XFree86 4.3.0 in Debian Unstable

Anonymous Coward writes "XFree86 4.3.0 has finally made it into Debian unstable. See the announcement." Note that Direct Rendering is broken (there's already a bug filed, and I'm experiencing the same problem - looks like something small and stupid, affecting everyone), so don't dist-upgrade just yet.

Isn't this late?

[theridersofrohan]

This is not mean to be a troll, honest. But wasn't the whole purpose of Debian Unstable to be really up to date? I mean, when people complain that debian is way too far behind, debian fans are quick to point out that debian has three distros and that unstable is really quite stable and as up to date as other distros. Now, XFree86 4.3.0 was released on the 26th of February last year [xfree86.org]- Why did it take a whole year for it to be included in unstable?

Don't start yapping about the delay..

[Captain Rotundo]

Remember Debian has 11 architectures to support... far more than any other major distro, and far more that the XFree86 team supports.

So you can bitch that once again Debian is behind the times, but remmember YOUR copy of XFree86 is more stable because of all the porting and testing the fine folks at the Debian X Strike Force do.

I just have to say I was glad to wait this long, and good work guys.

Re:I love Debian

[alexpage]

Apache's license may not be GPL-compatiable, but that doesn't mean it's not free software. according to the FSF [fsf.org]:

This is a permissive non-copyleft free software license with a few requirements that render it incompatble with the GNU GPL. We urge you not to use the Apache licenses for software you write. However, there is no reason to avoid running programs that have been released under this license, such as Apache.

Re:Isn't this late?

[hummassa]

No, this is the point of *experimental*. XF4.3 is in experimental for quite some time now.

Re:I love Debian

[Sevn]

Debian makes a great server. It's perfect for the situation where you can't use FreeBSD and you aren't getting hounded for Red Hat. I've never used it as a desktop because it's not well suited for it. Much like FreeBSD doesn't make a great desktop OS. Gentoo, on the other hand, makes an excellent desktop OS. I'd don't run Gentoo on servers anymore though. I've never understood the "holy war world domination" aspect of any of this. To corporate America it comes across as so much childish prattle. We actually had an employee trying to sell us on Debian for something completely unsuited and one of his bullits was a "saving the world from microsoft!!!!" rant and the really sad thing was he didn't even understand why including that "point" was a bad idea. When I tried to explain that our proprietary storage solution would not support Debian for their active/passive dual path fiber channel driver, he flipped out. Suggested we "sell the piece of shit" because it wouldn't work with Debian. Sure. We are going to part with our half million dollar fiber channel array because the company won't support Debian. Now I have higher-ups asking me what we should do with this guy and saying "I think he has a real passion for his work" isn't cutting it. They hear "he's a nut". Zealotry is fine but keep it at home. Oh, and there is no excuse for waiting over 13 months for an "unstable" version of XFree. You apologists can apologize away all you want, but that is ridiculous. I'm sorry. It's also hard to sell people on the idea that a free Linux with a 2.2 stable kernel is better than a 600 dollar "Enterprise Server" Linux with a 2.4.21-9 kernel. There is a lot of Red Hat 3.0 ES here. And even though I freaking HATE Red Hat because of how shitty rpm is, I have to admit that we have had zero problems with up2date and patches, and they seem to be very up to date with them. It has actually been a joy lately admining the 20 or so boxes. It's STILL not nearly as easy as babysitting a well configured FreeBSD farm, but it's getting pretty close.