[Project Idea] Looking ahead to the future of Linux ... [ I am on the Digest list, so send responses directly if you expect an immediate response. ] Although I am a new user, I am quickly growing very fond of Zope. Quite amazing, multiplatform and all. The option to use either the built-in DB or an external one, the built-in web server or an external one. My entire company is thinking of standardizing on Zope since we run Solaris, Linux and NT (along with a few, rogue *BSD variants) on our server-end. Little and big internal projects aside, I was wondering if Zope could possibly fill a gap that will come about with Linux shortly. That gap is software distribution at the enterprise server to client level. Linux (and many other OpenSource software and systems) is winning in the server arena, but the corporate desktop world is staying with NT and the consumer world is staying 95/98. While the third will take awhile, the corporate desktop is something that is attainable in the next few years (with all the Windows 2000 issues which I do not want to get into). Microsoft has SMS for NT and even Apple has a better system for MacOS X Server. What does Linux have? First off, most Linux distributions have RPM. While the format is the same, the filesystem and other distribution or installation-specific configuration may differ. Quite possibly, a Zope-based distributed management system could be built to serve this purpose. I guess my main question is if anyone else is trying to forge such a project togther. E.g., does the Caldera Open Administriative System (COAS) plan to solve such software distribution issues? If not, do any others? If not, I'd say it is a BIG DEAL to get such a project underway. And Zope may be the perfect fit for the back-end (hence, why I am posting this to this list instead of a my local LUG). Just an idea. Please feel free to pick it apart (short of calling me an idiot, well maybe you should anyway :-). I am still learning Python at this stage (big-time Perl advocate, but Python is definately better for web-apps). -- Bryan Bryan J. Smith mailto:b.j.smith@ieee.org,bjs@crc.com Software Engineer http://www.SmithConcepts.com/legal.html ============================================================== How can you say your operating system (OS) is enterprise- scalable when you run a competing operating system for your mail services (Solaris for Hotmail), sport the absolute worst uptimes for application services versus all other OSes (con- tinuous crashes under heavy loads), and have just now, finally started an 64-bit port let alone it is a completely incompa- tible fork from your existing 32-bit API?