[ Thanks to Patrick
Mullen for this link. ]
“First formed in 1997, Conectiva was known as Conectiva Linux
Parolin. In 1999 they released the first distribution focused on
server technology, which included a whopping 1900 pages of
documentation, which is pretty much unheard of in today’s world of
100 page manuals. 1999 also marked the year that Conectiva released
version 4.0, the distribution that brought them to the attention of
the rest of the planet.”
“Still, what makes Conectiva truly unique is that it is the only
Portuguese/Spanish/English distribution in the world. The only
other distribution that offers Spanish language capability that I
am aware of is Best Linux. Due to where they are situated, this
makes complete sense, as they can easily serve and support the huge
South and Central American markets. Since there are large Spanish
and Portuguese communities situated worldwide, Conectiva can cater
to markets in both the US and Europe. Amazingly, their English
support is quite good, with only a few translation errors in the
on-line documentation.”
“The second, and even more important feature that makes
Conectiva unique, is that version 6.0 of their distribution has APT
(Advanced Package Tool) enabled RPM package management. Finally, a
better way to install RPMs. This distribution now has automatic
dependency checking and the ability to pull the required files off
the internet if not available locally. Debian users may laugh at
this as they have had this for years, however; this is a first in
the RPM realm and will hopefully take the world by storm.”