Re: A lot of pending packages

[Tanguy Ortolo]

Le dimanche 13 juin 2010, Thomas Goirand a écrit :
> I don't agree with you on the reasons. The thing is, PHP applications
> in Debian aren't made to support multiple instance. The result being
> that it doesn't make sense to use them, because you wont be able to
> have more than a single site with it.

Some of them are. gallery2, for instance, has a multisite support.

> If there was a move toward multiple instances using a single package, I am
> quite sure that the situation would be different.

Their is a move, at least with DokuWiki. Their is a semi-official way to
build a multisite installation (they call that “farming”), that used
some non-free (CC-BY-NC-SA) scripts. I wrote to ask for a license
change some months ago, and I have just received a reply: these scripts
are now free (GPLv2), so I am now able to work on multisite support.

But I think that packaged webapps can be very useful, because:
- they allow anyone to simply “aptitude install dokuwiki” to get a
  working installation without worrying about file system paths, rights
  and so one;
- they often result in a cleaner, more secure setup (remember that many
  webapps install guides are written for users of mutualized hosting,
  and thus suggest to chmod -R 777 webapp_directory);
- they can interact with the web server(s) configuration, allowing to
  get a working installation without having to define an Alias or a
  VirtualHost (based on the suggestion of an installation guide that was
  written for an Apache HTTPD with monolithic configuration, and that
  was never written for [insert here your favorite web server]);
- they can integrate configuration options with debconf, providing a
  single interface.

In fact, I know that at least some users do use at least one packaged
webapp: mine. Because I get bug reports, some of them being my fault,
and I sincerly regret being only able to write the fix and not to upload
it to Debian or have it quickly uploaded, thus leaving my users with a
bug that I have corrected, but that they cannot apply automatically.

-- 
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Re: A lot of pending packages

[Tanguy Ortolo]

Le samedi 12 juin 2010, Johan Van de Wauw a écrit :
> 2010/6/11 Tanguy Ortolo :
> > * dokuwiki, a PHP-based wiki, that I co-maintain with a DD that has
> >  almost no time to sponsor me and suggested me to find another sponsor:
> >  such a package (PHP, web application) seems to interest nobody.
> 
> Which should not really come as a surprise. First of all, not many
> people actually use packaged php applications. According to popcon,
> drupal6 has only 444 installations, with only 13 'recent' users[1].
> The number will be an underestimation as many servers won't have
> popcon installed, but still...

Well, at least I know that my package is enough used to trigger some
bugs that are interresting both for me and for upstream. And some nasty
packaging bugs that are caused by strange spurious modifications made by
the user.

> Not many webapplications have an upstream which supports legacy
> versions, which means that it is up to the sponsor/maintainer to do
> so. While the same is true for many packages in debian, the security
> consequenses are usually more severe for a web app than for most
> desktop applications.

Yes indeed. I know that I will have to backport some patches. And I also
know that, as I am neither DD nor DM, they will take a longer time to be
uploaded to Debian, but this is independant of my will.

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Re: A lot of pending packages

[nikrou77]

Hi all,

I don't agree with you on the reasons. The thing is, PHP applications in
Debian
aren't made to support multiple instance. The result being that it
doesn't make
sense to use them, because you wont be able to have more than a single site
with it.

If there was a move toward multiple instances using a single package, I am
quite sure that the situation would be different.

I didn't think the problem is in debian, even if I agree you. 


There'snot so many web applications (PHP or what ever language you want) 
thatcould be installed one time and provide many instances.
If people upstream don't think (and manage code in that way) aboutproviding 
multiple instance with the same installation, maintainer'sjob will be too 
difficult. 

Nicolas


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Re: A lot of pending packages

[Thomas Goirand]

Johan Van de Wauw wrote:
> 2010/6/11 Tanguy Ortolo :
>   
>> * dokuwiki, a PHP-based wiki, that I co-maintain with a DD that has
>>  almost no time to sponsor me and suggested me to find another sponsor:
>>  such a package (PHP, web application) seems to interest nobody.
>> 
>
> Which should not really come as a surprise. First of all, not many
> people actually use packaged php applications. According to popcon,
> drupal6 has only 444 installations, with only 13 'recent' users[1].
> The number will be an underestimation as many servers won't have
> popcon installed, but still...
>
> Not many webapplications have an upstream which supports legacy
> versions, which means that it is up to the sponsor/maintainer to do
> so. While the same is true for many packages in debian, the security
> consequenses are usually more severe for a web app than for most
> desktop applications.
>
> If packages have a high chance of being hardly installed (because most
> people use upstream releases and not the debian packages, which
> happens a lot for php programs) and require a lot of work to support,
> it should be carefully considered whether we really want them in
> debian.
>
> [1]http://qa.debian.org/popcon.php?package=drupal6
>   

I don't agree with you on the reasons. The thing is, PHP applications in
Debian
aren't made to support multiple instance. The result being that it
doesn't make
sense to use them, because you wont be able to have more than a single site
with it.

If there was a move toward multiple instances using a single package, I am
quite sure that the situation would be different.

Also, yes, popcon is almost never installed on servers... The reason, IMHO,
must be that servers most of the time are setup automatically, and you don't
even see the popcon question. I wonder if it would be possible to have
popcon
debconf's answer set to yes by default! :)

Thomas


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Re: A lot of pending packages

[Johan Van de Wauw]

2010/6/11 Tanguy Ortolo :
> * dokuwiki, a PHP-based wiki, that I co-maintain with a DD that has
>  almost no time to sponsor me and suggested me to find another sponsor:
>  such a package (PHP, web application) seems to interest nobody.

Which should not really come as a surprise. First of all, not many
people actually use packaged php applications. According to popcon,
drupal6 has only 444 installations, with only 13 'recent' users[1].
The number will be an underestimation as many servers won't have
popcon installed, but still...

Not many webapplications have an upstream which supports legacy
versions, which means that it is up to the sponsor/maintainer to do
so. While the same is true for many packages in debian, the security
consequenses are usually more severe for a web app than for most
desktop applications.

If packages have a high chance of being hardly installed (because most
people use upstream releases and not the debian packages, which
happens a lot for php programs) and require a lot of work to support,
it should be carefully considered whether we really want them in
debian.

[1]http://qa.debian.org/popcon.php?package=drupal6


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Re: A lot of pending packages

[George Danchev]

Quoting "Klaus Grue" :

Perhaps maintainers should stand up and review some packages of  
their peers?


Absolutely. This already happens a little bit. It would be excellent
if more people could do it.


Maybe my experience with Fedora and Cygwin could be of interest. As  
a new packager, I made my first package ('logiweb') and submitted it  
to Debian, Fedora, and Cygwin:


Aug 2009 Submitted http://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/bugreport.cgi?bug=543550
Sep 2009 Submitted https://bugzilla.redhat.com/show_bug.cgi?id=523715
Mar 2010 Package pushed to Fedora stable
May 2010 Sent ITP to Cygwin
May 2010 Package uploaded to Cygwin

Sep-Mar I corrected the package under guidance of a Fedora sponsor  
(thanks). I was also lucky enough that a DD looked at my Debian  
package and gave guidance (thanks). But it seems that DD's are  
overloaded. At least my package is not in Debian yet.


Once my Fedora package was in shape, I was asked to demonstrate my  
technical skills by either preparing one more Fedora package or do a  
pre-review of some other package. So I chose to do a pre-review.


I picked a package, but somebody else was faster, and the package  
was processed before I could get started. Then I shortlisted ten  
packages
I found I was competent to pre-review, waited a few days, three  
packages were taken, picked one of the remaining packages, assigned  
it to myself, and did the pre-review. When my pre-review was  
accepted by my sponsor, my package was uploaded.


Once accepted in Fedora, uploading to Cygwin went very smoothly (thanks).

So this is my experience with Fedora: When I came with my package,  
the Fedora community did something for me (reviewed the package)  
then required me to do something for them (do a pre-review), and the  
package was accepted. That seems quite fair.


Furthermore, Fedora had a list of packages waiting for review, and  
it was easy to find one to pick.


I am not saying Fedora is ideal. On a Fedora mailing list, I just  
saw an invitation to come and celebrate the one-year anniversary of  
a Fedora review request.


My point, however, is that having some sort of formalized way in  
which maintainers can unload DDs could be a good thing.


This is really nice experience, however I strongly believe that all of  
that is also possible with Debian in its current form. You are allowed  
to do any tech work DDs are allowed, except uploading, voting and  
reading -private list until you gain DD (or resp. DM status), and it  
would be helpful indeed. Simply reviewing and/or uploading packages  
for the sake of it does not seem very efficient way to spend human  
time and archive space to me, otoh helping neglected packages or  
co-reviwing new hot or interesting packages makes sense and is  
absolutely possible, but then again people have different interests  
sometimes, so finding a match could be an issue, and it actually is  
most of the time.



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Re: A lot of pending packages

[Umang Varma]

On 06/12/2010 03:31 PM, Klaus Grue wrote:
> So this is my experience with Fedora: When I came with my package, the
> Fedora community did something for me (reviewed the package) then
> required me to do something for them (do a pre-review), and the package
> was accepted. That seems quite fair.
> 
> Furthermore, Fedora had a list of packages waiting for review, and it
> was easy to find one to pick.
> 
> I am not saying Fedora is ideal. On a Fedora mailing list, I just saw an
> invitation to come and celebrate the one-year anniversary of a Fedora
> review request.
> 
> My point, however, is that having some sort of formalized way in which
> maintainers can unload DDs could be a good thing.

I don't know anything about packaging for Fedora, so I cannot compare,
but I'll point out that reviewing a package requires a far greater
understanding than packaging your own software does. So, I do not
consider myself capable of reviewing someone else's package, even though
I feel capable of changing things in my own package.

I really appreciate the work that DD's here do and I follow d-mentors
and d-python to whatever extent my time and capabilities allow. I don't
see myself reviewing a package unless I get the hang of the details
(maybe by examining every RFS and try to understand the DD's review for
a good amount of time).

I'd imagine there are other newbies who've been able to get the hang of
packaging much faster and are able to make far more contributions while
others, who just want to get one package uploaded, don't follow
d-mentors after their review was completed. So the various levels of
interest and capability, I feel, don't make it possible to make a
review-in-return required.

Now I don't know whether this is what you were suggesting, but d-mentors
could encourage non-DDs to try their hand at mini-reviews where basic
things are checked and a DD could then do an independent review. By
comparing the reviews newbies can learn to review packages and
contribute later on.

Umang


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Re: A lot of pending packages

[Klaus Grue]

Perhaps maintainers should stand up and review some packages of their peers?


Absolutely. This already happens a little bit. It would be excellent
if more people could do it.


Maybe my experience with Fedora and Cygwin could be of interest. As a new 
packager, I made my first package ('logiweb') and submitted it to Debian, 
Fedora, and Cygwin:


Aug 2009 Submitted http://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/bugreport.cgi?bug=543550
Sep 2009 Submitted https://bugzilla.redhat.com/show_bug.cgi?id=523715
Mar 2010 Package pushed to Fedora stable
May 2010 Sent ITP to Cygwin
May 2010 Package uploaded to Cygwin

Sep-Mar I corrected the package under guidance of a Fedora sponsor 
(thanks). I was also lucky enough that a DD looked at my Debian package 
and gave guidance (thanks). But it seems that DD's are overloaded. At 
least my package is not in Debian yet.


Once my Fedora package was in shape, I was asked to demonstrate my 
technical skills by either preparing one more Fedora package or do a 
pre-review of some other package. So I chose to do a pre-review.


I picked a package, but somebody else was faster, and the package was 
processed before I could get started. Then I shortlisted ten packages
I found I was competent to pre-review, waited a few days, three packages 
were taken, picked one of the remaining packages, assigned it to myself, 
and did the pre-review. When my pre-review was accepted by my sponsor, my 
package was uploaded.


Once accepted in Fedora, uploading to Cygwin went very smoothly (thanks).

So this is my experience with Fedora: When I came with my package, the 
Fedora community did something for me (reviewed the package) then required 
me to do something for them (do a pre-review), and the package was 
accepted. That seems quite fair.


Furthermore, Fedora had a list of packages waiting for review, and it was 
easy to find one to pick.


I am not saying Fedora is ideal. On a Fedora mailing list, I just saw an 
invitation to come and celebrate the one-year anniversary of a Fedora 
review request.


My point, however, is that having some sort of formalized way in which 
maintainers can unload DDs could be a good thing.


Cheers,
Klaus


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Re: A lot of pending packages

[Paul Wise]

On Fri, Jun 11, 2010 at 5:26 PM, Johan Van de Wauw
 wrote:

> Perhaps maintainers should stand up and review some packages of their peers?

Absolutely. This already happens a little bit. It would be excellent
if more people could do it.

-- 
bye,
pabs

http://wiki.debian.org/PaulWise


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Re: A lot of pending packages

[Tanguy Ortolo]

Le vendredi 11 juin 2010, Raymond Wan a écrit :
> Anyway, about the above point, hopefully I am not wrong by saying
> this, but if nobody validates it, I don't think it means it is
> useless.

No, of course. I just meant that, in that case, the packaging work, that
was done for the benefit of all the Debian users, stays unknown and not
easy to use for most of them, thus failing in its primary goal for a
reason independant of the will of the packager.

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Re: A lot of pending packages

[Raymond Wan]

Hi all,

2010/6/11 Tanguy Ortolo :
> Le jeudi 10 juin 2010, Mohammad Ebrahim Mohammadi Panah a écrit :
> Failing to get sponsorship is very frustrating, because you make some
> work you find useful, and, because nobody validates it, it remains
> useless. I is even more frustrating when it consists in an update rather
> than a new package, and this update fixes bugs that do affect real
> users. Such a frustration make easy to find problems in the Debian
> management, so this point of view is not a neutral one. :-)


Quite honestly, I'm new here and joined this list because after many
years of using Debian, I'm wondering if I can help out.

Anyway, about the above point, hopefully I am not wrong by saying
this, but if nobody validates it, I don't think it means it is
useless.  It can still be a Debian package (or be source that has to
be compiled) ... just not an official one.  Perhaps it can be on a
homepage or something (with a good description that will help search
engines find it) and after it gets noticed and used, then finding a
sponsor might be easier?

I'm just saying that sometimes things happen the other way around...

Ray


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Re: A lot of pending packages

[Steffen Möller]

On 06/11/2010 01:10 PM, Ben Finney wrote:
> Tanguy Ortolo  writes:
>
>   
>> For the beginner's point of view, it looks like:
>> * there are not enough DD with time to review all proposed packages;
>> * to have more DD people have to apply;
>> * applicants have to show their skills and motivation by… maintaining
>>   packages, which requires sponsorship.
>> 
> Not true. Applicants can show their skills and motivation by
> contributing to existing packages. I would even argue that it's more
> important to do that than to submit new packages.
>   
Seconding everything that Ben said, I very much suggest
to check for Debian-subcommunities, i.e. "Blends", if they
fit your package. There is for instance Debian Science
or Debian Med, once you have access to their
subversion/git repositories, you'll feel much like
a DD already and finding sponsors is also a non-issue.

[...]
>> Failing to get sponsorship is very frustrating, because you make some
>> work you find useful, and, because nobody validates it, it remains
>> useless.
>> 
> This is a very real problem, and the feeling of frustration is not to be
> brushed aside.
One can always prepare one's own public repository or just use
Mentors as an archive. The more specialised things get, the smaller
the number of interested users and of interested sponsors alike.
And of those sponsors, there need to be one reading the debian-mentors
mailing list. If - one by one - you email maintainers of existing
similar packages in main if they can sponsor you or who their
sponsor was, I am confident that you will be helped with not too
much of a delay.

Best,

Steffen


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Re: A lot of pending packages

[Ben Finney]

Tanguy Ortolo  writes:

> For the beginner's point of view, it looks like:
> * there are not enough DD with time to review all proposed packages;
> * to have more DD people have to apply;
> * applicants have to show their skills and motivation by… maintaining
>   packages, which requires sponsorship.

Not true. Applicants can show their skills and motivation by
contributing to existing packages. I would even argue that it's more
important to do that than to submit new packages.

Pick bug reports, submit patches to fix them, respond to feedback,
demonstrate persistence and patience and ability to learn by husbanding
those patches through to release with the existing maintainer. I have
great confidence that anyone hoping to become a DD will learn a great
deal about how Debian works by following this process.

Following this successfully will not only improve Debian where it's
sorely needed, but will also establish exactly the kind of relationships
you need to gain advocacy from others and smooth your entry into the
project.

Bonus points for choosing packages which the maintainer has flagged with
a Request For Help (RFH) bug report; install the ‘devscripts’ package
and run ‘wnpp-alert’ frequently.

> So this looks like a vicious cirle.

Easily resolved by sufficient motivation and willingness to improve
Debian generally, rather than fretting about specific new releases.

> Failing to get sponsorship is very frustrating, because you make some
> work you find useful, and, because nobody validates it, it remains
> useless.

This is a very real problem, and the feeling of frustration is not to be
brushed aside.

However, in a way, it helps to redirect the focus to where it's needed:
relieving the load on *existing* package maintainers by helping them
with packages that are already in Debian.

-- 
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  `\believe in tolerance and free speech.” —David Brin |
_o__)  |
Ben Finney


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Re: A lot of pending packages

[Johan Van de Wauw]

On Thu, Jun 10, 2010 at 4:13 AM, Paul Wise  wrote:
> The fact is that there just aren't enough people who have time and are
> interested in sponsoring. Reviewing packages takes up a lot of time to
> do properly, especially for new packages. It has been this way for as
> long as I can remember.
>...
So on one hand we have debian developers who lack time to review new
packages and on the other hand maintainers who are eagerly awaiting a
review or sponsorship of their package. Perhaps maintainers should
stand up and review some packages of their peers? One could even
change the template to a request for review for *new* packages, and
make it a request for sponsorship only after a successful review?


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Re: A lot of pending packages

[Tanguy Ortolo]

Le jeudi 10 juin 2010, Mohammad Ebrahim Mohammadi Panah a écrit :
> I feel like encouraged enough to become a DD. But when I see how
> complicated is the process of getting a package sponsored, I'm afraid
> of even thinking about the process of becoming a DD. Or is it just me?
 
It is not just you. :-)

For the beginner's point of view, it looks like:
* there are not enough DD with time to review all proposed packages;
* to have more DD people have to apply;
* applicants have to show their skills and motivation by… maintaining
  packages, which requires sponsorship.
So this looks like a vicious cirle.

In fact it is not as simple as this, because not all DD have time to
sponsor people, and because the ease to get a sponsor greatly depends on
the interest the package itself will generate. For instance, for two
packages I maintain:
* latexila, a GTK+-based IDE for LaTeX, that got sponsored in very few
  time;
* dokuwiki, a PHP-based wiki, that I co-maintain with a DD that has
  almost no time to sponsor me and suggested me to find another sponsor:
  such a package (PHP, web application) seems to interest nobody.

Failing to get sponsorship is very frustrating, because you make some
work you find useful, and, because nobody validates it, it remains
useless. I is even more frustrating when it consists in an update rather
than a new package, and this update fixes bugs that do affect real
users. Such a frustration make easy to find problems in the Debian
management, so this point of view is not a neutral one. :-)

However, I think it is easier to get sponsorship from a specific
community, like a local or national Debian developpers group, or a
topic-related group, for instance debian-science (for science-related
packages). When such a group exists: for instance, debian-webapps seems
almost dead, so their is no hope getting sponsorship from there.

I think the conclusion should be: when you become a DD, do not forget
how you began, and do sponsor people.

-- 
Tanguy Ortolo


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Re: A lot of pending packages

[Joachim Wiedorn]

Hello, 

Lorenzo De Liso  wrote on 2010-06-10 03:02:

> OK, then I will adopt few packages which I'm interested and work on

With adopted packages you have the same stony way in mentors.d.o. The most
packages which I maintain were orphaned or RFA and for a package update
I often wait one ore two weeks. I think the best way would be to send the
first RFS and wait, say one week. If there is nobody sponsoring your
package try a second RFS. My last updated package stay in mentors.d.o
since 7 days and I have had only one reply of an DD who perhaps had time 
in three weeks ... so I am waiting.

Fondest regards,
 Joachim Wiedorn



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Re: A lot of pending packages

[أحمد المحمودي]

On Thu, Jun 10, 2010 at 10:13:35AM +0800, Paul Wise wrote:
> Sometimes the package is beyond my skill level (such as Java or
> complicated maintainer scripts) or written in languages I strongly
> dislike (PHP), which means I review part of the package and will not
> sponsor it.
---end quoted text---

It would be nice to have a page on mentors.d.n to advice uploaders to 
actually seek sponsorship from relevant Debian teams (Gnome/Java/PHP...) 


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Re: A lot of pending packages

[Petter Reinholdtsen]

[Lorenzo De Liso]
> I'm a simple debian contributor: I'm trying to get my work in debian
> through a sponsor [1] [2]. The problem is that I'm waiting for a sponsor
> since 7 days+ (and not only me, in mentors.debian.net there are 20+
> pending packages) [3].

My sponsoring preferences are available from
http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/debian-sponsoring.html >.  To
make sure I have direct contact with the prospective package
maintainer and avoid a backlog of packages I should have sponsored, I
want to be contacted on IRC about sponsoring.  So to me,
mentors.debian.net is a nice repository to find the source, and
uploading there is not the last step a future package maintainer need
to take to get her packages sponsored.

I want to avoid spending time reviewing a package where the
prospective package maintainer has gone missing, because I simply do
not have time to maintain more packages, and if I upload a package
where the maintainer is no longer available that would be the result.

I would love it if the package page on mentors.debian.net would
include the latest lintian status, a build log verifying that the
source is buildable with the current unstable and links to the project
home page, to save me more time and give it some added value to upload
there instead of putting the source package anywhere on the web.  It
would save me some time when I review a package for sponsoring. :)

Happy hacking,
-- 
Petter Reinholdtsen


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Re: A lot of pending packages

[Boyd Stephen Smith Jr.]

On Wednesday 09 June 2010 20:54:28 you wrote:
> I for one would like to become
> a DD. For a simple reason: it is my OS of choice since years ago, so I
> want it to be its best for everybody. But I suffer the problems I
> mentioned.

How many packages have you worked on for Debian?  Maybe it is time to apply 
for DD privileges.  Worst case scenario, you don't measure up now and you can 
apply again in 18 months.

> So my only visible activity on Debian is a few versions of
> a package. What is the way to go? Continue packaging and waiting for
> months (or even forever) to get it sponsored? Am I doing it wrong?!

After you've asked for sponsorship here, don't stop being visible.  Sure, give 
sponsors a little time to look at the package, but if you haven't gotten any 
response in a week or so, get more visible.

1. Reply to you original RFS with a new RFS.  You don't need any new content, 
you just need to catch a sponsor that was unavailable last week and is 
available this week.  If you've had (a) sponsor(s) before, make sure they get 
a CC on both.

2. Does the upload fix bugs?  Are they recorded in bugs.d.o?  If they haven't 
been reported, file one.  Once the bug exists, add a note to it that indicates 
your new package fixes the bug and include the URL for your package.  Is there 
a new upstream release and Debian isn't in a freeze?  After some amount of 
time, that *itself* can become a (wishlist) bug.

3. Do you know any other users of your package?  Have them test it for you and 
ask them to respond to your RFS with "I use this package, and this version is 
better than the last."

4. Get on IRC.  I think there's a #mentors on the Debian network, and there 
might be DDs on other channels that can provide extra quick turn-around or 
even more suggestions for visibility.

5. Search for DDs that might take an interest in your package.  Usually this 
isn't DDs that maintain similar packages, but rather teams centered around a 
technology, role, or programming language.

It is incredibly frustrating to do work and then find it ignored.  
Unfortunately, the Internet is a big place and the people that can give you 
kudos (or intelligently critique your work) are not already watching you.  Be 
proud of your work (until told otherwise), show it to as much of the Debian 
community as you can.

Now, it would get truly annoying if every new Debian packager did all of this 
every time they had anything to contribute, so give the original RFS at least 
a week to be looked at, and stop promoting for at least a week whenever you 
find a DD that will review (and possibly upload) your package.

If you aren't obnoxious with your self-promotion, you'll eventually find 
someone to take enough time to look at your package and, most likely, reply 
with a laundry list of things you need to fix.
-- 
Boyd Stephen Smith Jr.   ,= ,-_-. =.
b...@iguanasuicide.net  ((_/)o o(\_))
ICQ: 514984 YM/AIM: DaTwinkDaddy `-'(. .)`-'
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Re: A lot of pending packages

[Paul Wise]

Firstly, 7 days is a very short period of time to be waiting for
sponsorship, some have been waiting since 2006.

About your two packages:

autotrash: sounds like the functionality should be part of GNOME/KDE,
please talk to upstream about moving it there.

ardentryst: seems like a good fit for the Debian games team:

http://wiki.debian.org/Games/Team

We would definitely welcome new people, especially if they want to
work on other games than their own. Please note the games team is
having slight sponsorship issues too.

On to your mail

The fact is that there just aren't enough people who have time and are
interested in sponsoring. Reviewing packages takes up a lot of time to
do properly, especially for new packages. It has been this way for as
long as I can remember. To fix this situation, we need:

More interest from DDs in sponsoring packages both within and outside
their areas of interest.

More motivation from DDs to spend more of their time on Debian and
less on other things like work, personal life, etc.

More interest from maintainers in putting effort into their packages.

More interest from maintainers in keeping the packages on mentors.d.n
up to date and automatic removal of mentors.d.n packages that haven't
been updated in more than X months.

More automated QA stuff for mentors.d.n and more visibility for that
info so maintainers actually notice issues.

Ways for maintainers to give answers to common sponsor questions along
with their upload so that the overhead for sponsors is reduced.

Some of the above is part of the proposed design for debexpo, which
really needs folks to step up and work on it (hint hint). Other parts
can be helped by sending DDs to DebConf, I've found that a big
motivator.

On a regular basis I look back through the -mentors archives for RFS
threads with no replies and do a review of a few that look
interesting. Most of the packages I look at during those reviews are
definitely not of sufficient quality to make me comfortable uploading
them. Many contain non-free stuff, lack source, FTBFS etc etc blah.
After I review them, often there are no replies, followups or updates
to the package at all. People posting RFS mails don't seem to put in
the effort to make good packages, which reduces my motivation to deal
with -mentors. And if I actually do an upload, then usually the
maintainer looses interest in Debian or in the package and it sits
there on my QA page gathering bugs and reducing my motivation.
Sometimes the package is beyond my skill level (such as Java or
complicated maintainer scripts) or written in languages I strongly
dislike (PHP), which means I review part of the package and will not
sponsor it.

Personally I won't be actually sponsoring packages on a regular basis
until debexpo is in better shape and gets deployed. The exceptions are
the occasional QA upload, RC bug fix, team upload or (much less
likely) when I'm actually impressed with the quality of the initial
RFS of a package.

-- 
bye,
pabs

http://wiki.debian.org/PaulWise


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Re: A lot of pending packages

[Boyd Stephen Smith Jr.]

On Wednesday 09 June 2010 18:22:08 Lorenzo De Liso wrote:
> Il giorno mer, 09/06/2010 alle 18.12 -0500, Boyd Stephen Smith Jr. ha
> 
> scritto:
> > I don't think you are going to get a lot of traction for any proposal
> > that removes a DD from the upload process.
> > 
> > So, lack of free DDs will always be a potential issue.  I suggest you
> > encourage people to become a DD.
> 
> I know few DDs which are busy and sometimes they can't sponsor packages.
> Become a DD would be great but without a previous work for debian I
> don't think you can become a DD. Am I wrong?

You need someone to sponsor you, and usually they look at past experience with 
the Debian development process.  That doesn't mean you have to get your pet 
package into Debian, but it does mean you have to show competency with 
preparing uploads to the archive.

Also, technical competency is only part of being a DD.  It's much more 
important to be able to work well with the current DDs, process, and upstream 
to make Debian and the software packaged as part of it better.

I strongly suggest anyone interested in Debian packaging start with the "wnpp-
alert" program; existing packages and DDs need plenty of help with what is 
already there.
-- 
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b...@iguanasuicide.net  ((_/)o o(\_))
ICQ: 514984 YM/AIM: DaTwinkDaddy `-'(. .)`-'
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Re: A lot of pending packages

[Lorenzo De Liso]

Hello,

Il giorno mer, 09/06/2010 alle 17.26 -0700, Russ Allbery ha scritto:
> It may be worth noting here that the repository on mentors.d.o is not
> intended to serve as an upload queue that someone will process.  Rather,
> it's intended to provide a place where people can put packages to make it
> easy for others to look at them, and which can help with performing some
> consistency checks and verifications.
> 
> In other words, I wouldn't expect anyone to take action based on the
> presence of a package on mentors.d.o with no other communication.  It's
> more like free hosting for a source package while you look for someone to
> sponsor it, which makes it easier for the sponsor to look at the package.
> 
> A lot of Debian Developers (myself included) do essentially no upload
> sponsoring except as part of packaging teams.  Of course if there's a
> specific package, unrelated to other work in Debian, that you're trying to
> get into the archive, that doesn't help, but if the goal is to show
> involvement in Debian and to help the distribution, I would recommend
> joining a packaging team over just packaging new software.  I think
> there's general consensus that the largest quality issues in Debian are
> lack of attention and resources for maintaining the packages that we have
> now, not the difficulty in getting brand new packages included (although
> of course both are important in the long run).

OK, then I will adopt few packages which I'm interested and work on
them. I hope one day I can get my packages uploaded in debian as well.
Please, don't consider that as a flame, I wanted just to talk as CIVIL
persons. Also, I don't wanted to be aggressive or whatever.

Kind regards,

Lorenzo De Liso


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Re: A lot of pending packages

[Russ Allbery]

Lorenzo De Liso  writes:

> Yes, what Sune said is right. But if it's supposed to be so then new
> uploads will be processed slowly or never.

It may be worth noting here that the repository on mentors.d.o is not
intended to serve as an upload queue that someone will process.  Rather,
it's intended to provide a place where people can put packages to make it
easy for others to look at them, and which can help with performing some
consistency checks and verifications.

In other words, I wouldn't expect anyone to take action based on the
presence of a package on mentors.d.o with no other communication.  It's
more like free hosting for a source package while you look for someone to
sponsor it, which makes it easier for the sponsor to look at the package.

A lot of Debian Developers (myself included) do essentially no upload
sponsoring except as part of packaging teams.  Of course if there's a
specific package, unrelated to other work in Debian, that you're trying to
get into the archive, that doesn't help, but if the goal is to show
involvement in Debian and to help the distribution, I would recommend
joining a packaging team over just packaging new software.  I think
there's general consensus that the largest quality issues in Debian are
lack of attention and resources for maintaining the packages that we have
now, not the difficulty in getting brand new packages included (although
of course both are important in the long run).

-- 
Russ Allbery (r...@debian.org)   


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Re: A lot of pending packages

[Lorenzo De Liso]

Hello,

Il giorno gio, 10/06/2010 alle 09.31 +1000, Craig Small ha scritto:

> That's exactly how I work when sponsoring packages.  I look after 7 of
> them and all 7 have a reason for being there. There is only 9 packages
> that are asking for sponsors.
>
> Whereas for me that would be my worst nightmare. A gui toolkit I don't
> use and haven't got install and a language I don't understand.  However,
> the variety of interests and skills is a good thing.
> 
> What Sune said is pretty good advice, you may also be able to ask people
> who look after similiar packages.  I sponsored purple-plugin-pack
> because I maintaint pidgin-musictracker.

Yes, what Sune said is right. But if it's supposed to be so then new
uploads will be processed slowly or never.

Kind regards,

Lorenzo De Liso



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Re: A lot of pending packages

[Craig Small]

On Wed, Jun 09, 2010 at 10:44:00PM +, Sune Vuorela wrote:
> On 2010-06-09, Lorenzo De Liso  wrote:
> > I'm a simple debian contributor: I'm trying to get my work in debian
> > through a sponsor [1] [2]. The problem is that I'm waiting for a sponsor
> > since 7 days+ (and not only me, in mentors.debian.net there are 20+
> > pending packages) [3]. Why are they in pending status and nobody wants
> > to upload them? I know, we all are busy with the real life things, but a
> 
> When I'm sponsoring packages, which happens from time to time, it is
> normally packages that I somehow have a interest in.
> I think that many other sponsors feel it the same way.
That's exactly how I work when sponsoring packages.  I look after 7 of
them and all 7 have a reason for being there. There is only 9 packages
that are asking for sponsors.

> For example, my interests is mostly around KDE, and I really try to
> avoid python stuff. That kind of rules your two packages out for me.
Whereas for me that would be my worst nightmare. A gui toolkit I don't
use and haven't got install and a language I don't understand.  However,
the variety of interests and skills is a good thing.

What Sune said is pretty good advice, you may also be able to ask people
who look after similiar packages.  I sponsored purple-plugin-pack
because I maintaint pidgin-musictracker.

 - Craig

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http://www.enc.com.au/ csmall at : enc.com.au
http://www.debian.org/  Debian GNU/Linux, software should be Free 


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Re: A lot of pending packages

[Mohammad Ebrahim Mohammadi Panah]

I feel like encouraged enough to become a DD. But when I see how
complicated is the process of getting a package sponsored, I'm afraid
of even thinking about the process of becoming a DD. Or is it just me?

On Thu, Jun 10, 2010 at 3:42 AM, Boyd Stephen Smith Jr.
 wrote:
> On Wednesday 09 June 2010 18:06:06 Lorenzo De Liso wrote:
>
> I don't think you are going to get a lot of traction for any proposal that
> removes a DD from the upload process.
>
> So, lack of free DDs will always be a potential issue.  I suggest you
> encourage people to become a DD.
> --
> Boyd Stephen Smith Jr.                   ,= ,-_-. =.
> b...@iguanasuicide.net                   ((_/)o o(\_))
> ICQ: 514984 YM/AIM: DaTwinkDaddy         `-'(. .)`-'
> http://iguanasuicide.net/                    \_/
>


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Re: A lot of pending packages

[Lorenzo De Liso]

Il giorno mer, 09/06/2010 alle 18.12 -0500, Boyd Stephen Smith Jr. ha
scritto:
> I don't think you are going to get a lot of traction for any proposal that 
> removes a DD from the upload process.
> 
> So, lack of free DDs will always be a potential issue.  I suggest you 
> encourage people to become a DD.

I know few DDs which are busy and sometimes they can't sponsor packages.
Become a DD would be great but without a previous work for debian I
don't think you can become a DD. Am I wrong?


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Re: A lot of pending packages

[Boyd Stephen Smith Jr.]

On Wednesday 09 June 2010 18:06:06 Lorenzo De Liso wrote:
> Il giorno mer, 09/06/2010 alle 22.44 +, Sune Vuorela ha scritto:
> > A recommended strategy is to package some apps that are interesting
> > enough to get some DDs to work with you, and then you can also most
> > likely get them to look at other of your stuff.
> 
> That's the most commonly situation, in this case, if the package will
> look OK it will be uploaded soon. But the problem is that the people
> can't find always free DDs to work with they.

I don't think you are going to get a lot of traction for any proposal that 
removes a DD from the upload process.

So, lack of free DDs will always be a potential issue.  I suggest you 
encourage people to become a DD.
-- 
Boyd Stephen Smith Jr.   ,= ,-_-. =.
b...@iguanasuicide.net  ((_/)o o(\_))
ICQ: 514984 YM/AIM: DaTwinkDaddy `-'(. .)`-'
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Re: A lot of pending packages

[Lorenzo De Liso]

Hello,

Il giorno mer, 09/06/2010 alle 22.44 +, Sune Vuorela ha scritto:
> When I'm sponsoring packages, which happens from time to time, it is
> normally packages that I somehow have a interest in.
> I think that many other sponsors feel it the same way.

Sure and I'm agree about that.

> For example, my interests is mostly around KDE, and I really try to
> avoid python stuff. That kind of rules your two packages out for me.

That's right, everyone has its own skills, but if nobody will do that
the packages will be never uploaded in debian and some contributors can
feel themselves discouraged.

> I browsed quickly thru those 20+ packages,  and a lot of them hasn't
> been presented on debian-mentors. If they are just uploaded to mentors.dn
> and then left silent, then no one with notice.
> I have also seen discussions in other forums about some of the specific
> packages not presented on this list, so some people also just use
> mentors.dn to share the work with their 'normal' sponsors, and do the
> discussions outside this list, so that's also not a good metric.

You're right, but I was talking for packages which has been presented in
the debian-mentors mailing list.

> A recommended strategy is to package some apps that are interesting
> enough to get some DDs to work with you, and then you can also most
> likely get them to look at other of your stuff.

That's the most commonly situation, in this case, if the package will
look OK it will be uploaded soon. But the problem is that the people
can't find always free DDs to work with they.

> And another often recommended strategy is to help with existing
> packages, rather than introducing new.

Yes, I'm agree but if someone can't find the right package? if they want
their own packages uploaded into debian?

Until now I have always uploaded my work in ubuntu (the reason? I can't
find a sponsor for my debian work). 

Kind regards,

Lorenzo De Liso



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Re: A lot of pending packages

[Sune Vuorela]

On 2010-06-09, Lorenzo De Liso  wrote:
> Hi all,
>
> I'm a simple debian contributor: I'm trying to get my work in debian
> through a sponsor [1] [2]. The problem is that I'm waiting for a sponsor
> since 7 days+ (and not only me, in mentors.debian.net there are 20+
> pending packages) [3]. Why are they in pending status and nobody wants
> to upload them? I know, we all are busy with the real life things, but a

When I'm sponsoring packages, which happens from time to time, it is
normally packages that I somehow have a interest in.
I think that many other sponsors feel it the same way.

For example, my interests is mostly around KDE, and I really try to
avoid python stuff. That kind of rules your two packages out for me.

I browsed quickly thru those 20+ packages,  and a lot of them hasn't
been presented on debian-mentors. If they are just uploaded to mentors.dn
and then left silent, then no one with notice.
I have also seen discussions in other forums about some of the specific
packages not presented on this list, so some people also just use
mentors.dn to share the work with their 'normal' sponsors, and do the
discussions outside this list, so that's also not a good metric.

A recommended strategy is to package some apps that are interesting
enough to get some DDs to work with you, and then you can also most
likely get them to look at other of your stuff.

And another often recommended strategy is to help with existing
packages, rather than introducing new.

/Sune


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A lot of pending packages

[Lorenzo De Liso]

Hi all,

I'm a simple debian contributor: I'm trying to get my work in debian
through a sponsor [1] [2]. The problem is that I'm waiting for a sponsor
since 7 days+ (and not only me, in mentors.debian.net there are 20+
pending packages) [3]. Why are they in pending status and nobody wants
to upload them? I know, we all are busy with the real life things, but a
bit of attention should be given to that situation. The most important
questions are: if nobody wants to upload the pending packages, how can
you encourage the people which is trying to contribute for debian? If
that's not happening then it means you aren't doing a good work (yes and
I'm sorry to say that). How can we ask ubuntu prospective developers to
get their work in debian if their packages will not be sponsorized? [4]
My wish (for me and other contributors) is to see the list of the
pending uploads clean, with no pending packages. In case of
inconsistence with the debian packages and the debian policy I'd suggest
to use this mailing list as help for new contributions (someone is
already doing that), but from many time I see just "RFS" first of the
e-mail with few answer e-mail (not for all packages). 

[1] http://lists.debian.org/debian-mentors/2010/06/msg4.html 
[2] http://lists.debian.org/debian-mentors/2010/06/msg5.html
[3] http://mentors.debian.net/cgi-bin/sponsor-pkglist
[4]
https://lists.ubuntu.com/archives/ubuntu-devel/2010-April/030716.html 

Kind regards,

Lorenzo De Liso


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