The move will see the community development project focusing on a single repository for Fedora code, eliminating the previous distinction between those that made up the Core general purpose operating system code, and the Extras additional software packages.
The change will be implemented with the forthcoming Fedora 7, according to an announcement made by Fedora Project board member and Raleigh, North Carolina-based Red Hat employee, Bill Nottingham.
Starting with Fedora 7, there is no more Core, and no more Extras; there is only Fedora. One single repository, built in the community on open source tools, assembled into whatever spins the Fedora community desires, he wrote on the Fedora mailing list.
The first test1 release of Fedora 7 is due for release at the end of the month, with test2 at the end of February, test3 at the end of March, and final general availability at the end of April.
The Fedora 7 code will eventually find its way into Red Hat’s commercial Enterprise Linux distribution, although it could be some time given that Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5 is expected to be launched at the end of February. RHEL 5 is based on Fedora Core 6, which was released in October 2006.
Nottingham noted that it has not been decided precisely how the Fedora project will unite the Core and Extras packages. That will be one of the key elements of the Fedora 7 development effort, with the build system being modified to enable the combination.
The Fedora project last underwent a major reorganization in April 2006 as Red Hat abandoned plans to create an independent foundation but opened up the project to allow community members to sit on the Fedora Project Board. It is that board that will now decide how best to proceed with Fedora 7.
