[lsb-discuss] Determining OS variant

[Robert Schweikert]

Hi Jon,

On 03/21/2011 01:02 PM, Jon Masters wrote:
> Greetings LSB,
>
> I was recently answering some questions for an associate of mine
> concerning lsb_release. This is, of course, an excellent way to
> determine the OS version that is in use. One thing this utility does not
> support (today) is the provision of a variant of the OS:
>
> Server
> Desktop
> Workstation
> etc.
>

The LSB is not modular, at least not in this sense. In a way your 
question also points at the root of the problem that we face with 
modularization.

We do not want variants of the LSB. The LSB is intended to be one 
standard and a distribution is either certified, or it is not. At the 
same time we realize that it is desirable to install parts of the LSB. 
The popular example here is a server without installing any desktop 
packages.

The problem we have to solve from an LSB perspective is to allow the 
creation and querying of modules while at the same time ensuring the 
integrity of LSB, i.e. modules != variants.

> Do you think you might add such an option?

I believe we already have a bug for modularization in the LSB bugzilla. 
This topic will also be discussed during out meeting at the LF 
Collaboration Summit.

> And tell me how one would go
> about making a request to have this option added?

Generally we track requests as bug:
http://bugs.linuxbase.org/

HTH,
Robert

-- 
Robert Schweikert                           MAY THE SOURCE BE WITH YOU
Novell-IBM Software Integration Center                LINUX
Tech Lead
rschweikert at novell.com
rschweikert at ca.ibm.com
781-464-8147

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