"Since most distros cannot be upgraded without hosing the whole thing"
I did four OS upgrades last week. Three where flawless; "aptitude update && aptitude full-upgrade" then accept default Y/N answers until all packages where updated. No hosing the entire systems. The fourth system's only issue was that I had to install a slightly older version of PHP until a few of the websites can be updated. No issues caused by the distribution itself.
From what I hear, the Windows upgrade process only now managed a clean OS upgrade. Even still, my personal habit will be the historically required format and reinstall.
I've also torn out the entire reporting system in a live server then reinstalled it without a reboot. I've Removed the entire http/php/mysql stack and reinstalled.. no reboot needed. Both cases where live production servers and only the http/php reinstall was noticable on the user side.
You can't remove and replace the Windows reporting system (she me Windows with Events uninstalled) and something as major as IIS or MS-SQL is going to force a system reboot.
"The problem with the Mongolian-horde concept of system development is an absence of self-discipline and the Not Invented Here Syndrome (pride). "
You may need to provide evidence of self discapline. Do you commonly interact with the developer communities? Is there a lack of self discapline among kernel developers? What the heck, it's only open source reviewed by my peers.. may as well write sloppy code. You understand the affect of peer review on people who take pride in what they do right?
And "Not Invented Here".. really? You looked at Microsoft, Apple, Oracle and other proprietary companies then looked at open source development companies an decided that "non invented here" was more prefelent among the open source people.. who's development model is about sharing code and building on top of what was "not invented here"?
