The second beta of Mandriva Linux 2008, codenamed Galilee, is now available. The release notes are available here. A guide to major new features (some of which are not yet implemented in this beta) is available here, and the detailed technical specifications are available here. This beta is available as a three CD or one DVD Free edition (containing no non-free software or drivers) for the x86-32 and x86-64 architectures, with a traditional installer. Future betas will be available in One live/install CD hybrid editions with proprietary drivers.
To view parent comment, click here.
To read all comments associated with this story, please click here.
Member since:2005-07-08
As I was saying, you're watching this under the wrong perspective. You're still assuming people have the means to follow every single revisions of a given software just to keep it source compatible whereas source compability is supposed to be the biggest strenght of OSS.
It's the role of the os maker to make sure that software still run on the new version.
I'm not saying at all that the default should be gcc3, the default shoud be everything still working when I upgrade, not the opposite. If I'm paying 79 euros (the prize of mandriva 2007.1 in any french retail store), I want to be sure that the software I use will run in 3 or 4 years.
This is the whole point of big company certyfing for windows, solaris or red hat enterprise and not mandriva, they want to make sure that their custommers will be able to run their software for as long as they want.
And this is simply not the case with Mandriva (without a lot of asshle) whatever side you're looking at it.
Member since:
2005-07-06
Looking at that page, GIZA++ hasn't been updated since 2003. There have been several major GCC revisions since then. It's simply not practical to stay on a version of GCC that works for this and maybe a couple of other old apps (3.3?) by default, and introduce huge difficulties in building more widely used and up-to-date software which is now targeting GCC 4.
A distributor's job is always going to involve trade offs. In this case, I'm afraid, there's just more benefits overall to defaulting to GCC 4 than GCC 3.