[Beowulf] RIP CentOS 8

[David Mathog]

On 8 Dec 2020 08:27:20 -0800 Chris Samuel wrote:

> It looks like the CentOS project has announced the end of CentOS 8 as a
> version that tracked RHEL for the end of 2021, it will be replaced by
> the CentOS stream which will run ahead of RHEL8. CentOS 7 is unaffected
> (though RHEL7 only has 3 more years of life left).
> 
> https://blog.centos.org/2020/12/future-is-centos-stream/

<Insert assortment of not very nice words here.>

This is no doubt the result of some MBA at Red Hat / IBM trying to 
"monetize" the CentOS community by forcing them to buy RHEL by holding 
the threat of a less stable CentOS over their heads - without realizing 
that CentOS users are going to reject that notion wholesale.  Especially 
since it truncates the support model on CentOS 8 eight YEARS early.  
Great way to buy a boatload of bad will.

I'm expecting a new distro to fork from CentOS 8/RHEL 8 any second now 
and then track RHEL 8 going forward.  Gregory Kurtzer indicated in that 
thread that he was thinking along similar lines.  One must also wonder 
how many of the CentOS developers are going to want to ride this ship 
down.

It always seemed likely that CentOS would come to a bad end when Red Hat 
took over, and now it has.


Regards,

David Mathog
mathog at caltech.edu
Manager, Sequence Analysis Facility, Biology Division, Caltech