Hi all,

In this week's Gentoo Weekly Newsletter, there is mention of the forthcoming launch of a Gentoo-based startup that will provide custom binary packages to subscribing users through standard Portage mechanisms.

The service is developed and provided by a startup called GenUX.

Information on their site is a bit sparse at the moment, but it sounds like something I'd be interested in.

If Caker and our little Gentoo community could agree a "Gentoo Linode profile" (i.e. -X, -gnome, etc.) with GenUX -- thereby limiting Linode usage of GenUX servers -- I reckon this might be worth an additional $2-$3 a month per opted-in Gentoo user. If Linode.com could handle the GenUX subscriptions as a whole; Linode/Gentoo users just need to opt-in as an extra to their regular account.

Any other Linode/Gentoo users willing to express an interest?


Cliff

I would be willing to -- except I already have debian on my server.

_________________
Jay Faulkner
http://oldos.org

Or could compile your packages yourself with exactly the USE flags you want and save $2-$3 a month. nice and nohup are your friends.

Whats the point?

I don't think this is going to fly - at least not yet.

GenUX is in closed alpha at the moment - perhaps a little early to be asking caker about implementing it. The service is priced at $10 per computer per month (presumably tied to IP addresses), so caker would have to cut some kind of deal for joint usage by Linodes.

If your Linode is too busy to compile what you need, spend the $3 on extra bandwidth and distcc on your home workstation while you sleep.

_________________
/ Peter

Some good points made by all.



So did I 1999-2003, but after some time in NetBSD-land, I now prefer my Linux to be served by Gentoo.




I do that already -- package them locally, upload them to my Linode, then emerge -ukg them. It works, but is very time-consuming and is especially irritating for unscheduled maintenance like security updates.



They are accepting contact at the moment with a BETA rollout anticipated in a few weeks.



My original post was not too clear, but yes, that's the idea. My $2-$3 per opt-in Gentoo Linode is well below the $10 indicated at the GenUX site, but I think reasonable considering that no Linoder is likely to be emerging x11, gnome or other huge meta-packages.

As for Chris, he already buys in services "on our behalf" from HE and TP. He also does some administering of licenses for a commercial webadmin front-end. A GenUX setup would be no different.

I assumed, as you did, that access control of GenUX services will be IP-based. If this is indeed the case, then Chris's administration costs would be minimal or, if script-based, even zero. GenUX would then just be an opt-in Linode Extra and paid as part of our monthly fee.

Among Gentoo users at large, there is some demand for binary packaging -- not all circumstances are right for source builds. The reason for the top post was to determine whether or not there is a significant level of demand for such an Extra here.

If not, it's not a problem -- even though I think it would be a great feature to have.

Regards,

Cliff

Hi I'm Joseph from GenUX and yes we could work out a deal with linode especially since I am sure linode users wouldn't be installing things like KDE or Gnome but more like Apache or Postfix.

If someone from Linode wishes to discuss such an idea please contact me directly: jcohen at gen-ux.com

Joseph