Developers quit PCLinuxOS to start Unity Linux
Internal issues have rocked the world of PCLinuxOS, with numerous developers quitting the project. The issues appear to have started when project lead, Bill Reynolds (Texstar), took a year-long break from running the distribution and left the distro's primary system administrator, Solis, in charge. Without input from the project founder, development of PCLinuxOS 2009 by the community continued but just before release, Solis halted it so that Reynolds could overview it. The release was then delayed two weeks while it was finalised. It appears that many developers were not happy with the way this was handled and have consequently left the project.
Writing on her blog, Solis explains: "He [Reynolds] left me in charge of his 'baby' while he was on hiatus... The only problem was the 'boys'. They didn't realize the trust that the big jefe had placed in me as he handed me the keys to his 'Kingdom'. He not only handed over all the keys, but made me admin over all he had. Why couldn't they just accept his trust in me, instead of going 'behind closed doors' to plan what direction they were headed in next? It all boiled down to me stopping the release of this year's offering until 'the man' had a chance to look it over. He wasn't totally happy, and it took almost two weeks to get it in suitable shape for release. In the meantime they stomped out the door, and took a lot of people with them based on lies." The project has now started the task of "opening up to the community whereas before everything was done or controlled by a small group. Tasks are being divided up into sections, and teams are being assembled so this very thing cannot happen again (hopefully)," writes Solis.
JMiahMan, admin of the PCLinuxOS hardware database and developer of EeePCLinuxOS, voiced his dismay at the announcement: "Not hearing from Texstar for more than a year, development [by the community] continued, then the moment before release passwords were changed on servers and suddenly Texstar is back and now not only halting the release, but saying all the hard work the community did for a year wasn't good enough. That's leadership suicide." More information is sure to come to light as former developers switch to other projects.
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The issues within PCLinuxOS have rippled across other distributions which are derived from it. TinyMe, a PCLinuxOS based distribution for older hardware, has decided to
break away from the their parent distro due to irreconcilable differences: "I and many others who have packaged and/or developed for PCLinuxOS are leaving the dev team due to disagreement with individuals within it. This action was taken with no ill will intended toward PCLinuxOS and Texstar. A compromise was attempted but not achieved. I'd like to thank all the PCLinuxOS community members for their support and all TinyMe community members for their constant enthusiasm, supportive comments, and continued support/use of the distribution." According to project lead, KDulcimer, the next release will not use the official PCLinuxOS repositories and, as such, an upgrade from previous versions may not be possible. As yet it is unclear whether the project will base itself off another existing distribution, or build their own base from scratch. Either way, the project aims to continue on developing: "As it is now, TinyMe will continue development with even more vigor than in past releases," writes KDulcimer. Other derivatives which are expected to re-base and leave PCLinuxOS are, EeePCLinuxOS, Granular, PCe17OS, PCFluxboxOS, Producer Edition (previously PELinuxOS) and Tinyflux.
In related news, Derrick Devine, former administrator of the community project site MyPCLinuxOS, recently handed over control of the project and
announced work on a new Linux distribution, called Unity, with many of the other former PCLinuxOS developers: "What it will be is a new Linux distribution that takes an incremental approach to desktop Linux. It will provide a central core and use the mklivecd scripts that PCLinuxOS uses and it will provide a base from which to build just about any desktop you want out there." Currently the distro is being developed behind closed doors, but more information should come to light soon. Either way, it is clear that no animosity exists on the side of former PCLinuxOS developers, who remain grateful to the distribution for everything they have been able to achieve over the years. Derrick continues: "You won't hear us say anything bad about PCLinuxOS, its leadership, or the direction it is going. We are very proud to have been members of the PCLinuxOS community... some of us for almost six years. Nothing can take away our gratitude."