Hi
Installing and using yumdownloader or apt-get may paper over some cracks, but the cracks are still there. When discussing Linux distributions, one can't really count anything that's not part of the actual distribution.
I am just letting you know that your criticisms have been addressed not to mention that apt-get is available for FC3 too. Fedora Extras *is* part of Fedora as the actual distribution. It is developed very much in sync with the core repository
I know some distros are part CD (or DVD) and part download: Debian and Ubuntu are both like this, but AFAIK FC3 is what's on the DVD image I downloaded.
Ubuntu isnt making available its entire Debian compatible subset within CD's afaik. Fedora Extras isnt currently available as CD/DVD's. You are free to do them yourself and share them with the rest of the community. I am pretty sure you can also get some people involved if you ask in the extras list . For a rapidly developed distribution like Fedora its going to be outdated pretty soon anyway and I am not convinced its a good idea but Fedora Core 5 plans includes several enhancements including a repository aware installer and a CD Image general tool which might help you
http://www.fedoraproject.org/wiki/FC5Future regards Rahul
