We were about to break out the celebratory Cokes, when a stream of curses rang across our offices in Bangalore.

"Red Hat is releasing Red Hat Linux 6.1 on October 4!"

Talk about punctured balloons.

Reading the specifications of this upcoming release, we knew with sinking hearts that our work had just begun. A fully-graphical, user-friendly install process, all updates merged, new and improved packages, visual development tools like Glade, and much more. Compared to this, we felt dated and incomplete.

A call to PCQ confirmed our fears—KK said that our readers deserved only the best or better, the latest or later. Would we be able to get Red Hat Linux 6.1 to India to build a new PCQ Linux CD, in time for the November issue? Traditionally, the CD has to be shipped to Singapore for duplication latest by the fifth of the previous month, in order to make it in time for the following month’s issue.

More bad news—while RHL 6.1 was available for download from any number of FTP sites across the world, Red Hat would be shipping official packages only by October 18. There was no way that we could wait that long to lay our hands on a readymade CD.

Gopi was the first to say it, "Looks like we have a monster download ahead of us."

October 6 We finally began the download, two days after the CD deadline. The delay was because the CD image became available for download only on the evening of the fifth as per US time, which is the morning of the sixth in India. Someone remarked that it was ironic that we were being slowed down because the Americans are so behind us.... We finally began the download, two days after the CD deadline. The delay was because the CD image became available for download only on the evening of the fifth as per US time, which is the morning of the sixth in India. Someone remarked that it was ironic that we were being slowed down because the Americans are so behind us....

The CD image was 642 MB in size—none of us had ever attempted a single download this big. And while we had bandwidth available to us, things were stacked against us—all the Red Hat mirror FTP sites across the world were choked with thousands and thousands of people attempting the same feat. Add to this the fact that VSNL was hopelessly oversubscribed on bandwidth (even on a completely traffic-free 2 Mbps link at ERnet Bangalore, we were getting throughputs of no more than 1 MB every 10 minutes), and we knew we were in for a long, long wait, with nothing to do but wait....and pray.

October 9 It’s been going on for three days and three nights now. Late at night, we were still only at 400 MB. KK called up to check on the status. We expected to hear him say it. "Forget it, we can’t wait any longer." It’s been going on for three days and three nights now. Late at night, we were still only at 400 MB. KK called up to check on the status. We expected to hear him say it. "Forget it, we can’t wait any longer."