Fedora Core Shrinking

The Fedora Core Linux Blog reports that the cd-images of Fedora Core will not contain some popular applications on the next release. Even some small and powerful programs (like Abiword and Gnumeric) aren’t going to make the cut.

Some controversy has been stirred up by this move. Couldn’t some packages (such as a selection of large desktop backgrounds) be removed instead of these popular packages? Sure, packages must be removed to keep the download size down, but what to remove? Lots of people use Gnumeric and Abiword, don’t they?

With all the discussion of software value and the open source community’s attempt to applaud all good software, this is the true test of what is useful. In the end, a decision must be made about what packages will be on the download CD. Do we need KOffice as well as OpenOffice.org?
Ultimately something needs to be cut for a distro to provide only the best software to its users.