1 |
On Sat, Feb 2, 2013 at 9:07 PM, Vaeth <vaeth@××××××××××××××××××××××××.de> wrote: |
2 |
> Sorry, but I feel that I must explain once more: |
3 |
> |
4 |
> |
5 |
>>>> When I came to Gentoo many years ago, this was a very rare problem, |
6 |
>>>> but the removal of packages has tremendously increased, and it is |
7 |
>>>> not only me who is observing this problem - there were already some |
8 |
>>>> threads in the forums, and people planning to but not coming back |
9 |
>>>> to Gentoo for this reason. |
10 |
>>> |
11 |
>>> |
12 |
>>> Awesome so they could've get involved and maintain it themselves if they |
13 |
>>> seen |
14 |
>>> it so crushial for their lives. |
15 |
>> |
16 |
>> |
17 |
>> Agreed. That's why there are last rights announcements with a 30 day |
18 |
>> delay before the package is actually removed. |
19 |
> |
20 |
> |
21 |
> So this 30 day delay will enable these people to get involved, |
22 |
> especially for all the packages which were removed in the last years? |
23 |
> Now it is apparent that an archive for dropped packages (in the |
24 |
> form of keeping masked packages or some other form) is not needed: |
25 |
> I want to join your club with the time machine! |
26 |
|
27 |
Gentoo has been running for over 10 years without it, so I would argue |
28 |
it is not *needed*. |
29 |
Would it be nice? Sure! No one is saying 'hey your idea sucks!' We are |
30 |
saying 'hey we are not really interested in doing this, but you should |
31 |
feel free to do it yourself, and we would think it is cool and totally |
32 |
support you.' |
33 |
|
34 |
> |
35 |
> |
36 |
>> In a nutshell, the people complaining about removals should stop |
37 |
>> complaining and start volunteering to maintain either the packages |
38 |
> |
39 |
> |
40 |
> Yep! That's the right attitude: Give the people 30 days (even those |
41 |
> people who are currently not at Gentoo for whatever reason) to know |
42 |
> years in advance all the software they might ever need and tell them, |
43 |
> if in doubt, just to maintain hundreds of packages! |
44 |
|
45 |
I don't believe for a second that it is the role of Gentoo to have |
46 |
packaged 'any software the user might have ever needed, or will ever |
47 |
need.' I'm unsure if this is the point you are making? |
48 |
|
49 |
> It is *of course* their fault if they do not! |
50 |
> Later, if they need a package, you can blame them that they have |
51 |
> not voluntereered for all these packages they possibly might have needed, |
52 |
> because years ago they had 30 days time to think about it (even longer |
53 |
> if they took the time and resources to backup on their machines all |
54 |
> tarballs of all packages). |
55 |
> |
56 |
> To be serious: If somebody *has* the resources to backup all dropped |
57 |
> tarballs, he should please donate these resources to Gentoo, because |
58 |
> Gentoo nowadays definitely cannot afford to waste a byte. |
59 |
|
60 |
It has nothing to do with disk space. The tree has software packages |
61 |
in it. I would argue that *most* of the software: |
62 |
|
63 |
1) Has someone in Gentoo to maintain it. |
64 |
2) Has a herd in Gentoo to maintain it. |
65 |
3) Has a proxy-maintainer outside of Gentoo and a dev willing to |
66 |
commit on behalf of that person to maintain it. |
67 |
|
68 |
A minority of the software available is un-maintained. When I started |
69 |
the treecleaner project, I wanted all the software in the tree to have |
70 |
a maintainer; packages that had no maintainer would be removed. This |
71 |
was basically voted down by the Gentoo Community. Instead we adopted a |
72 |
less aggressive policy: |
73 |
|
74 |
http://www.gentoo.org/proj/en/qa/treecleaners/policy.xml |
75 |
|
76 |
Treecleaners also quasi-manage maintainer-needed packages. |
77 |
http://www.gentoo.org/proj/en/qa/treecleaners/maintainer-needed.xml |
78 |
|
79 |
Note that there are currently 734 packages 'assigned' to maintainer needed. |
80 |
|
81 |
When I created the treecleaners project I really tried to make the |
82 |
policies very straightforward so that when maskings occurred that |
83 |
users would not be confused as to why the package was being removed, |
84 |
and I also tried to make it clear how a user or developer could 'save' |
85 |
a package. |
86 |
|
87 |
> |
88 |
> Or how else can it be explained that this idea of enabling people |
89 |
> to use previous packages if they need to is fought so intensively? |
90 |
|
91 |
Again I don't think anyone dismisses the idea. The problem is |
92 |
implementing it is perhaps not as trivial as you think. If I pick on |
93 |
the git migration as an example; we have essentially been 'trying to |
94 |
migrate to git' for like 2 years. That is going very slowly, even |
95 |
though everyone is basically on board with the idea. |
96 |
|
97 |
This is not a small agile project. Very often you need folks in the |
98 |
community willing to drive things to completion. mgorny's work on |
99 |
python-r1.eclass and his multilib stuff is one recent example. |
100 |
|
101 |
I think what you have failed to do is find someone in the developer |
102 |
community who is really eager to implement your idea. |
103 |
|
104 |
> |
105 |
> All it costs is some amount of disk/mirror space. |
106 |
> Or is it really that you *want* to blame the user and put |
107 |
> pressure on him to maintain packages? |
108 |
|
109 |
Why do you want to put pressure on *me* to maintain software I do not |
110 |
want to maintain? Or put pressure on *Gentoo* to mirror someones |
111 |
source code or binaries, for software Gentoo are no longer interested |
112 |
in distributing? |
113 |
|
114 |
> |
115 |
> Strange that as soon as user's resources are required, Gentoo's |
116 |
> attitude was always quite the opposite: E.g. it just *always* installs |
117 |
> bash completion or systemd files (or previously also static libraries, |
118 |
> although I must admit that the situation for the latter was now |
119 |
> improved, fortunately) - the user must care about cleaning |
120 |
> for himself if he does not want to waste resources. |
121 |
> |
122 |
> Sure, both is an admissible attitude - only the user is responsible |
123 |
> for everything. |
124 |
> |
125 |
> It is just: *I* want to contribute only to a distribution which |
126 |
> also cares somewhat about the users. |
127 |
> Maybe some developers feel the same, but it is of course up to you |
128 |
> to decide this. |
129 |
> |
130 |
> Regards |
131 |
> Martin |
132 |
> |