues.

http://www.linuxquestions.org/questi...to-die-744022/ - looks as though the Register has picked up the story too.

Man in charge of all the money disappears. Very strange...

Quote:

Originally Posted by unSpawn (Post 3625998)

You mean I should wonder if I should doubt mr Wieers to know the difference between what he "thinks" he knows and what he "knows" he knows?

No I mean you should distinguish between what you "know" from what you "think" based on what you've read. As I noted I "think" (that is to say my opinion is) that the open letter and Dag Wieers' comments are valid but I don't "know" they are. For all we know (that word again) Lance Davis himself posted this stuff to set us all up for libel law suits by spreading it as "fact". I'd also point out nothing has been written purporting to be Lance Davis' response so we only have one side of the story (if that).

My caution was aimed at the fact that I have seen lawsuits for libel over supposedly anonymous internet postings. Also living in Atlanta I have the memory of how Richard Jewel was widely reported to be the Olympics bomber only to have most of the news organizations that did so later having to pay him when it turned out he wasn't.

Looks like http://www.centos.org/ has some new updates:

Quote:

# CentOS is not dead or going away. The signers of the Open Letter are fully committed to continue the CentOS Project. Updates and new releases will continue.

# The issues raised in the Open Letter have been raised privately literally for years and a voluntary resolution had been hoped for and worked toward. But progress requires follow through. We have tried contacting Lance in private for a long period of time before this Open Letter. While we received promises, there was no real response or follow through from him on promises made. We are sure he is not dead, on vacation, or sick. Once we all decided there was no movement in the matter we created the Open Letter. This is not something that appeared just recently.

# We would really like to continue the project using the centos.org domain. That is one of the reasons for the Open Letter. But the developers will move to another domain if there is no other option. Protective backups are in place; hot machines exist to allow for a cutover with a simple one time installation of one RPM package. We continue to refine our plans if this might be the case, to make the transition as smooth as possible.

# We thank the people who have stepped forward and want to donate to the CentOS project to hold off for now until issues surrounding the centos.org domain and donation policy are resolved. Selected donations will be privately solicited by the signers of the Open Letter on some transition matters. We will post general instructions on how you can help the project as matters become resolved.

# The CentOS project is run completely by volunteers and we are aware that this requires a different management style. We have been and continue to work to prevent issues like these from occurring in the future. We will continue this effort in the future, but the matters mentioned in the Open Letter prevent us from moving forward at this moment, as they need to be resolved first.

Last Update: July 30, 2009 20:45 UTC by Donavan

It looks as though they are making plans to change the domain if required and continue without Lance. I don't think they can afford to wait too long as I'm sure customers will want to know the longer term plans for CentOS.

In the long run this should be good for CentOS. It will take all of the control from an individual and place it a more formal foundation or committee. I have followed CentOS for some time. I am sure the developers will continue to work under better conditions in the future.

I sure hope so, CentOS is one of the best distros available and certainly a mainstay for many business enterprises.

Jeff

New updates on centos.org

Quote:

The CentOS Development team had a routine meeting today with Lance Davis in attendance. During the meeting a majority of issues were resolved immediately and a working agreement was reached with deadlines for remaining unresolved issues. There should be no impact to any CentOS users going forward.

The CentOS project is now in control of the CentOS.org and CentOS.info domains and owns all trademarks, materials, and artwork in the CentOS distributions.

We look forward to working with Lance to quickly complete all the agreed upon issues.

More information will follow soon.

Original Letter

Last Update: August 1, 2009 04:34 UTC by Donavan Nelson

This is good news. I am glad they are resolving issues quickly.