FC5 vs CentOS 4.3 for the new server

I'm debating which linux to drop on for the new server.

The debate is between Fedora Core 5 and CentOS

CentOS has a 5 year maintenance cycle that patches will still be released for it... Assuming that the CentOS organization exists in 5 years.

The draw back IMO is that it's still on the 2.6.9 kernel, and probably will be for all 5 years. That isn't to say I couldn't roll my own kernel, but the point of running CentOS is that it's on a much longer maintenance cycle and wont be picking up new things.

Fedora Core 5 has a much shorter maintenance cycle. The best that could be hoped for with it is around 2 years. It is on 2.6.17 now, but keeps rolling forward. That's both good and bad. Good in that it's a much newer kernel, but bad in that it could be less stable.

Just to give an idea of the age of 2.6.9, we haven't been running it since we rebooted back on 2005-08-23

Anyway, I'm wondering if anyone has opinions on either or both. I think I'll make a decision tomorrow.

Dru

I would recommend going with whatever is easier to work with from the programming standpoint. The lifespan is almost irrelevant due to the changes in the game over time. Then again Dru, I drive a concrete truck.

Well you've really hit the nail on the head there, Dru. I've been debating this myself for some time.

The short life cycle of FC5 is a concern, as is the stability (think of it as Redhat Enterprise Linux 5 Beta). But the balance to that is that you probably won't be needing a whole lot in the way of "extra" libraries or packages, I'd guess, and with fewer stuff packages installed, there's fewer to update, and less of a chance that you'd need to be worried about instability brought on by cutting edge code.

CentOS I've never touched or read much about. But if it's as you say, the only comfort I can offer there is that they should be patching the kernel for bugs and vulerabilities. As is commonly the case with RHEL packages, the version of software they report isn't always exactly the actual version. Is there much difference from a development/functionality standpoint between 2.6.9 and 2.6.17? Of the functionality that is there, how much would you use?

Finally, I may have been in some sleep-deprived/Pseudofed haze, but IIRC, you had to get a RAID card for the box. Are the drivers compatible with 2.6.17? That may lock in the answer for you.

Hey look! A relatively short answer from me!

This is a tough one. As you and I discussed last night, I don't have much experience with CentOS. I think given the fact that the machine is visible from the net, I would first make triple sure both address the occasional security vulnerabilities regularly. I doubt that there will be much differences in terms of the two kernels, as far as your hardware was concerned (machine is not the bleeding edge in terms of CPU, etc.), since both are 2.6. But you may get slightly better performance as they put tweeks and such in 2.6.17 (with the occasional goof).

As for maintenance cycle, well, having worked for a major Telco and dealt with systems which handled all sorts of things for AT&T (800, collect calls, etc), Audix systems and such, and later with the VM systems at Verizon, AT&T and Cingular, I know that HW tends to act up frequently enough that even with RAID and such, the diffs between two and five years really will not be as big a deal as you think.

In the end, it may just be better to go with FC given your familiarity with it and its track record.

And like BotFodder, this is a pretty short answer for me too.

I'm a Windows 2000/2003 man, but given your pros and cons here I would go with Fedora. I'm a stickler for patches - for the aforementioned reason.

I'd run it on ...er, that middle distro. There's stable, testing, and one other, and one's in the middle.

CentOS takes the patches from redhat and says they'll roll them within 72 hours, although they try to do so in a 24 hour window.

I'm downloading the centos isos now. We'll see how it goes.

the 3ware raid card drivers were introduced directly into the 2.6 kernel, so they're already there and good to go.

Looks like CentOS it is