The most recent version of Fedora, Red Hat's cutting-edge Linux distribution, provides users of Red Hat's more staid and stable Red Hat Enterprise Linux an early look at what's to come in their operating system of choice.
In addition to serving as sort of a Linux technology preview, Fedora 11 can itself serve in a full gamut of Linux roles--as long as Fedora-embracing users are prepared for the upgrade and bug mitigation that can accompany the use of such a fast-paced distribution.
Organizations in search of a freely available Linux server for production roles would do best to steer toward CentOS, which tracks RHEL and benefits from the bug-squashing efforts of the Fedora vanguard.
In my tests of Fedora 11, the biggest improvements were in the area of virtualization, with the Red Hat-led toolset around creating, accessing and managing virtual machines across multiple hosts continuing to mature.
As a virtualization server, Fedora still lags behind proprietary options such as those from VMware in functionality and polish. However, the fast clip at which Fedora's tools are progressing bodes well for the next major RHEL version.
Fedora 11 can also serve well in desktop roles, as it includes the latest and greatest of desktop-oriented open-source software, including Version 2.26.1 of the GNOME desktop environment, Version 3.1 of the OpenOffice.org productivity suite and Version 3.5 Beta 4 of the Firefox Web browser
:source: News source:
eweek.com