Mandrakesoft Rejiggers Its Linux Roadmap, Naming Conventions

by Timothy Prickett Morgan

One of the great things about the open source Linux operating system is the speed with which the many thousands of members of the open source community develop features for Linux and the other system and application programs that run on top of Linux. Open source software is seething with change, and it evolves right before your very eyes. While nerds love this constant change, this is exactly what commercial and consumer Linux customers do not want. They want stability.

And that is why Linux distro Mandrakesoft is taking the pace down a notch and getting in phase with its customers. This week, Mandrakesoft announced it will eventually be moving to a more leisurely and predictable release schedule.

It is no accident that the change in the speed at which Mandrakesoft delivers new Linux releases is being announced in the wake of the company's recent acquisition of Conectiva, a Linux distributor that focused mostly on Spanish and Portuguese Linux distributions in South America while Mandrakesoft focused on French and English distributions of Linux in France and North America. (See Mandrakesoft Buys Rival Linux Distro, Conectiva for more information on that acquisition.)

Gael Duval, one of the founders of Mandrakesoft, says the changes to its Linux roadmap and development schedule are the result of requests from partners and distributors to have a longer development cycle--in this case, an annual cycle, which is the pace of change that Mandrakesoft now says is optimal. An annual update cycle gives Mandrakesoft and its partners more time to prepare for releases and to sell a product before they have to gear up to sell an update of it. Not coincidentally, customers who are getting commercial Linux distributions and who are therefore buying Linux support for at least a year for a particular snapshot of the Linux and related software stack (that is what a commercial distro is, after all), want to milk their money for all it is worth, too. Users are also interested in having vendors like Mandrakesoft ensure that forthcoming Linux features are fully cooked before they are rolled out in commercial products and in their home or corporate machines. Perhaps as significant, Mandrakesoft, having acquired Conectiva, wants to create a merged product line and get the combined software engineering staff of the company (70 employees in total) working on creating this merged product.

Before Mandrakesoft moves to an annual release schedule and moves in Conectiva features and functionality, it is going to put out a "transitional" version of Linux. This release will be called Mandrakelinux Limited Edition 2005. As you can see from this naming scheme, Mandrakesoft is moving toward a naming scheme that has the year of its release in it, which makes it easier for everyone to identify that release. Microsoft started this year-based naming scheme with Windows 95, and very few vendors have opted for it because it clearly identifies just how long in the tooth a product is. However, the Linux community is not Microsoft, and it stands to reason that Mandrakesoft will be able to keep on its annual release schedule even if the core Linux development slips and slides a bit, as happened with the Linux 2.4 and 2.6 kernels. When the Linux community slips, it is a matter of months, not years.

In any event, Mandrakelinux Limited Edition 2005 will ship this spring (which technically started yesterday and which gives the company 13 more weeks to get it done). It will support an up-to-date Linux kernel as well as the KDE 3.3 and Gnome 2.8 graphical user interfaces and the Firefox 1.0.1 Web browser. It will be based on the current development branch and it will not have full support and services from Mandrakesoft. This version will not be available through retail channels, but will be available as a DVD or CD set or as a download through Mandrakesoft's online store.

This fall, Mandrakelinux 2006 will fully integrate Conectiva technologies and Mandrakesoft's online services into a single, unified product. Unlike the Limited Edition 2005 release, the Mandrakelinux 2006 release will have full services and support and will be available through retail channels.

By the way, the existing Mandrakelinux 10.1 for consumers, Mandrakelinux Corporate Desktop for business PCs and laptops, and Mandrakelinux Corporate Server 3.0--all based on the Linux 2.6 kernel--will continue to be available until the Mandrakelinux 2006 ships this fall, and depending on demand, the company may sell these products for some time after the new release is out. The 2006 Edition will presumably have standard and premium Corporate Server editions, as the current 3.0 product does, and the desktop products will probably also be available in the Discovery, PowerPack, and PowerPack+ variants that Mandrakesoft currently sells with its Linux 2.6 products; these variations provide different features at different prices.