Debian is a community-led Linux distribution project, and so lacks the marketing power of Red Hat and Novell’s SUSE Linux, but one thing it is not short of is users. It is the second most popular Linux distribution for web serving behind Red Hat, according to Netcraft’s March 2005 Linux web server survey.
It has also been chosen for some high profile Linux deployments, such as the City of Munich’s LiMux project to move 14,000 desktops from Microsoft’s Windows to Linux, and the Linex project of the regional government of Extremadura, Spain.
It is also the basis of a number of commercial vendor-led Linux distributions, from the likes of Progeny, Linspire, Xandros, and Sun Wah Linux, as well as Canonical’s Ubuntu Linux, and Bruce Perens’s UserLinux project.
Mr Perens is the former Debian project leader, but it is the project’s founder – and now Progeny chairman and chief strategist – Ian Murdock who is leading the push towards a common core and release schedule.
The seeds for the plan appear to have been sown with a posting on his blog in June, which argued that the Debian project needed a more structured approach if it is to make the most of its potential.
In his blog, Mr Murdock argued that Debian needs a predictable release cycle, better engagement with ISVs, IHVs, and OEMs, to work more closely with the Linux Standards Base, and to make the most of the collective power of the numerous Debian-based distributions.
Reports indicate that the Debian Core Consortium is an attempt to respond to those needs and cater more to the demands of potential enterprise customers. A predictable release cycle and compatibility with the LSB will certainly help, and ISV/IHV support is key to gaining traction among enterprise customers.
The first of these two goals are in the Debian community’s own hands. The third, while potentially problematic given the preference of ISVs and IHVs for fewer platforms to support, could be achievable given the existing popularity of Debian distributions.
Harnessing the collective power of the various Debian-based Linux distributions could be a harder nut to crack, despite the commercial benefits promised by increased standardization. Previous vendor-led standardization efforts, such as UnitedLinux and the Linux Core Consortium, have tried before.
UnitedLinux fell apart after founding member Caldera became SCO Group and started making legal claims against Linux code, and it remains to be seen what impact the formation of the Debian Core Consortium will have on the Linux Core Consortium. The LCC was founded in November 2004 by Progeny, Madrakesoft, Conectiva (now combined as Mandriva), and Turbolinux.
Mandriva is currently trying to mount its own challenge to Red Hat and Novell following the combination of Mandrakesoft, Conectiva, and Lycoris into the new company, and Mandriva has already stated that it has no plans to move to a Debian-based distribution from its various RPM-based products.
