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For years, Google used an in-house Linux distribution called Goobuntu (based on Ubuntu LTS releases), as its development platform. No more.
After more than five years with Ubuntu, Google is replacing Goobuntu with gLinux, a Linux distribution based on Debian Testing.
[...] As MuyLinux reports, gLinux is being built from the source code of the packages and Google introduces its own changes to it. The changes will also be contributed to the upstream.
[...] How does Google plan to move to Debian Testing? The current Debian Testing release is upcoming Debian 10 Buster. Google has developed an internal tool to migrate the existing systems from Ubuntu 14.04 LTS to Debian 10 Buster. Project leader Margarita claimed in the Debconf talk that tool was tested to be working fine.
Google also plans to send the changes to Debian Upstream and hence contributing to its development.
[...] Back in 2012, Canonical had clarified that Google is not their largest business desktop customer. However, it is safe to say that Google was a big customer for them. As Google prepares to switch to Debian, this will surely result in revenue loss for Canonical.
(Score: 2) by maxwell demon on Tuesday January 23 2018, @09:45PM (1 child)
What would be the point of different distributions if they were all essentially the same with only cosmetic differences?
The Tao of math: The numbers you can count are not the real numbers.
(Score: 2) by DannyB on Tuesday January 23 2018, @10:47PM
It can be more than cosmetic differences.
First, the "cosmetics". Different desktop environments do have real, material usability differences. Users have strong preferences for different ways of working. Distributions can be focused on different primary users based on default applications.
Second, looking beneath the desktop environment (if any!). Some distributions might be focused on being extremely lightweight. (Alpine) Which makes them a good starting point for, example, Docker containers. Or focused on being a server without any desktop. Or distributions focused on being the best desktop.
Standardization is a GOOD thing to the extent that it makes it possible for package developers to make ONE build and have it work on all distributions.
Distributions could focus on security. Or running everything in a container.
It seems to me that having more standardization doesn't kill having lots of distributions. But maybe it kills having a pointlessly large number of incompatible distributions. And hey, it's open source, nobody is stopping anybody from building whatever they think is best.
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