PCLinuxOS is boring!
One great thing about Linux is the furious 6 month development cycle that most major distributions use. That’s right, no matter if you use Ubuntu, Mandriva or Fedora you will get a fresh bleeding edge version of the operating system twice a year. The fresh releases have loads of bugs on the release date, then they are maturized for a few months and once the projects get the stability up, it is time to install or upgrade to the next bleeding edge version. Unfortunately there are also distributions that do not offer this excitement. One of these distributions is the PCLinuxOS, usually abbreviated as PCLOS.
The PCLinuxOS uses a somewhat different approach. Instead of pushing out an entirely new distribution versions twice a year, they have been incrementally updating the distribution in terms of application versions and system core components. This is often titled as the rolling update approach. The previous full release of PCLOS is the 2007 version which was released almost a year ago. It shipped with Firefox 2.0.0.3, OpenOffice 2.2.0, KDE 3.5.6 and so on, but with the rolling updates philosophy it is still up-to-date after applying the updates with Synaptic. A PCLOS 2007 user still has latest stable versions of applications, and a fairly new kernel as well.
The approach that PCLOS has chosen makes distribution boring and extremely non-challenging. First of all, the PCLOS seems to be very stable and doesn’t have any of the embarrassing bugs that the bleeding edge distributions have. The upgrades are incremental, so the risk of regression errors (new bugs introduced by updates and fixes) is very well managed. This is not the case with distributions that make a new release every 6 months, as they seem to be able to break a lot of things in between the versions. In other words using PCLOS you miss all the anticipation of waiting bug fixes and the excitement of installing your system for scratch twice a year, not to mention the feeling of guts and glory if one is brave enough to perform a system upgrade to the latest release.
Seriously speaking, I think the 6 month development cycle is hurting the popularization of Linux operating systems. The whole point of frequent cycle is to keep the development pace fast. Indeed, desktop Linux distributions have made amazing progress for the last few years and are now more and more considered as suitable for regular desktop user as a Windows replacement. However, now that Linux has caught up with the competition in basic features and usability, the path to success would be to finalize, fine-tune, stabilize and productize the distributions. This finalizing effort takes time and does not fit to the twice a year upgrade cycle. After all Microsoft has ben stabilizing Windows XP for seven years and a new service pack is still to be released!
Another problem is that due to release frequency the Linux distributions way too short product life cycle - the main applications may only be offered updates for about a year or so. This is very unfortunate, as key applications are showing rapid progress, like the OpenOffice for an example which has been improving a lot recently in every updated version. Linux by nature is a very well upgradeable system, so why this feature is not utilized more? Instead the users are pushed with releases that are buggy on the release date and have a very short life-cycle - both of these characteristics are very unappealing for the Joe Average.
The Linux distributions should look more into the rolling updates approach, slow down the release cycle to at least 12 months. Product life cycle should be extended to three years, to provide stability and predictability for home and small office users. Many Linux distributions have trouble working out a business model, so perhaps the extended life cycle with applications updates might be a feature that people would be ready to pay for? Linux would be very suitable for small and home offices, but no entrepreneur is willing to reinstall the computers every year.
Luckily PCLinuxOS is different and I can continue the boring life of actually working with the operating system, instead of working on it. Radically simple!
I am running Arch, and it couldn’t be more stable. And the rolling updates are fantastic, always the newest stuff, and no problems. So what is the big deal with PCLOS?
Tag it FUD. “OOH the mainstream distros got so many Bugs! and are unstable!!! boo! ”
Please, avoid spreading such lies. PLOS is as bugged as other distros, it will still die with a bad graphics card driver.
Xanadu you are missing the point. In between the release cycles, the 6 month distros change so dramatically, that there is high certainty of bugs. I have tried extensively every major distro of the last release cycle and all of them had HUGE bugs, bugs that should belong to an alpha/beta, but not to a release. Of course the issues are and were fixed in the next month or two.
Rolling update distros upgrade only some of the components at once, so the change is incremental and things are less likely the break. PCLOS 2007 most likely has had it’s share of bugs on the release date, but it has been matured about a year now, so it is very stable. At the same time the major releases sent out new versions last autumn, and will release new ones again soon (Mandriva 2008.1, Ubuntu 8.04…)
Brandon: Most likely the big deal with PCLOS is the same greatness you find in Arch. PCLOS obviously is more targeted for newbies and out-of-the-box readiness.
Brandon,
This wasn’t a dig at any distro (save the ones that do a 6-monthly release). It seems those 6-monthly releases only just get the chance to become really stable and happy about the time the new version is released. A rolling distro doesn’t have that problem.
It seems Arch and PCLOS have similar ways of doing things, and it works for both distos. Any distro can be broken by a bad driver, but the rolling update both PCLOS and Arch use, is excellent, limiting the impact any bug has. And it’s easy enough for both to rollback the implimentation of a bugged package.
You like Arch, I like PCLOS, we both benefit from great devs, who work hard to make sure we don’t have to suffer from problems. Enjoy it!
Great article its good to see someone spreading the word about rolling release or as you termed them rolling update distros. I personally use PCLinux and am very happy not to have to reinstall and have to jump through hoops in order to get my system usable every six months. Also thank you Brandon Plaufcan for posting that Arch is also a rolling release distro. I will download and give it a try right away. If any others use a rolling release distro please list them in your comments.
What alpha/beta bugs is the author talking about? I’ve been using Ubuntu since Edgy, and have not seen any at all, and no crashes too. While personal experience may differ, and while I can’t vouch for distros other then Ubuntu, in my experience, it’s pretty safe to assume that work done by Debian community and the testing during Ubuntu’s development cycle makes the final version very stable and reliable.
The problem with rolling releases is having to download and install over 500 MB of updates if you want to install it, say, a year after. It’s really like installing it twice.
pinguin: I just pickup a single example for you. Ubuntu Gutsy Gibbon has a bug that caused Gnome to lose all visual settings. I encountered this after just 2-3 days of use. Now, if I recall correctly (can be 100% sure), openSUSE betas had the same bug, but they managed to fix it before the release.
Gibbon wasn’t a great release by Ubuntu. Let’s hope they can pick it up with Hardy, as it is going to be supported for the longer term (LTS release).
Pinguin, With a rolling release Distro, every so often, the Distro’s devs release a new updated ISO. This is so you won’t have to download 500MB if you have to reinstall “a year later”.
Regards, James
Hi Chaps..
As for downloading 500MB each time you re-install .. no, you dont really have to, when you have ten minutes spare (or it just seems about time to) just make your own LiveCD, once you have took the latest updates, we all do, its quick, cheap and easy, cant see any real problems or inconveniences really.
Mark_UK
I agree. I’ve been using PCLOS for almost a year now it has been perfect and constantly stays up to date. If I’m not mistaken this is why Simply Mepis switched back to Debian for Mepis 7 instead of Ubuntu. Mepis will now be a rolling release or at least that’s my understanding. Always been a big Mepis fan but can’t get it to run on my system darn it. Love Ubuntu also but after about a year your old OS is stuck with old and dusty packages.
I just can’t see changing out anything right now in place of PCLOS. I will say though I have Gusty on another PC using CNR from Linspire. I know many of you despise Linspire for “the deal” but CNR has actually been updating many of my packages that Ubuntu has already stopped updating. Gusty and CNR seem to be a pretty good mix right now but not sure how long that’ll last or if CNR will leave Gusty behind also when Hardy comes out. Time will tell. I think CNR can extend the life of 7.04 and 7.10 but nothing beats a distro like PCLOS where it just stays up to date all of the time.
Great review.. rolling updates are very good for PCLOS and I like it… The best distro with a release cykle is ubuntu… OpenSuse, FEdora etc etc has to many bugs at the beginning.. Ubuntu had the nvidia driver bug that crashed the system during install and really weird screen problems so I vote for Sidux, PCLOS, Arch and all the other rolling updates distros…