Akemi Yagi wrote:
Since CentOS strives to be a free, binary-identical version of Red Hat,
how does this process work? I imagine it goes something like this...
Red Hat releases Red Hat Enterprise Linux AS 4.6 on some date. I can't
seem to find the date on redhat.com, but according to wikipedia, it was
15th of November, 2007.[1]
So then once Red Hat releases RHEL AS 4.6, the CentOS team basically
downloads the source code/whatever they need, strips out the graphics
and other copyrighted material, "CentOS-ifies" it, and then releases it
as CentOS 4.6.
Is that basically how this process works?
So then the answer to my Samba related questions is this: Red Hat
released the security updates that I mentioned as part of Update 6.
They didn't release anything for RHEL 4.5. So naturally, the CentOS
team doesn't want to "backport" these updates to CentOS 4.5, they're
doing the same thing Red Hat did, releasing the new samba package with
the security fixes I mentioned (almost certainly in addition to other
fixes) as part of the CentOS Update 6. And personally, I have to say
that makes a lot of sense since the point of CentOS is to be as
identical to RHEL as possible.
Thanks again for responding, Johnny. Would you please let me know if I
got that right and make any necessary corrections?
Thanks,
- Bit
I think you have a clear view on this topic. There is also a related
thread in the CentOS forum and Johnny's response is comment #14
http://www.centos.org/modules/newbb/viewtopic.php?topic_id=11376&forum=42
Akemi
Thanks for your response and the link; that helped a lot.
I think I need to clear up one thing in my post for sake of posterity.
"Red Hat released the security updates [for samba] that I mentioned as
part of Update 6."
That's not really accurate. The samba updates were not really *part* of
Update 6, rather they were simply released *after* RHEL released Update 6.
Red Hat constantly releases security updates. So while we're on RHEL
4.5, Red Hat releases security updates and then these updates trickle
from RHEL 4.5 down into CentOS 4.5 at a pretty quick pace. But a RHEL
Update is a big deal; it significantly changes lots of packages. So
after RHEL 4.6 is released, it takes the CentOS team a few weeks to
"CentOS-ify" the Update and get CentOS 4.5 up to version 4.6. During
those few weeks, Red Hat is still releasing security updates, but they
are for RHEL 4.6 and cannot realistically be applied to CentOS 4.5. So
we have to wait for CentOS to become 4.6 before it can start receiving
security updates again. And THAT'S what causes the short lag in
security updates in CentOS after a point release.
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