Derivatives of Red Hat Linux

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Red Hat is not the only game in Linux town. Red Hat Linux is one of the most popular distributions, however, and the company has had a tremendous impact on the open source community in general and on Linux distributions in particular. Many distributions are derived from Red Hat Linux; some are direct "knock-offs", and some merely use the same packaging format. This section lists a few popular derivatives or cousins of Red Hat Linux.

Mandrake

Mandrake is a Linux distribution produced by MandrakeSoft. Mandrake is focused on the desktop market and provides some financial support to the KDE project in the same way that Red Hat supports the GNOME project. Mandrake was originally based on a version of Red Hat Linux but has since diverged. Mandrake still tracks Red Hat Linux, but only loosely, to maintain feature-byfeature parity. Mandrake generally eschews most of Red Hat's custom software (such as kudzu and anaconda, the installer) in favor of its own versions. Mandrake also includes additional tools addressing how the user interacts with the system; for example, Mandrake includes a "supermount" program that aims to make it transparent for users to mount various devices. Finally, Mandrake also includes a wide variety of software, including a great deal of beta or alpha quality software.

Caldera

Caldera's OpenLinux distribution is aimed squarely at the corporate market. Caldera is not as rigorous about remaining strictly open source as is Red Hat, and so Caldera ships a number of proprietary (non–open source) software packages with their distribution. Caldera also provides support and professional services for their distribution. Caldera has other Unix-like offerings in addition to their Linux distribution; notably, Caldera now owns UnixWare, which is the only true direct descendant from the original AT&T SysV Unix. Caldera's OpenLinux was originally based on an older version of Red Hat Linux, but diverged fairly early on.

TurboLinux

TurboLinux produces a distribution focused on clustering and high-availability servers. Their distribution is typically used in either large, Beowulf parallel "number crunchers" or in server clusters for web sites or application servers. TurboLinux does not track the latest and greatest software as aggressively other distributions, but instead focuses on its own clustering solutions.

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