12/12/2025 at 1:39:28 PM
To avoid misunderstandings, this repository is about a project at Cornell University named the Flexible Extensible Digital Object Repository Architecture (FEDORA), not a Red Hat one.by fodmap
12/12/2025 at 2:52:06 PM
It took me far too long to figure this out from their site, but when I did, the project looked far less interesting.For a while there, I thought the "been in existence for 20+ years and our users represent an engaged, supportive and invested global community of users focused on sustainability and growth" was the Fedora Project extending their expertise in file organization and distribution to other use cases.
But on the bright side, I now have a link I can use to confuse my students with (to keep them out of their comfort zone and promote deep research).
by jasoneckert
12/12/2025 at 1:46:36 PM
And predates Fedora by about 6 years.by macintux
12/12/2025 at 1:58:45 PM
I was ready to be mad in the comments, now I'm mad but in the other direction.by cevn
12/13/2025 at 12:03:30 AM
It seems that in 2003 (when Fedora Linux first launched) this project was pretty obscure and early-stage, so it's hard to blame Red Hat for not having known about it then. This kind of thing just happens sometimes.by ameliaquining
12/13/2025 at 2:11:30 AM
Fedora and Red Hat aren't super common or easily accessible anymore either, since they've made their choice as they're entitled to move towards enterprise.by j45
12/14/2025 at 2:25:43 PM
I feel like fedora is pretty accessible at this point. The main speedbump is enabling non-free repos but if you're helping someone install linux for the first time you just tell them to check that box during setup.by samtheDamned
12/12/2025 at 5:56:38 PM
Don't be mad, they are clearly distinct — one is FEDORA and the other is Fedora!by stronglikedan
12/12/2025 at 2:02:45 PM
Right or wrong, who owns the trademark?by phkahler
12/12/2025 at 2:11:15 PM
Both. '...all parties settled on a co-existence agreement that stated that the Cornell-UVA project could use the name when clearly associated with open source software for digital object repository systems and that Red Hat could use the name when it was clearly associated with open source computer operating systems.'by fodmap
12/12/2025 at 2:38:35 PM
> The transferable agreement stipulated that each project must display the following text on their web site: [...]Looks like Cornell-UVA satisfied this by placing it on their about page. Red Hat on the other hand hid it on a dedicated legalese page nobody will read: https://docs.fedoraproject.org/en-US/legal/
Not a good look IMO.
by notpushkin
12/12/2025 at 10:08:20 PM
So first of all IAARHL (and I do a lot of work supporting Fedora) but IANARHTL. That said, I have seen the actual agreement (but many years ago), which predates my arrival at Red Hat by some years, but don't have immediate access to it and am disinclined to hunt down a copy solely because of this thread. However, my recollection of it is that it was quite a bit more specific than the Cornell-UVA paraphrase as to where the parties expected the notice to appear. My further recollection is that it was the Cornell-UVA FEDORA that was not really complying with the letter of the agreement as to that issue, rather than the Fedora Linux Fedora, essentially the opposite of what you're saying. To settle this we'd have to get the agreement and do some Wayback Machine research, which I'm also disinclined to do at the moment.Now, as to why it's on the Fedora Legal Docs site today, that's because a few years ago we undertook a significant migration of all "legal" content from the basically deprecated Fedora Project wiki to the newly created Fedora Legal Docs site. In general, such material is now much easier to find than it was in the wiki era (where it was spread across multiple wiki pages). I don't know when the trademark notice first came to be placed on the Fedora wiki, which itself didn't always exist, but I believe when Cornell-UVA and Red Hat signed the agreement, Fedora may have still been using a redhat.com site.
by richardfontana
12/13/2025 at 1:55:31 PM
Yeah, I believe this is correct from the legal standpoint, and as long as both parties are okay with it, it’s alright with me.My point is: Fedora is a great project, but it’s also so much more popular than FEDORA (I assume a lot of HN readers haven’t even heard about this second one before). It would be nice to mention them in just a tiny bit more prominent way – say, at the bottom of about page. But it’s really not a big deal either way.
by notpushkin
12/12/2025 at 5:27:07 PM
Due to their comparative popularity, it makes complete sense to me. You don't have people in HN comments for a new Fedora release going "Wait is this about the Digital Access Project?"What does "not a good look" even mean in this context? Getting tired of this phrase's overuse tbh. "Think of the optics" fell into disuse and I can't wait for this one to join it.
by Andrex
12/12/2025 at 9:38:56 PM
> What does "not a good look" even mean in this context?it's a kind way of saying they're being assholes?
by kasabali
12/13/2025 at 1:44:34 PM
I wouldn’t go as far as saying they’re being assholes. Fedora is a nice project after all. It’s just a bit sad to see the asymmetry here, especially since Fedora is so much more well known than FEDORA.A sibling commenter is right though: the Legal page is linked from the footer, I was looking in the wrong place.
by notpushkin
12/12/2025 at 8:13:16 PM
Red Hat is the bigger party here. Their minimization of this issue seems a little like bullying.by supercheetah
12/12/2025 at 10:48:45 PM
There is no issue except the one third-parties (such as HN commenters) are making out of it.Fedora and FEDORA reached an agreement a long time ago. Unless I missed something, neither party has disparaged the other in that time. The parent comment is making drama out of literally nothing. Neither side cares so why is parent OP trying to stir shit up?
As the kids say, "not a good look."
by Andrex
12/13/2025 at 2:02:33 AM
> not a good lookDirectly linked from every page as Legal in the footer. What do you try to say; it almost feels you imply docs.fp.o is obscuring it?
by gbraad
12/13/2025 at 2:06:24 PM
I stand corrected. I got lost in a huge amount of links in the footer of the homepage, but it is indeed linked to from another footer (which is, indeed, present on every page).by notpushkin
12/12/2025 at 2:39:03 PM
> associated with open source software for digital object repository systems and that Red Hat could use the name when it was clearly associated with open source computer operating systems.'If it's as worded, I'm surprised Fedora Directory Server didn't end up being a problem for RedHat, as its not an OS, and you could call it a digital object repository system, I guess.
Or maybe thats why they re-branded it as 389 Directory Server?
by t90fan
12/12/2025 at 10:21:13 PM
I'm pretty sure it's not why it was rebranded; the timing doesn't make sense since the rebranding occurred several years after the trademark coexistence agreement.The curious question though is why 389 was formerly called Fedora Directory Server. From what I've been told by someone who was around at the time (as I wasn't), it's because Red Hat went through a very brief period where it experimented with using the "Fedora" brand as a sort of general "upstream of Red Hat, sponsored by Red Hat" sort of community brand. This was I think quickly rejected as a bad idea but Fedora Directory Server was apparently the one (for a while) surviving example of the experiment. I imagine that the reason for the rebranding was that it was confusing to use the "Fedora" name at a certain point because the directory server project never really had anything particularly to do with Fedora (apart from the connection to Red Hat).
by richardfontana
12/12/2025 at 2:07:08 PM
The hat!> The term fedora was in use as early as 1891.
by tsak
12/12/2025 at 1:59:53 PM
Thanks for that explanation. Totally threw me for a minute.by RickJWagner
12/13/2025 at 2:11:01 AM
Didn't think about the Linux distro at all because the software was clearly described as otherwise.by j45
12/12/2025 at 4:05:09 PM
And they have Fedora Slack(ware)!by actionfromafar
12/12/2025 at 5:19:36 PM
Wait - I saw a link to a Slack chat workspace. Do they have something for Slackware Linux as well?by iNate2000
12/12/2025 at 5:36:21 PM
No, sorry it was that I meant. Also confusing when you are primed to think RedHat -> Fedora -> Slackware :)by actionfromafar