---
created_at: '2013-05-06T18:31:50.000Z'
title: Linux is not about choice (2008)
url: http://www.redhat.com/archives/rhl-devel-list/2008-January/msg00861.html
author: emillon
points: 295
story_text: ''
comment_text: 
num_comments: 231
story_id: 
story_title: 
story_url: 
parent_id: 
created_at_i: 1367865110
_tags:
- story
- author_emillon
- story_5663926
objectID: '5663926'

---
[Source](https://www.redhat.com/archives/rhl-devel-list/2008-January/msg00861.html "Permalink to Linux is not about choice [was Re: Fedora too cutting edge?]")

# Linux is not about choice [was Re: Fedora too cutting edge?]

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# Linux is not about choice [was Re: Fedora too cutting edge?]

* * *
* _From_: Adam Jackson <ajackson redhat com>
* _To_: Development discussions related to Fedora <fedora-devel-list redhat com>
* _Subject_: Linux is not about choice [was Re: Fedora too cutting edge?]
* _Date_: Wed, 09 Jan 2008 15:58:45 -0500
* * *
    
    
    > Linux is about choice.
    
    If I could only have one thing this year, it would be to eliminate that
    meme from the collective consciousness.  It is a disease.  It strangles
    the mind and ensures you can never change anything ever because someone
    somewhere has OCD'd their environment exactly how they like it and how
    dare you change it on them you're so mean and next time I have friends
    over for Buffy night you're not invited mom he's sitting on my side
    again.
    
    As a consumer, yes, you have lots of choices in which Linux you use.
    This does not mean Linux is in any sense _about_ choice, any more than
    because there are so many kinds of cars you can buy that cars are about
    choice.
    
    The complaints up-thread about juju and pulse are entirely valid, but
    the solution is not to try to deliver two things at once.  If you try to
    deliver both at once you have to also deliver a way of switching between
    the two.  Now you have three moving parts instead of one, which means
    the failure rate has gone up by a factor of _six_ (three parts, and
    three interactions).  We have essentially already posited that we have
    insufficient developer effort to have 100%-complete features at ship
    time, so asking them to take on six times the failure rate when they're
    already overburdened is just madness.  Alternatively, we could say that
    we're integrating features too rapidly, but you do that at the expense
    of goal 1, to be the showcase for the latest and greatest in free
    software.
    
    Software is hard.  The way to fix it is to fix it, not sweep it under
    the rug.
    
    There is a legitimate discussion to be had about where and how we draw
    the line for feature inclusion, about how we increase and formalize our
    testing efforts, and about how we develop and deploy spike solutions for
    corner-case problems like the one device class that juju happens to do
    worse than the old stack.  But the chain of logic from "Linux is about
    choice" to "ship everything and let the user chose how they want their
    sound to not work" starts with fallacy and ends with disaster.
    
    - ajax
    
    

* * *
* **Follow-Ups**: 
    * [**Re: Linux is not about choice [was Re: Fedora too cutting edge?]][4]**
        * _From:_ Jesse Keating
    * [**Re: Linux is not about choice [was Re: Fedora too cutting edge?]][8]**
        * _From:_ Dave Airlie
    * [**Re: Linux is not about choice [was Re: Fedora too cutting edge?]][9]**
        * _From:_ Thorsten Leemhuis
    * [**Re: Linux is not about choice [was Re: Fedora too cutting edge?]][10]**
        * _From:_ David Zeuthen
    * [**Re: Linux is not about choice [was Re: Fedora too cutting edge?]][11]**
        * _From:_ John Dennis
    * [**Re: Linux is not about choice [was Re: Fedora too cutting edge?]][12]**
        * _From:_ Patrice Dumas
* **References**: 
    * [**Fedora too cutting edge?][13]**
        * _From:_ Hans de Goede
    * [**Re: Fedora too cutting edge?][14]**
        * _From:_ Thorsten Leemhuis
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[1]: https://www.redhat.com/msg00860.html
[2]: https://www.redhat.com/msg00862.html
[3]: https://www.redhat.com/msg00859.html
[4]: https://www.redhat.com/msg00863.html
[5]: https://www.redhat.com/thread.html#00861
[6]: https://www.redhat.com/date.html#00861
[7]: https://www.redhat.com/author.html#00861
[8]: https://www.redhat.com/msg00865.html
[9]: https://www.redhat.com/msg00869.html
[10]: https://www.redhat.com/msg00871.html
[11]: https://www.redhat.com/msg00875.html
[12]: https://www.redhat.com/msg00888.html
[13]: https://www.redhat.com/msg00845.html
[14]: https://www.redhat.com/msg00848.html

