Re: [gentoo-soc] Package statistics reporting tool

[Brian Dolbec]

On Tue, 2011-03-29 at 08:53 -0500, Donnie Berkholz wrote:
> On 18:54 Tue 29 Mar     , Vikraman wrote:
> > I've been doing research on this project for sometime, and would
> > really like my ideas to be reviewed by the community before
> > submitting my application.
> >
> > * User runs a script as a cronjob (or a portage hook ?), which
> > collects stats on installed packages, and uploads to the online
> > database. Surprisingly easy to code using the gentoolkit API.

:) Thanks, anything else needed in there, just ask.

>
> Sure, one of those two options sounds good. The choice can be easily
> changed later, but I prefer the idea of a hook that runs after the
> package manager completes installing a package set.
>
> People on laptops may not run cron jobs regularly, or at all.

 good point.

>
> > * Webapp generates statistics on the packages (top packages,
> > versions, popularity, packages from overlays). Thanks to ideas from
> > an old thread on the forums. Devs, please suggest some more useful
> > ideas/stats too.
>
> For Gentoo users:
> - Search by package name
> - Search by packages often installed with this one (recommendations)
> - Add ratings. Maybe just via the GUI frontend for now.
> - Add user reputations and profiles. How many ratings, etc. Provide the
>   option of logging in as user or anonymously for package uploads.
>
>
> Tools for Gentoo developers:
> - Least popular packages
> - Search by maintainer/herd
> - Integrate with Bugzilla by showing # of bugs & linking to the list
> - Integrate w/ BZ by showing # of tinderbox-related bugs
>
> For example, a useful search would be ≤20 users, package assigned to
> maintainer-needed or maintainer wanted, and ≥1 open bugs.
>
> > * Dev/user runs a cli script to read stats or a gui program to
> > display graphs.
> >
> > I'm looking forward to coding the project in Python, gui using
> > PyGTK, database using MySQL. For the web service implementation,
> > should I use SOAP (soappy, which I'll need to learn) or something
> > like web.py (I've used it earlier) ?
>
> What is the role of the GUI? Please describe the use cases and justify
> why it should be a desktop app rather than a webapp.

As much of a gui person as I am, I too think a web browser would be
preferred connecting for this. It could also be expanded as the need or
new query type comes up and then becomes available to all without the
need to upgrade.

>
> Consider REST for the web service rather than SOAP. There's a nice book
> called "RESTful Web Services" you might like to take a look at.
>
> > It was also suggested earlier to allow a dev to trigger a popup
> > feedback from the user. I think that would require the user ro run a
> > daemon, which will listen for queries.
>
> It doesn't necessarily have to be instant. Upon the next installation,
> when uploading new stats, the client could check for messages.

Yes, this was what I was trying to suggest at the time, perhaps I could
have chosen better words :/

>
> > Please suggest what details to include and what not to include in
> > the application.
>
> Many resources exist on this topic:
>
> - http://www.gentoo.org/proj/en/userrel/soc/applying.xml
> - http://www.booki.cc/gsocstudentguide/_v/1.0/writing-a-proposal/
> - http://google-opensource.blogspot.com/2011/03/dos-and-donts-of-google-summer-of-code.html
>


-- 
Brian Dolbec <brian.dolbec@×××××.com>