Should YaST Become Independent?

Kevan's blog includes a number of screen shots from a current YaST build. He feels that YaST from openSUSE is now ready to be ported to other systems: "I would have to say it is far from 'Yet another Setup Tool'. I consider it 'The ultimate Setup Tool'."

Kevan ultimately presents the notion of forking YaST to other distributions, based on an idea openSUSE community manager Joe Brockmeier offered last Friday in his blog. Brockmeier wondered if YaST should be released separately from openSUSE, an idea he in turn inherited from Stanislav Visnovsky, who asserts in his own blog that "YaST is a tool that can be used across distributions and there are people interested in this to happen."

Brockmeier cites several arguments in favor of the separation. "Linux, after all these years, still lacks a good, comprehensive, and cross-distro system management tool." Also, YaST releases would get more attention by being independent. Not least of all, more users would test the product, thus providing better chances for improvement.