On 07/03/14 18:09, Ary Kleinerman wrote:
Hi,
I'm a new Archer and I'm planning to install arch linux in a production
server environment, but I have doubts because Arch is a rolling release. My
question is: what does it happen when there are big changes? e.g. changes
in the filesystem or when Arch has started using systemd.
Regards,
Ary
Hi,
As far as the rolling release is concerned, I don't think it should be
banned just because the servers are production ones. To be honest, I
think the problem goes a little deeper than that, and as it so happens,
I ran into a similar questioning recently.
I think there are two important questions to ask :
- Is the server set up for final users or actual programmers/technical
folks ?
- Does the server require maximal uptime, and how much downtime can it
afford to take ?
For the first one, that's what finally brought me back to Debian on my
latest install, even though I had absolutely no technical issue with
using Arch. You see, I work with web developers on this machine, and
they need an nginx server with PHP and MySQL available for their
applications. To me, that is the tricky thing : these developers would
assassinate me if I kept updating PHP regularly, because their local
development environment doesn't have the same update rhythm, meaning I
would probably take down their applications very often, because they
cannot handle versions of PHP higher than theirs. Pretty logical
actually, especially with Windows-based developers, who need to do a lot
more manipulations to keep their WAMP install up-to-date (when they
can). Same thing happens with other applications, even though I can't
quote many more right now. Anyway, the question reveals an important
point when you work with programmers : make sure you match development
and production environments as much as you can (and it *does* require a
lot of efforts if one of them is Arch).
Now, if your server aims at final users, like students (out of the
computing field) or administratives, then I don't see many risks to
anticipate. Applications do not rely on each other very much, crashing
one doesn't mean taking the whole thing down. A failed update could be
fixed without too much services downtime required.
The other question on the other hand remains quite obvious. If your
server runs a simple Intranet in a company, where documents can still be
shared physically in last resort, well : install Arch and enjoy the
ride! The information system can afford longer downtimes, giving you
enough time to fix whatever update messed things up. By the way, I
strongly believe you will fix things faster if you like your environment
(I assume it is Arch here, of course). Being used to your system is much
more important than its stability when it comes to your sysadmin speed
of reaction.
All in all : think about who uses (and messes with) your server, and how
much they rely on it. To me, those are two important things to take into
account when choosing your distribution.
