Re: Why not only support Sid and Testing?
Am 2006-09-15 17:47:52, schrieb Hendrik Sattler: Thus, you can install xorg without installing discover. Do you always install with all recommends? That will pull in lots of useless stuff... No, I use only apt-get because I prefer Lite-Systems. If I use recommends my system would not be Dateisystem 1M-Blöcke Benutzt Verfügbar Ben% Eingehängt auf /dev/hda1 44957 368 14% / /dev/hda3 1428 833 524 62% /tmp /dev/hda5 2819 1073 1603 41% /usr /dev/hda6 714 135 541 20% /var /dev/hda7 17720 148 12% /var/log samba3.private:/home 67858 64611 3247 96% /home Once I have tried to install the same Workststion on a Test-Machine but including Recommends... This would automaticale install KDE and GNOME libs and much more using additional 800 MByte. Thanks, Greetings and nice Day Michelle Konzack Systemadministrator Tamay Dogan Network Debian GNU/Linux Consultant -- Linux-User #280138 with the Linux Counter, http://counter.li.org/ # Debian GNU/Linux Consultant # Michelle Konzack Apt. 917 ICQ #328449886 50, rue de Soultz MSM LinuxMichi 0033/6/6192519367100 Strasbourg/France IRC #Debian (irc.icq.com) -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of unsubscribe. Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: Why not only support Sid and Testing?
Am 2006-09-11 22:08:02, schrieb Joseph Smidt: I know I am in for an argument, but I think it is a good question. I'm sure many of you have read Mark's blog: http://www.markshuttleworth.com/archives/56. It says 76% of Debian users run unstable and probably a fair fraction of the rest run testing. Not possibel, since I have only two machines with Sid, two with Etch and now over 160 with Sarge. Isn't it a cause of stress trying to cram for the freeze? I do not think so. Haven't we seen emails about how we are behind the RC goals for Etch which causes frustration? All the questions: is this or that going in Etch, why not? (I have been resposible for some of these) Like to run a Testing/Unstable server public? - Apache, php5, courier... No Thanks! I think we all really love running unstable. It is very fun Unstable is good for development and nothing more. I use Debian since 03/1999 and with Sid I had in the 7 1/2 years at least 40 total fallouts after upgrading... I (and probably many others) must earn money with it and a fallout of on day can cost your Enterprise. because it is exciting and sometimes unpredictible. Debian, in my You are sick! Debian GNU/Linux is an Operating System and NOT A GADGET from Redmond. 1. Those who maintain Debian love unstable. It is the OS that offers the I am Developer (French Army) and I do not like Unsatable in any kind! It is my job to develop software on Unstable and then do testing on Unstable, Testing and Stable. All other is brain damaged and humbug! 2. Testing would be a better distro. The time and effort that goes into Freezing, maintaining Stable and Oldstable, could be pulled into Since X.org requires discover it is uninstallable on many machines of my customers (I t loads tonns of modules they never need and I am not able to compile over 600 different Kernels and I do not know, how to blacklist the Whole Kernel-Module-Tree at once). I hope this will be solved soon... making testing a better distro for those who want new software, without the risk of running Unstable. Those who enjoy trying to live on the bleeding edge, who don't want to bleed to death. For such Harakiri are other Distributions based on Debian better. 3. The freeze seems to cause more stress then happiness. ??? 4. Let's face it, it does both Debian and Desktop users who want a constantly updating, Easy as Windows to use, stable distro a favor to And what about the majority of Debian Users running several 100.000 Servers worldwide. (I have 160 own, then they are arround 1800 Servers at the French Army, several 1000 at Police Nationale, ...) send them to Ubuntu. Debian will stop getting harassed how Ubuntu's stable is so much nicer for users then Debian's. On the other, it does Ubuntu has another goal as Debian. Do not compare apples with pears. them a favor to go where life is made easier for them. (I am not saying Ubuntu stable is better then Debian's Stable, just the type of users who Ubuntu Stable is Debian Unstable And Ubuntu does not fit anything I need. Thanks, Greetings and nice Day Michelle Konzack Systemadministrator Tamay Dogan Network Debian GNU/Linux Consultant -- Linux-User #280138 with the Linux Counter, http://counter.li.org/ # Debian GNU/Linux Consultant # Michelle Konzack Apt. 917 ICQ #328449886 50, rue de Soultz MSM LinuxMichi 0033/6/6192519367100 Strasbourg/France IRC #Debian (irc.icq.com) -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of unsubscribe. Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: Why not only support Sid and Testing?
Am Freitag 15 September 2006 12:30 schrieb Michelle Konzack: Since X.org requires discover Huh? Did I miss something? X.org runs fine without discover installed. Actually, uninstalling discover is the first thing I do after an installation of the base system. HS -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of unsubscribe. Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: Why not only support Sid and Testing?
Am 2006-09-15 16:01:03, schrieb Hendrik Sattler: Am Freitag 15 September 2006 12:30 schrieb Michelle Konzack: Since X.org requires discover Huh? Did I miss something? X.org runs fine without discover installed. Actually, uninstalling discover is the first thing I do after an installation of the base system. Xorg use discover for the autodetection of the Graphiccard Now for 2 days I think, I have read on debian-x that they are working on it. (removing of discover and using the Xorg own detection tool... If I update 600 Sarge systems to Etch, they would currently install discover as a depends. And then I am in trouble since on the machines I have recently installed (Clean Sarge) discover had detect nonexisting Hardware and loaded over 100 modules for nothing (and conflicting). Effectivly we need to load between 15 and 20 modules. The dist-upgrade Woody=Sarge had not the problem. Thanks, Greetings and nice Day Michelle Konzack Systemadministrator Tamay Dogan Network Debian GNU/Linux Consultant -- Linux-User #280138 with the Linux Counter, http://counter.li.org/ # Debian GNU/Linux Consultant # Michelle Konzack Apt. 917 ICQ #328449886 50, rue de Soultz MSM LinuxMichi 0033/6/6192519367100 Strasbourg/France IRC #Debian (irc.icq.com) -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of unsubscribe. Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: Why not only support Sid and Testing?
Am Freitag 15 September 2006 17:27 schrieb Michelle Konzack: If I update 600 Sarge systems to Etch, they would currently install discover as a depends. No, it is only a recommends: Depends: xserver-xorg-core, xserver-xorg-video-all | xserver-xorg-video, xserver-xorg-input-all | xserver-xorg-input, debconf, xkb-data | xkb-data-legacy, xbase-clients Pre-Depends: x11-common (= 7.0.0-0ubuntu3) Recommends: laptop-detect, xresprobe, mdetect, discover1 | discover Thus, you can install xorg without installing discover. Do you always install with all recommends? That will pull in lots of useless stuff... HS -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of unsubscribe. Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: Why not only support Sid and Testing?
* Hendrik Sattler: Am Freitag 15 September 2006 17:27 schrieb Michelle Konzack: If I update 600 Sarge systems to Etch, they would currently install discover as a depends. No, it is only a recommends: Which means it will be automatically installed if you follow the documented upgrade procedure (which involves aptitude, and aptitude automatically installs packages recommended by new packages). Or am I missing something? -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of unsubscribe. Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: Why not only support Sid and Testing?
Am Freitag 15 September 2006 22:52 schrieb Florian Weimer: aptitude automatically installs packages recommended by new packages). This can be turned off either via the GUI, via entry in the config file or even from command line with -R. HS -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of unsubscribe. Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: Why not only support Sid and Testing?
On Tuesday 12 September 2006 14:07, Josselin Mouette wrote: Le mardi 12 septembre 2006 à 07:23 -0600, Joseph Smidt a écrit : At the risk of repeating myself, Desktop Users: For most non-server minded people who still want a stable OS, Debian takes too long to release. On top of that,many of them want a As easy aw Windows distro. I don't know that Debian will provide that as well as Ubuntu, unless we want to alter many aspects of the project, like how often we release. Oh well. I wonder how Microsoft could manage to provide as easy as Windows OSes given the length of their release cycle. The answer is they don't. Techworld ran a story almost a month ago now: Microsoft is leaving the OS business after Vista is released to focus on services, virtualization and other products. You can already start to see the change being made: Windows Live OneCare is replacing Windows on WalMart shelves, for example. -- Paul Johnson Email and IM (XMPP Google Talk): [EMAIL PROTECTED] pgpspzLoE8zsi.pgp Description: PGP signature
Re: Why not only support Sid and Testing?
On Tuesday 12 September 2006 23:40, Mgr. Peter Tuharsky wrote: Easily. They have around 95% market share and strong established monopoly. Evidence doesn't support that statement. Even Microsoft's arguably generous in their favor estimate puts their OS market share on the desktop at about 85%, and servers around 10%. My web stats put Windows at around 70%, presumably desktops. If the 95% figure was ever true, those days are ancient history now. -- Paul Johnson Email and IM (XMPP Google Talk): [EMAIL PROTECTED] pgpaB0fVwKmo4.pgp Description: PGP signature
Re: Why not only support Sid and Testing?
Josselin Mouette wrote / napísal(a): Le mardi 12 septembre 2006 à 07:23 -0600, Joseph Smidt a écrit : At the risk of repeating myself, Desktop Users: For most non-server minded people who still want a stable OS, Debian takes too long to release. On top of that,many of them want a As easy aw Windows distro. I don't know that Debian will provide that as well as Ubuntu, unless we want to alter many aspects of the project, like how often we release. Oh well. I wonder how Microsoft could manage to provide as easy as Windows OSes given the length of their release cycle. Easily. They have around 95% market share and strong established monopoly. -- Odchádzajúca správa neobsahuje vírusy, nepoužívam Windows. === Mgr. Peter Tuhársky Referát informatiky Mesto Banská Bystrica ČSA 26 975 39 Banská Bystrica Tel: +421 48 4330 118 Fax: +421 48 411 3575 === -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of unsubscribe. Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: Why not only support Sid and Testing?
Le mardi 12 septembre 2006 à 07:23 -0600, Joseph Smidt a écrit : At the risk of repeating myself, Desktop Users: For most non-server minded people who still want a stable OS, Debian takes too long to release. On top of that,many of them want a As easy aw Windows distro. I don't know that Debian will provide that as well as Ubuntu, unless we want to alter many aspects of the project, like how often we release. And I don't agree, even for Desktop Users. I think you're talking desktop tweakers. Two examples: - My wife at home likes Debian, she likes the entire FOSS concept etc. Yet, she wants hates it when tiny little subtle changes in her desktop or applications get in her way and require her to learn again that this entry has moved to another menu etc. Even if it happens every 3 months, it just gets on her nerves. When it does, she wants to kill me, and since I want to live, we run stable. - At work: the employees, including the sysadmin, should do something else with their time that getting back on tracks a system that was running fine the day before (even if it's only every three months or so). Sure, occasionally I need a more recent version of a software, then I can get a backport or compile it from source, takes half a day in the tricky cases. Of course I'm running an older version of SuSE at work, and it's not so great for backports. I'd much rather have a Debian stable, updated to the new stable each time it comes out. Sure, once in a while I install a more experimental system at home, or play enough with my stable system to get it to fail, or buy esoteric hardware, and I like the thrill I get and the skills I develop. I'm just a natural puzzle solver. Still, I do that out of mission-critical and family range. One side-note on the stress caused by freezes: I haven't been much involved in Debian development so far, but from my viewpoint, this phase is tremendously useful for keeping the entire distribution in shape, with clearly defined goals, RC bug-squashing, removing obsolete and unmaintained packages etc. Regards, Thibaut. -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of unsubscribe. Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: Why not only support Sid and Testing?
On Mon, 11 Sep 2006 22:08:02 -0600, Joseph Smidt [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: I know I am in for an argument, but I think it is a good question. I'm sure many of you have read Mark's blog: http://www.markshuttleworth.com/archives/56. It says 76% of Debian users run unstable and probably a fair fraction of the rest run testing. I tend to doubt these numbers, especially if they come from a source that is known for its Ubuntu / Canonical marketing blurb. Greetings Marc, who is running unstable on two of fifteen systems -- -- !! No courtesy copies, please !! - Marc Haber |Questions are the | Mailadresse im Header Mannheim, Germany | Beginning of Wisdom | http://www.zugschlus.de/ Nordisch by Nature | Lt. Worf, TNG Rightful Heir | Fon: *49 621 72739834
Re: Why not only support Sid and Testing?
On Tuesday 12 September 2006 11:08, Marc Haber wrote: On Mon, 11 Sep 2006 22:08:02 -0600, Joseph Smidt [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: I know I am in for an argument, but I think it is a good question. I'm sure many of you have read Mark's blog: http://www.markshuttleworth.com/archives/56. It says 76% of Debian users run unstable and probably a fair fraction of the rest run testing. I tend to doubt these numbers, especially if they come from a source that is known for its Ubuntu / Canonical marketing blurb. Marc, I hope you don't easily assume a bad will behind these numbers. Any servey could bring wrong numbers up or even a wrong trend, but that is not always done on purpose. It is far easier to make an honest mistake, than to construct some sort of evil plan ;-) Greetings Marc, who is running unstable on two of fifteen systems Another thing which might be taken into account is that there are stable machines which are not even internetworked or don't have popularity-contest package installed for any reason (to save some cpu cycles;-), while almost any unstable/development machine needs the latest stuff and needs to interact with the debian server infrastructure. -- pub 4096R/0E4BD0AB 2003-03-18 people.fccf.net/danchev/key pgp.mit.edu fingerprint 1AE7 7C66 0A26 5BFF DF22 5D55 1C57 0C89 0E4B D0AB -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of unsubscribe. Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: Why not only support Sid and Testing?
Marc Haber [EMAIL PROTECTED] writes: http://www.markshuttleworth.com/archives/56. It says 76% of Debian users run unstable and probably a fair fraction of the rest run testing. I tend to doubt these numbers, especially if they come from a source that is known for its Ubuntu / Canonical marketing blurb. Yeah, especially since the kind of person who runs stable is, I expect, much less likely to answer web polls etc... :-) -Miles -- Is it true that nothing can be known? If so how do we know this? -Woody Allen -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of unsubscribe. Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: Why not only support Sid and Testing?
Le lundi 11 septembre 2006 à 22:08 -0600, Joseph Smidt a écrit : I know I am in for an argument, but I think it is a good question. I'm sure many of you have read Mark's blog: http://www.markshuttleworth.com/archives/56. It says 76% of Debian users run unstable and probably a fair fraction of the rest run testing. On the other side, Netcraft reports more than a million websites running Debian. Do you really think they are running testing or unstable? Mark Shuttleworth wants Ubuntu to replace Debian on all market segments, turning Debian into a provider for unstable packages. But we have no reason to help him. -- .''`. Josselin Mouette/\./\ : :' : [EMAIL PROTECTED] `. `'[EMAIL PROTECTED] `- Debian GNU/Linux -- The power of freedom
Re: Why not only support Sid and Testing?
On Sep 12, Joseph Smidt [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: I think Debian (I maintain a couple packages too, and hopefully more in the future, so I am not just trying to tell those who work what to do) should consider only supporting unstable and testing for a few reasons: Then people would need to accept that Debian cannot be the solution to every problem, and this would be politically bad. -- ciao, Marco signature.asc Description: Digital signature
Re: Why not only support Sid and Testing?
On Mon, Sep 11, 2006 at 10:08:02PM -0600, Joseph Smidt wrote: I know I am in for an argument, but I think it is a good question. I'm sure many of you have read Mark's blog: http://www.markshuttleworth.com/archives/56. It says 76% of Debian users run unstable and probably a fair fraction of the rest run testing. We had an ages-long mail thread about this (and many other related suggestions, everything from drop stable to drop unstable) a few months ago -- you may want to reread it if you're interested in the topic. /* Steinar */ -- Homepage: http://www.sesse.net/ -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of unsubscribe. Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: Why not only support Sid and Testing?
On Mon, Sep 11, 2006 at 10:08:02PM -0600, Joseph Smidt wrote: I know I am in for an argument, but I think it is a good question. I'm sure many of you have read Mark's blog: http://www.markshuttleworth.com/archives/56. It says 76% of Debian users run unstable and probably a fair fraction of the rest run testing. That's not what I'm seeing. 100% of my customers run stable. 100% of the servers on which I have root and that run Debian, run stable (there are some that've been set up by my business partner and that run FreeBSD) -- with the single exception of my home server, which happens to be my workstation, too. Isn't it a cause of stress trying to cram for the freeze? Yes, but that doesn't mean it's not worth it. -- Fun will now commence -- Seven Of Nine, Ashes to Ashes, stardate 53679.4 -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of unsubscribe. Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: Why not only support Sid and Testing?
Gabriel Puliatti [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Also, maintainers _need_ to run unstable. No, I don't agree here. How else would they test the latest package that has been uploaded and see if any bugs need to be fixed before it moves into testing? I'm running unstable in a chroot, but I hardly work there. I'm working with the current sid packages backported to my sarge box. After all, I'm using it not only for maintaining Debian packages, but also for doing unrelated paid work, and I couldn't afford to have fun and unpredictible effects. Whether there are bugs that need to be fixed before it moves into testing, this has to be done by the community. After all, even RC bugs, let alone normal and important ones, often need some tweaking and adjustment before I can reproduce them on my system. Regards, Frank -- Frank Küster Single Molecule Spectroscopy, Protein Folding @ Inst. f. Biochemie, Univ. Zürich Debian Developer (teTeX/TeXLive)
Re: Why not only support Sid and Testing?
Hi, On Mon, 2006-09-11 at 22:08 -0600, Joseph Smidt wrote: I know I am in for an argument, but I think it is a good question. I'm sure many of you have read Mark's blog: http://www.markshuttleworth.com/archives/56. It says 76% of Debian users run unstable and probably a fair fraction of the rest run testing. We have about a hundred servers running stable, and we never had any testing or unstable servers, with a single exception: we absolutely knew that testing was very close to become stable, and it was safe to switch to testing on a couple servers. I think there are many others that depend on a community-supported and stable Debian. -- Enver signature.asc Description: This is a digitally signed message part
Re: Why not only support Sid and Testing?
On Tue, Sep 12, 2006 at 01:18:19PM +0200, Wouter Verhelst wrote: Isn't it a cause of stress trying to cram for the freeze? Yes, but that doesn't mean it's not worth it. I admit, just because something is hard does not mean it is not worth it. The question in my mind becomes: Is it still worth it if the bulk of people Stable is created for are better servered somewhere else? Server Users: I worked at Los Alamos National Laboratory this summer. They love Debian, they even mirror Debian. However, they feel Debian will not be taken seriously on the server unless they provide paid full time support, and provide a set timtable where a server edition will be supported. (They would want that time table to be at least 3 years, if not as long as 5) I know we provide a great server, maybe even the best. But is it worth all the time and stress if the bulk of those who use servers aren't interested in running Debian for these reasons? At the risk of repeating myself, Desktop Users: For most non-server minded people who still want a stable OS, Debian takes too long to release. On top of that,many of them want a As easy aw Windows distro. I don't know that Debian will provide that as well as Ubuntu, unless we want to alter many aspects of the project, like how often we release. On the other hand, better than anyone else, we appeal to a crowd who is enchanted with an ever evolving system which is in a special way exciting. Those who are risky have unstable and those a little less inclined to take a risk have testing. We serve these people better than anyone hands down. In all of this I want to say I really love Debian. I don't think the other distros are better in quality. It is purely a question of whether we *serve* them better, whether by providing full time paid support or releasing constantly with a training wheels sytle OS. I do think Debian is the best in terms of quality. I just don't know if it is worth the stress if the crowd we are stressing over may feel better suited somewhere else. Joseph Smidt PS I will read the previous threads on this subject. signature.asc Description: Digital signature
Re: Why not only support Sid and Testing?
Wouter Verhelst [EMAIL PROTECTED] writes: On Mon, Sep 11, 2006 at 10:08:02PM -0600, Joseph Smidt wrote: I know I am in for an argument, but I think it is a good question. I'm sure many of you have read Mark's blog: http://www.markshuttleworth.com/archives/56. It says 76% of Debian users run unstable and probably a fair fraction of the rest run testing. That's not what I'm seeing. 100% of my customers run stable. 100% of the servers on which I have root and that run Debian, run stable (there are some that've been set up by my business partner and that run FreeBSD) -- with the single exception of my home server, which happens to be my workstation, too. I can add a bunch of cluster with a total of over 4000 nodes all running stable. Most of them have no route to the outside world so they can't run popcon at all and none of them have it installed. The constant updating that testing has would make the cluster totaly unmaintainable. MfG Goswin -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of unsubscribe. Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: Why not only support Sid and Testing?
Joseph Smidt wrote: The question in my mind becomes: Is it still worth it if the bulk of people Stable is created for are better servered somewhere else? You don't have a complete view on the situation, probably because you're a geek. Stable is not limited to servers. Almost every municipality, NGO, business coproration, etc. run Debian stable on their workstations for very good reasons. It is absolutely great, very easy to maintain, and the users don't care about the hottest stuff, they care to get their job done. I can assure you that GNOME 2.8 runs fine on stable and it is more than good for a generic business activity. So the bulk of people Stable is created for is tremendously large, just try to imagine it. It is not limited to the kiddies that hang on IRC. [Yavor, who actually works as a shipbroker but voluntarily supports all machines in the company; and is suffering great pain since the boss, looking at his desktop running Debian testing, ordered the migration from stable to testing for all the workstations 2 years ago.] -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of unsubscribe. Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: Why not only support Sid and Testing?
Joseph Smidt wrote: I know I am in for an argument, but I think it is a good question. I'm sure many of you have read Mark's blog: http://www.markshuttleworth.com/archives/56. It says 76% of Debian users run unstable and probably a fair fraction of the rest run testing. What percentage run stable? (Hint - the sum of that and the unstable users may total 100%.) I have one workstation running unstable (because it's an amd64), one running stable with an unstable chroot, a physics analysis cluster running stable, and a home computer running stable (because my wife hates it when things break on upgrade). I think we all really love running unstable. It is very fun because it is exciting and sometimes unpredictible. On a computer used for playing or for maintaining Debian packages, this is fun. On a cluster supporting other users, or a computer behind a modem, or a computer that needs to have a reliably constant base of installed software, definitely not. Forgive me if I put words in your mouth, but you seem to have the impression that typical Debian users have only a single desktop machine that they enjoy upgrading, breaking, and fixing. Maybe this was true 10 years ago, before GNU/Linux had any recognition as a professional operating system. Now, at least for a significant minority of users, this is not the case. 1. Those who maintain Debian love unstable. It is the OS that offers the most freedom. Maintaining a Stable and Oldstable seem to distract from the focus of an ever evolving Unstable. I have an email from a developer I will not name that says he/she is not looking forward to having to maintain multiple versions of the same package in several different Debian snapshots when he/she could be worrying about one. As far as Debian is concerned, a developer does in fact only have to worry about one version of the package - the one in unstable. (If s/he wants this package ever to enter testing or stable, there are additional constraints - but these constraints mainly involve having no RC bugs, which packages should not have anyway.) Granted s/he can put forth additional effort to maintain a backport, or to help the security team with security fixes, but these are optional on his/her part. I recognize that said developer may have an employer who wants the package maintained on other Debian versions too. But in that case, said developer is at least getting paid for the work of doing so. 2. Testing would be a better distro. The time and effort that goes into Freezing, maintaining Stable and Oldstable, could be pulled into making testing a better distro for those who want new software, without the risk of running Unstable. Those who enjoy trying to live on the bleeding edge, who don't want to bleed to death. Testing is updated continually and there are many people who need a stable platform with only minimal changes (security fixes) that can be relied on to last for a year or more. 3. The freeze seems to cause more stress then happiness. Depends upon who you ask. I am very happy that Debian produces a stable reliable platform every 1.5 - 3 years. I am more than willing to trade off the annoyance of having to deal with coordinated library transitions, a few months' freeze, etc. The release managers surely get a lot more stress from it than I as a normal DD do; but on the other hand, the release must make them correspondingly more happy, or else (being volunteers) they would work on something else. 4. Let's face it, it does both Debian and Desktop users who want a constantly updating, Easy as Windows to use, stable distro a favor to send them to Ubuntu. Debian will stop getting harassed how Ubuntu's stable is so much nicer for users then Debian's. On the other, it does them a favor to go where life is made easier for them. (I am not saying Ubuntu stable is better then Debian's Stable, just the type of users who like a training wheels distro that has stable updates every 6 months is never going to be happy with Debian's Stable and Debian could do better off not having them harassing Debian over everything they like or dislike) Send them to Ubuntu, and let them come back when they want to run an Unstable style system. Very, very few Ubuntu users run their Unstable snapshot. Those types of people should be sent here. If your main point here is that people who complain a lot prefer Ubuntu/stable over Debian/stable, then I hope you are right; that's fine with me! But I don't see how this supports your argument to dump Debian/stable. Did you mean to imply that Ubuntu/stable is an acceptable replacement for Debian/stable? At least for me, this is not true. Most Ubuntu stable releases are only supported for a relatively short time, which is not long enough for me; and most Ubuntu packages are in universe where (AFAIK) they only get support in a stable release on a best-effort basis by a small and overworked MOTU team. regards, -- Kevin B.
Re: Why not only support Sid and Testing?
Marc Haber wrote: I know I am in for an argument, but I think it is a good question. I'm sure many of you have read Mark's blog: http://www.markshuttleworth.com/archives/56. It says 76% of Debian users run unstable and probably a fair fraction of the rest run testing. I tend to doubt these numbers, especially if they come from a source that is known for its Ubuntu / Canonical marketing blurb. So do I. A more credible source are apt sources being downloaded. In this area stable's market share was about 3/4, oldstable something around 1/12 and the rest testing/unstable. (All figures are at least half a year old and from the top of my memory, which may be failing me. IIRC it was aj who mentioned them in IRC). Maybe the FTP masters can provide more current figures. Cheers, Moritz -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of unsubscribe. Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: Why not only support Sid and Testing?
Le mardi 12 septembre 2006 à 07:23 -0600, Joseph Smidt a écrit : At the risk of repeating myself, Desktop Users: For most non-server minded people who still want a stable OS, Debian takes too long to release. On top of that,many of them want a As easy aw Windows distro. I don't know that Debian will provide that as well as Ubuntu, unless we want to alter many aspects of the project, like how often we release. Oh well. I wonder how Microsoft could manage to provide as easy as Windows OSes given the length of their release cycle. -- .''`. Josselin Mouette/\./\ : :' : [EMAIL PROTECTED] `. `'[EMAIL PROTECTED] `- Debian GNU/Linux -- The power of freedom signature.asc Description: Ceci est une partie de message numériquement signée
Re: Why not only support Sid and Testing?
Am Dienstag 12 September 2006 22:29 schrieb Moritz Muehlenhoff: Marc Haber wrote: I know I am in for an argument, but I think it is a good question. I'm sure many of you have read Mark's blog: http://www.markshuttleworth.com/archives/56. It says 76% of Debian users run unstable and probably a fair fraction of the rest run testing. I tend to doubt these numbers, especially if they come from a source that is known for its Ubuntu / Canonical marketing blurb. So do I. A more credible source are apt sources being downloaded. Not really. Many stable users install from the 2-DVD media set. And even they install from online repositories: you install less often packages when using stable than you update packages when using testing/unstable. Do not trust any statistics that you did not fake yourself ;) HS -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of unsubscribe. Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: Why not only support Sid and Testing?
Joey Hess [EMAIL PROTECTED] writes: The version numbers from popcon are much more interesting, but also heavily skewed by eg, d-i defaulting to installing popcon in etch but not in (released versions of) sarge. Please also be aware that many of us who run stable on hundreds of production systems don't participate in popcon on our production systems due to security concerns. Yes, I know that the amount of data that it exposes is small, but there's also near-zero benefit from the perspective of the reporting organization, and it's extremely difficult to make the case of sending a complete list of installed packages for each machine to a central repository. Security people immediately start worrying about that data being used to discover vulnerable systems. All the systems on which I run popcon are running testing or unstable because I only run popcon on my personal workstation and development systems. We have hundreds of production servers running Debian stable that are not reflected in those numbers. I do think that we probably have as many if not more users using testing+unstable than stable, but at this point that can only be a gut feeling, there aren't really good numbers to back it up. Certainly I have easily a hundred times as many systems running stable as I do running testing/unstable. -- Russ Allbery ([EMAIL PROTECTED]) http://www.eyrie.org/~eagle/ -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of unsubscribe. Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: Why not only support Sid and Testing?
On Mon, 2006-09-11 at 22:08 -0600, Joseph Smidt wrote: 1. Those who maintain Debian love unstable. It is the OS that offers the most freedom. Maintaining a Stable and Oldstable seem to distract from the focus of an ever evolving Unstable. I have an email from a developer I will not name that says he/she is not looking forward to having to maintain multiple versions of the same package in several different Debian snapshots when he/she could be worrying about one. The whole point of unstable is having new software, which can be tested. Testing is already quite stable, and any desktop user can use this. While unstable may be said to be a collection of packages, testing and stable are what Debian is, the distribution. Also, maintainers _need_ to run unstable. How else would they test the latest package that has been uploaded and see if any bugs need to be fixed before it moves into testing? 2. Testing would be a better distro. The time and effort that goes into Freezing, maintaining Stable and Oldstable, could be pulled into making testing a better distro for those who want new software, without the risk of running Unstable. Those who enjoy trying to live on the bleeding edge, who don't want to bleed to death. At the cost of stability and security, which is what stable is there for. 3. The freeze seems to cause more stress then happiness. A woman's labour while bearing a child causes more stress than happiness, but is needed. The freeze is needed to ensure proper testing and be able to correctly support stable, fixing the latest bugs and releasing it. 4. Let's face it, it does both Debian and Desktop users who want a constantly updating, Easy as Windows to use, stable distro a favor to send them to Ubuntu. Debian will stop getting harassed how Ubuntu's stable is so much nicer for users then Debian's. On the other, it does them a favor to go where life is made easier for them. (I am not saying Ubuntu stable is better then Debian's Stable, just the type of users who like a training wheels distro that has stable updates every 6 months is never going to be happy with Debian's Stable and Debian could do better off not having them harassing Debian over everything they like or dislike) Send them to Ubuntu, and let them come back when they want to run an Unstable style system. Very, very few Ubuntu users run their Unstable snapshot. Those types of people should be sent here. Debian does not cater only to desktop users. By doing what you propose, the server and those users who need to use a stable, tested distro are being left behind. If a desktop user wants fast releases, he/she can run Testing, which has a new release almost every day, with software coming in. You cannot compare Debian sid with Ubuntu edgy at the moment. Ubuntu's unstable is much more unstable than Debian's, as the release cycle is less, and more has to happen in this time. Running edgy is like running experimental at the moment. Besides, I'm sure the majority running it are developers at the moment. -- No violence, gentlemen -- no violence, I beg of you! Consider the furniture! -- Sherlock Holmes Gabriel Puliatti [EMAIL PROTECTED] predius.org signature.asc Description: This is a digitally signed message part
Re: Why not only support Sid and Testing?
Our users who currently use stable in various mission critical and other destabalization-averse environments (basically everyone who isn't a single desktop user) need and want stable releases which are supported by the very capable security and stable release teams. Our stable releases fill a niche that no other FOSS distribution currently fills adequately, though many have tried. While I clearly can't force other developers to work on getting stable released, I personally am very motivated to see it happen for the very fact that I am a user who has systems running in destabalization-averse environments; I'm glad that many other developers feel the same way, because it enables me to work on other things besides having a stable system. Beyond that, conflict, pressure, and stress are all parts of any anarchistic process which is as large as Debian is. However, what you see on the surface via the mailing lists really is a small microcosm of what is going on. Real work rarely happens in MUAs; it happens in editors and on the command line. Don Armstrong -- A people living under the perpetual menace of war and invasion is very easy to govern. It demands no social reforms. It does not haggle over expenditures on armaments and military equipment. It pays without discussion, it ruins itself, and that is an excellent thing for the syndicates of financiers and manufacturers for whom patriotic terrors are an abundant source of gain. -- Anatole France http://www.donarmstrong.com http://rzlab.ucr.edu -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of unsubscribe. Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Why not only support Sid and Testing?
I know I am in for an argument, but I think it is a good question. I'm sure many of you have read Mark's blog: http://www.markshuttleworth.com/archives/56. It says 76% of Debian users run unstable and probably a fair fraction of the rest run testing. Isn't it a cause of stress trying to cram for the freeze? Haven't we seen emails about how we are behind the RC goals for Etch which causes frustration? All the questions: is this or that going in Etch, why not? (I have been resposible for some of these) I think we all really love running unstable. It is very fun because it is exciting and sometimes unpredictible. Debian, in my opinion, appeals to an ambitiuos crowd who is willing to take risks and is not afraid to explore the inner workings of a linux system. Such a crowd, I believe, would prefere running unstable or testing and not a system that contains packages that can be over a year old. I think Debian (I maintain a couple packages too, and hopefully more in the future, so I am not just trying to tell those who work what to do) should consider only supporting unstable and testing for a few reasons: 1. Those who maintain Debian love unstable. It is the OS that offers the most freedom. Maintaining a Stable and Oldstable seem to distract from the focus of an ever evolving Unstable. I have an email from a developer I will not name that says he/she is not looking forward to having to maintain multiple versions of the same package in several different Debian snapshots when he/she could be worrying about one. 2. Testing would be a better distro. The time and effort that goes into Freezing, maintaining Stable and Oldstable, could be pulled into making testing a better distro for those who want new software, without the risk of running Unstable. Those who enjoy trying to live on the bleeding edge, who don't want to bleed to death. 3. The freeze seems to cause more stress then happiness. 4. Let's face it, it does both Debian and Desktop users who want a constantly updating, Easy as Windows to use, stable distro a favor to send them to Ubuntu. Debian will stop getting harassed how Ubuntu's stable is so much nicer for users then Debian's. On the other, it does them a favor to go where life is made easier for them. (I am not saying Ubuntu stable is better then Debian's Stable, just the type of users who like a training wheels distro that has stable updates every 6 months is never going to be happy with Debian's Stable and Debian could do better off not having them harassing Debian over everything they like or dislike) Send them to Ubuntu, and let them come back when they want to run an Unstable style system. Very, very few Ubuntu users run their Unstable snapshot. Those types of people should be sent here. Joseph Smidt signature.asc Description: Digital signature
Re: Why not only support Sid and Testing?
-BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE- Hash: SHA1 Hi, I think we all really love running unstable. It is very fun because it is exciting and sometimes unpredictible. Debian, in my opinion, appeals to an ambitiuos crowd who is willing to take risks and is not afraid to explore the inner workings of a linux system. Such a crowd, I believe, would prefere running unstable or testing and not a system that contains packages that can be over a year old. I think you really have to differentiate what kind of use you are talking about. I have the feeling you are only/mostly looking at the desktop segment. For desktops I kind of agree with you. On a desktop I always want to have the new and fancy and I run unstable on my desktops (the other reason is to help find bugs). On the other hand I also maintain a bunch of servers and I would not want to run testing on them. I really like stable for servers, as I have an extremely solid system which doesn't give me much work, except installing security upgrades. When etch comes out I will upgrade those servers to etch and then I don't have to do much work on them for quite some time till the next release comes out. Patrick -BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE- Version: GnuPG v1.4.3 (MingW32) iD8DBQFFBjS8aA/ofYi4EMoRAgqiAKCr19igpBaZcThPJWK6B+r/ZdQ7mgCfSR+z oJyFymKCx450CGlnbBYDtEg= =ibva -END PGP SIGNATURE- -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of unsubscribe. Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: Why not only support Sid and Testing?
Joseph Smidt wrote: I know I am in for an argument, but I think it is a good question. I'm sure many of you have read Mark's blog: http://www.markshuttleworth.com/archives/56. It says 76% of Debian users run unstable and probably a fair fraction of the rest run testing. Those numbers are apparently based on this survey: http://www.lucas-nussbaum.net/blog/?p=206 Which only examined 85 xchat users on #debian on oftc. The number combined testing and unstable FWIW. I wouldn't give it much credance. The version numbers from popcon are much more interesting, but also heavily skewed by eg, d-i defaulting to installing popcon in etch but not in (released versions of) sarge. One interesting thing I do see in the popcon numbers is that, even since a little before the release of sarge, the number of machines with its version of popcon installed has remained very close to the same, while the number using testing versions of popcon surpassed it even before d-i started installing it by default. I'm not sure that this indicates; manually installing popcon probably selects for the kind of users who use unstable/testing. It will be interesting to get the data from the next stable release where many people should install it by default. I do think that we probably have as many if not more users using testing+unstable than stable, but at this point that can only be a gut feeling, there aren't really good numbers to back it up. I think Debian (I maintain a couple packages too, and hopefully more in the future, so I am not just trying to tell those who work what to do) should consider only supporting unstable and testing for a few reasons: If you're interested in Debian supporting unstable and testing and not stable, then there are several things you can do to help bring those distributions, especially testing, up to par as a really usable distribution for a larger percentage of users: * Participate in the testing security team, which can always use more help. * Help with d-i and with getting frequent releases of the installer out. * Help nudge those releases closer to being full releases of testing, rather than just being releases of the installer. * Help the release team deal with RC bugs that hold packages out of testing with other issues that block transitions, so that testing has current versions of software (and current security fixes, etc). Since all of these activities also have side effects that make stable releases better and/or more frequent, and most of the work done targeted at making stable releases better makes testing better in between, I've not worried much about trying to realign the project's focus away from stable. -- see shy jo signature.asc Description: Digital signature
Re: Why not only support Sid and Testing?
On Tuesday 12 September 2006 07:08, Joseph Smidt wrote: I know I am in for an argument, but I think it is a good question. I'm sure many of you have read Mark's blog: http://www.markshuttleworth.com/archives/56. It says 76% of Debian users run unstable and probably a fair fraction of the rest run testing. The answer is in the same article: Many people have asked why I decided to build Ubuntu alongside, or on top of, Debian, rather than trying to get Debian to turn into a peak in its own right. The reason is simple - I believe that Debian’s breadth is too precious to compromise just because one person with resources cares a lot about a few specific use cases. We should not narrow the scope of Debian. The breadth of Debian, its diversity of packages and architectures, together with the social equality of all DD’s, is its greatest asset. And Mr. Mark Shuttleworth is ultimately right about that track. The Debian breadth is large, unique and versatile, and this includes the very conservative Stable releases too, to let people have better things to do than fixing/fighting a production system. OTOH it is really complex to drive such a large beast and there is room to improve communication inside the project, but it does worth the effort. Thus, there is no use to kill renown Debian virtues, but try to fix deficiencies instead ;-). -- pub 4096R/0E4BD0AB 2003-03-18 people.fccf.net/danchev/key pgp.mit.edu fingerprint 1AE7 7C66 0A26 5BFF DF22 5D55 1C57 0C89 0E4B D0AB -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of unsubscribe. Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]
