Binary incompatibility of Linux distributions

[Amedee Van Gasse (Ubuntu)]

On Tue, May 12, 2009 13:43, Odd wrote:
> One of my pet peeves with Linux has been that software for
> one distro is incompatible with another. There are work-arounds of course,
> but they should really not be needed.

It seems like Mark Shuttleworth, the founder of Ubuntu, and Linus
Torvalds, founder of Linux, disagree with you.

Read Mark's arguments on
https://wiki.ubuntu.com/MarkShuttleworth#What%20about%20binary%20compatibility%20between%20distributions?

At the bottom we read what Linus thinks:

It is worth noting that the Linux kernel itself takes the same approach,
shunning "binary compatibility" in favour of a "custom monolithic kernel".
Each release of the kernel requires that it be compiled separately from
previous releases. Modules (drivers) need to be recompiled with the new
release, they cannot just be used in their binary form. Linus has
specifically stated that the monolithic kernel - based on source code, not
trying to maintain a binary interface for drivers across releases - is
better for the kernel. We believe the same is true for the distribution.