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Hi Grant, Jeremiah |
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|
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On Monday 26 August 2002 12:28, Grant Goodyear wrote: |
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> > And they have to go through a specific set of privileged people. |
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> |
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> True, although to the best of my knowledge all distributions have |
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> a similar system. I don't think it will ever make sense to |
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> provide CVS write access to all users; it's simply too easy to |
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> mess things up. Goodness knows that our developers regularly |
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> manage to render Gentoo uninstallable, and they're trying very |
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> hard not to do that. Our system isn't perfect, but I'm not sure |
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> what would be better. |
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Jeremiah: yup, above is quite to the point. I'd second all that Grant has |
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said. However there is some hope for more general user involvment. Please |
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read below... |
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|
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> > Q: Can I help, can I help |
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> > A: Sure, you can take out the trash and scrub the toilets. |
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> |
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> Well, right now that's pretty much what the developers are doing, |
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> too. Our biggest need for help right now is good bug reports and |
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> help with existing bugs. The only major "development" that is |
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> ocurring right now is portage and some people starting to work on |
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> a sensible installer. Everything else is really bug fixing of |
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> one sort or another. |
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This is quite true, core developers spend large portion of their time "taking |
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out the trash". However I am afraid that we are pretty stuck in this mode the |
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way things are now. The problem is: these bugs are mostly not ours, but |
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rahter due to ignorance/weirdness/etc of upstream stuff, I mean here original |
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authors of the packages. It would be a life in heaven if everything installed |
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via "./configure && make && make install". All packages would compile on any |
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arch and glibc/gcc version and no weir dependencies were lost in docs and |
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nothing would conflict... Well, you get the idea. Unfortunately this is our |
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imperfect word where everything tends to break and noticeable portion of bugs |
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require getting in touch with package authors or figuring out just what |
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build/configuration changes were implemented in this new revision? |
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Things will get better when we release 1.4, however I am afraid not by |
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much. |
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|
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The point I am getting at here is that we should and can allow our users to |
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take care of a large portion of non-crytical packages. What we need is: |
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1. Multiple stability levels or KEYWORDS |
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2. Streamlined ebuild processing - that automates submission of new |
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ebuilds/versions and assigns them some kind of "new" or "user-test" |
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keyword/level |
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3.Feedback system that collects user voices and moves ebuilds to corresponding |
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categories increasing or decreasing their stability rating. |
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4. Core group oversees and takes care of the core/crytical stuff and has |
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*much* more time to work onportage/sysinit/other_more_distro_specifc_stuff |
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Well, that would be one possible point of view on this :). |
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|
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Please take a look at bug#1523 for much more details (though bear in mind that |
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some of that stuff is outdated by now). |
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|
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> > Among all the distributions I am familiar with, Gentoo is, |
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> > in my opinion, the best as far as placing trust in it's users. |
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> > But Gentoo is also, in my opinion, far from what I imagine as ideal. |
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> |
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> Fair enough. If you have additional ideas on how we can trust our |
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> users better, please do post on bugzilla. |
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That's what I did over half a year ago. Since then I got involved in gentoo |
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more than I imagined :). |
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|
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So, the situation can (and I think should) be changed to give even more |
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freedom to our users (and take some stress off core group simultaneously ;)). |
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However as any change this takes time, especially with a large evolving |
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system which gentoo became. At present we are near completion of step 1 in |
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that partial list above (I mean here the KEYWORDS that we were so busy |
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adding. As things settle down we will switch to this new masking mechanism |
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and get even some more functionality into. At least this was the plan |
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according to discussions/announcements over past few month). Eventually I |
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hope we will get some more issues resolved and will be offering: |
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1. multitude of profiles (not just arch/gcc specific but tailored to certain |
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tasks: such as server vs desktop, etc.) |
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2. partial [portage tree] database checkout (according to profile or stability |
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setting) |
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3. streamlined/user_managed ebuild submissions (for non-crytical stuff) |
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4. anything else? |
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|
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And it all takes quite some work, so any help is appreciated; but then any |
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exciting project has a lot of routine associated with it. |
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|
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George |