[Mageia-dev] Release cycles proposals, and discussion

[Michael Scherer]

Le lundi 13 juin 2011 à 05:04 -0700, Ron a écrit :
> > There is a limited set of options, and as you can see, none of your 
> > idea was not already explored by someone else.
> It has all been done before, in that sense let's just close up shop and call it a day???

Your first argument was "we should not do release, that's what all
others do". I just explained that not doing release is not a new idea.

And maybe I misunderstood your ideas, but if the mere fact that we are
not alone on a segment is a reason to leave it because we cannot
compete, then since by your own word, Arch is doing well, why should we
try to compete too ?
 
In fact, instead of telling what Arch does well, maybe you could start
to say where Arch is not doing well, and how you propose to do things to
do better if you want to convince there is room for another distribution
and room for improvement.

Because if Arch is already fulfilling all your needs, I fail to see what
to do. So the first step would be to explain what Arch is not doing
right if you hope to convince us we can do better.


> > If everything move all days, you cannot :
> > - translate software ( as the string will change every day )
> > - create documentation ( for the same reason )
> > - communicate ( as everything ca be broken at any time )
> > - ensure stability ( as each change can bring unstability )
> 
> > And for user, some do not want to redo training every week for 
> > their users, because libreoffice got updated, because ff 4 just arrived 
> > and 75% of extensions do not work, etc. 
> >
> > In fact, the whole release model is basically what is used all >over the
> > place, from lower level like kernel to higher level like kde. So >you can
> > get lots of feedback on it.
> You are correct on the release model being used everywhere, that fit's development 
> and really there is no other way to do it as it takes time. 
> But really, up stream does have to take time but package maintainers can pull things in pretty fast 
> and make things work.

Being myself a packager, and being a packager since a long time ( like 7
years ), I feel that I have to disagree. While there isn't much breakage
on packaging side, we also suffer from bugs like upstream developers
does, mainly because we use the same software as them. We also develop
our own software ( like the installer, drakxtools, etc ). We also do
work on integration, etc.

And I am a little bit disappointed to learn that my work as a packager
do not take time. I must maybe do it wrong, as it seems to be a real
work.

> I don't understand what's being said here? Are we a community of users 
> or are we just teachers teaching a class? Help with changes is what 
> forums and people are for. 

If people want changes, they either do it themselves, or they wait on
someone else to do. And waiting for someone else to do mean to convince
that someone. And that someone is everybody reading you on the list,
which also mean me.  

Wanting changes has never been sufficient for making them appear. We
wanted to have a change regarding Mandriva, we made it.

> You worried about not being able to keep up with documentation? 
> I suggest you take a look at the Arch wiki, best Linux wiki 
> there is and things change fast... Again, community...

Then I would answer "just look at the ubuntu wiki" to see that the
quality of a wiki is not related to the release model of a
distribution. 

And when I say documentation, I was speaking of something like :
http://doc.mandriva.com/index.php 
or like this :
http://docs.fedoraproject.org/en-US/Fedora/15/html/Installation_Guide/index.html

And so, since you didn't answer to the others points I made, shall I
assume they are valid concerns ? 

> > So basically, you suggest that since everybody is already doing 
> > it, this is useless. So the logical conclusion is we should drop 
> > the distribution ?
> No that is not what I'm saying!
>
> What I am saying is that you have 100+/- distributions all going by a 
> release model and only a handful making rolling releases. 

A majority of distributions developers have independently decided to use
a release model, so it is obviously something that is fulfilling their
needs as well as the need of a majority of users, no ?


> There is only one defacto maker of a rolling release and that is Arch, 
> why does this have to be? (Yes I know there are others but Arch is the 
> leader of the pack)

Technically, there is Gentoo, and derived distribution  or Debian
Testing, and I know more people running Gentoo and Debian than Arch
users. I would even say that the *BSD and Slackware are a form of
rolling release, since they have a fixed small base system updated from
time to time, and a evolving upper level with updated software and
others stuff. 

In fact, if we look at the market share, the dominant unix system with a
rolling release model would be mac os X. 

( but I guess that you disagree with the fact that *BSD are a rolling
release, which is yet another reason to use a different and more clearer
term ).

> >like debian testing ( and CUT ) ? suse tumbleweed ? arch linux
> Nope, gotta call you on this... Debian testing rolls with the purpose of becoming a release... 
> Therefore things can grow outdated rather quickly. 

Well, that's still rolling none the less. But as I said several time for
the previous discussion, rolling release is a term that people used to
designate different things. 

If things are too old, this is not rolling release ?
And if things are too broken, this is not rolling release either ? 


> Suse tumblweed IS NOT going to be a true rolling release! It is going to "tumble up" to the 
> next release hence the name.

That's not exactly what they say on their wiki page : 
http://fr.opensuse.org/Portal:Tumbleweed
But maybe I didn't understood that, and maybe they didn't explained to
me when I asked the question 4 months ago.

> > Very stable for a distribution mean "that do not change". That's
> > incompatible with the idea of rolling per definition. And inorder 
> > to have stable software, you have to freeze them and fix bugs. So 
> > to have that on the whole distribution, you need to freeze the 
> > whole distribution for a time, and then ask for test, fix bugs 
> > and then release. Which is exactly what we currently do since >years.
> Sorry, your wrong! I have been using Arch for years and have yet 
> to meet a show stopper bug, it is very stable. 
> Stability simply means tested! 

When Debian people speak of the stable distribution, they mean it
doesn't change much. When Mandriva speak of the stable distribution,
they mean it doesn't change much. When we us that word for the
distribution, we mean the same. 

You use it differently, that's fine. But you cannot expect to be
understood if you use a different vocabulary than the people you are
talking with, unless you ask us to change our vocabulary to fit yours.

> It does not have to be like Debian testing 
> that grows stale with time, you can remain very very close to bleeding 
> edge and still remain stable...

Debian testing is what you would call stable because the way it is
updated ( ie, no broken dependencies, no blocking bugs, waiting time
before updating ). 

> > So basically, you just reinvented the concept of release, and the 
> > way Mandriva, Debian, Fedora work since years. 
> And I must have peed in your cheerios... 

I think there is no need to be vulgar.

> I am all for giving people what they want, 
> I also don't think you have to follow the status quo to do so... We don't have 
> to be "just another distribution doing the same things the others are doing"... 
> Sorry, but this is what I see....

Then I guess we do not see that way, but I guess also that being myself
involved in depth in the distribution and having participated since
years to Mandriva and having looked at others ( as said in the
introduction of my first mail ), I see details that you do not see
( such as the governance, the openness of various others areas besides
packaging, etc ).

Now, you whole mail is "we should do like arch", and that's a motivation
that I do not understand. What do you expect us to bring that arch does
not bring for you ? What would be the added value ?

-- 
Michael Scherer