[gentoo-dev] Re: Gnome Stabilization 3.6 or 3.8

[Duncan]

Alex Alexander posted on Thu, 08 Aug 2013 05:51:38 +0300 as excerpted:

> On Thu, Aug 8, 2013 at 2:49 AM, Patrick Lauer wrote:
>
>> On 08/07/2013 09:14 PM, Alexandre Rostovtsev wrote:
>> > On Wed, 2013-08-07 at 14:45 +0200, Michael Weber wrote:
>> >>
>> >> Gnome Herd decided to target stablilization of 3.8 [1] which
>> >> requires systemd.
>> >>
>> >> What are the reasons to stable 3.8 and not 3.6, a version w/o this
>> >> restriction, enabling all non systemd users to profit from this
>> >> eye-candy as well.
>> >
>> > To stabilize gnome-3.6, we would need [people willing to do it].
>> > We do not have such people on the gnome team.
>> >
>> Seeing the noise in #gentoo from people getting whacked in the kidney
>> by the systemd sidegrade ... that's a very optimistic decision.
>>
>> It'll cause lots of pain for users that suddenly can't start lvm
>> properly and other nasty landmines

>> I hope you understand that some of us will be very rude and just
>> suggest to unmerge gnome on all support requests as it now moves
>> outside our support range ...
>>
> Although I understand your frustration, I don't see any other options
> for the Gentoo gnome team. People who don't like this should take their
> complaints upstream.

That reads to me like resigned acceptance.

Gentoo/gnome is simply working with what upstream gnome gives them, which 
for gentoo/gnome users now means a choice between gnome with systemd and 
if no systemd, no gnome either.  Upstream decision that gentoo/gnome is 
dealing with too.

...

[Those uninterested in gentoo/kde can stop reading here, as the rest of 
the post is a complaint about that project not taking the same position.]

Gentoo/kde users would be so lucky!

As a gentoo/kde-er, I *WISH* the gentoo/kde team was as similarly willing 
to continue support for the options kde upstream *ARE* still providing -- 
kde4 with the semantic-desktop options turned off.  Yes, this does mean 
doing without kdepim, but that has been the case for several versions, no 
upstream change there for 4.11, at least not for kde's base packages as 
necessary to run a kde desktop, yet gentoo carried support for building 
kde without semantic-desktop in 4.10, and doesn't in 4.11.

Meanwhile, while the same build-time options that worked in 4.10 still 
work in 4.11 (I know, as I put a lot of work into patching the ebuilds 
here when gentoo/kde removed the options despite upstream continuing to 
have them), the gentoo/kde project has decided to force the semantic-
desktop option ON for gentooers even where upstream continues to provide 
the option to turn it off!


None-the-less, I do understand the problem of a gentoo project supporting 
an option no devs on the project are actually interested in running.  
Testing would be left to users, and quality would suffer a bit as a 
result, but I know for a fact that there's users out there DOING that 
testing, even with the additional cost of having to maintain ebuild 
patches themselves to do it, because I'm one of them!  Further, I'm 
running 4.11.49.9999 live-branch and was running the betas before the 
branch from trunk, so there's at least one user actually doing that 
testing early enough to catch a good share of that feature's problems 
before they get anywhere close to ~arch, let alone stable.

Despite, or perhaps /because/ of, all the previous pain kde upstream has 
caused its users with the 4.x bump (which unlike the 4.10/4.11 bump was 
at LEAST a major version bump) and with kdepim's switch to akonadi 
mid-4.x (which unfortunately was NOT a major version bump), this time 
there's no indication of upstream kde changing semantic-desktop horses 
mid-stream and mid-major-version and forcing it on like that; it's
gentoo/kde that's doing it, pure and simple.

And I've already posted that regardless of what upstream kde or gentoo/kde 
does, after all the trouble I went thru to rid my system of semantic-
desktop earlier in the kde4 series, I'm not ABOUT to enable it again now, 
yes indeed, even if that means I unmerge the kde desktop entirely and 
switch to something else -- which after all I've already done for major 
portions of kde, including switching kmail->claws-mail when kdepim 
unfortunately jumped the shark mid-major-version.


So as I said, gentoo/kde-ers would be so lucky, if the gentoo/kde project 
took the same position gentoo/gnome's taking here, that they support what 
upstream offers, that gentoo/gnome's only forcing systemd because 
upstream gnome's forcing it.  Were that the case, semantic-desktop 
wouldn't be forced by gentoo/kde in kde 4.11, where upstream still offers 
the same options they did in 4.10, where gentoo/kde offered the option as 
well.

Meanwhile, I guess I know what the kde-sunset users felt like now... 
except in that case as well as the gentoo/gnome case but unlike this one, 
upstream WAS dropping support, and the gentoo project was simply 
following upstream...

-- 
Duncan - List replies preferred.   No HTML msgs.
"Every nonfree program has a lord, a master --
and if you use the program, he is your master."  Richard Stallman