Thanks Konstantin for all of this great information.

I'll second the recommendation to watch Troy's video.
It makes me feel a bit more comfortable that Alma/Rocky will be able to 
deliver the 10 years of updates.

I still have a sour taste for this new "module" packaging scheme. It 
seems to make rebuilding installation media with a custom package set a 
headache.  I've managed to hack something together, but it isn't 
pretty.  Has anyone else successfully tackled this?

-Mark

On 5/4/21 12:41 PM, Konstantin Olchanski wrote:
> On Mon, May 03, 2021 at 09:14:11PM +0000, Dave Dykstra wrote:
>> Here's a presentation at HEPiX'21 from CERN that's publicly available:
>>      https://indico.cern.ch/event/995485/contributions/4256466/
> Thank you for the link, I was not aware of this presentation.
>
> For further reading, it contains a link to the March meeting of the linux
> future committee: https://indico.cern.ch/event/1019875/
>
> All materials are publically available, the zoom chat transcript requires
> a CERN login (which I have), I am reading through the stuff now.
>
>
> First impressions from the HEPIX presentation:
>
> - there is no explanation how CentOS Stream is a technically acceptable replacement
> for CentOS Linux. There is many questions here, none answered.
>
> - there is no suggestion of reviving the CERN+FermiLab collaboration
> (named SL or otherwise). This is surprising, if Princeton can roll out
> a "new centos", CERN+Fermilab have even more resources to do same.
>
> - there is no suggestion of CERN providing extended support for CentOS-8. To me, this would be the obvious path forward.
>
> - first slide of "distribution landscape" is nonsense, with everybody stuck with el7 for another 3 years and bye, bye, c++14, c++17, c++20.
>
> - second slide of "distribution landscape" has LHC experiments changing horses in the middle of Run 3. Good luck with that.
>
> - no discussion of "red hat takedown/takeover of centos, 2.0" scenario for Rocky Linux & co.
>
>
> First impressions from the "linux future" meeting in March:
>
> - 30 minutes of our Troy Dawson leading Red Hat's video presentation: https://videos.cern.ch/record/2756480 (where they say "rail", they mean RHEL, took me a while to catch this)
>
> - "CC7 is not an option to use for RUN3 at CMS", page 4, https://indico.cern.ch/event/1019875/attachments/2214410/3751654/lfc002.pdf
>
> - support for 64-bit ARM is a requirement (good, but what about existing 32-bit ARM and 32-bit x86 machines?)
>
> - page 5, key take away, "Most likely moving to CS8 is your best option, as this allows for a trivial upgrade path to EL8 at a later date".
>
> (Is this true? Can somebody point me to the instructions for upgrading Centos Stream 8 to RHEL 8? A quick google search finds nothing)
>
> - Linux BOF slides https://indico.cern.ch/event/995485/sessions/386343/attachments/2209929/3739897/hepixLinuxBoFMarch16th2021.pdf
> - Linux BOF 82 min video https://videos.cern.ch/record/2756412
>
> - Ben Maurice slides https://codimd.web.cern.ch/p/Zcc5CqncC#/1
>
> - zoom chat (requires cern login) - all questions raised are reflected in Ben Maurice slides.
>
>
> Bottom line.
>
> All arrows point at CentOS Stream, but there is no review/evaluation of it's technical suitability
> for HEP specific needs. Good/bad/etc compared to el7 and compared to non-RPM alternatives (ubuntu,
> etc). And there is many questions, none answered.
>
> It looks like everybody will have to do their own evaluation and decide for themselves.
>
> P.S.
>
> Do watch Troy's video!
>
>