Re: Help with a debdiff for tigervnc

[Andrew C Aitchison]

On Sun, 21 Jan 2024, Aaron Rainbolt wrote:


On 1/21/24 05:41, Andrew C Aitchison wrote:


Debian have fixed a security bug in tigervnc which is in universe,
so someone needs to generate a debdiff for the security team to
 review it and publish the package:
https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/tigervnc/+bug/2048442

Debian have fixed this by building tigervnc 1.13.1 with xorg-server-source

= 2:21.1.10, but Ubuntu 23.10 has tigervnc 1.12.0+dfsg-8 and
xorg-server-source

2:21.1.7-3ubuntu2.6

On a good day I can build a .deb from source, but I am not familiar with
debdiffs and it is not clear to me that changing the upstream version
(either for mantic or noble) is a casual thing to do.

What is the next step to get this fix published ?


If all that's necessary is to rebuild tigervnc against a properly patched 
xorg-xserver-source, this shouldn't be too tricky. The versions of 
xorg-xserver with the patch fixed can be seen at 
https://ubuntu.com/security/notices/USN-5986-1. All that would then be 
necessary is to bump the dependency to require a version of 
xorg-xserver-source greater than or equal to the corresponding version in 
each stable release, and bump the dependency to require the newest available 
version of xorg-server-source or greater in the development release.


The tricky part here is following the whole Stable Release Updates process 
(https://wiki.ubuntu.com/StableReleaseUpdates), which takes at least a week 
(probably more like a week and a couple of days) and requires lot of effort 
and testing to make work. If you're interested in helping to fix this 
hands-on, I'd be happy to assist, but stable release updates are one of the 
harder parts of Ubuntu development. If you'd prefer, I'd also be happy to 
just take this bug and work on getting it fixed.


Could you take it please ? I don't have any Ubuntu developer rights.

What is the best way to watch or see what you have done ?

Thanks,

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Help with a debdiff for tigervnc

[Andrew C Aitchison]

Debian have fixed a security bug in tigervnc which is in universe,
so someone needs to generate a debdiff for the security team to
 review it and publish the package:
https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/tigervnc/+bug/2048442

Debian have fixed this by building tigervnc 1.13.1 with xorg-server-source

= 2:21.1.10, but Ubuntu 23.10 has tigervnc 1.12.0+dfsg-8 and
xorg-server-source

2:21.1.7-3ubuntu2.6

On a good day I can build a .deb from source, but I am not familiar with
debdiffs and it is not clear to me that changing the upstream version
(either for mantic or noble) is a casual thing to do.

What is the next step to get this fix published ?

Thanks,

--
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   and...@aitchison.me.uk

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keepass2 updates?

[Andrew McGlashan]

-BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-
Hash: SHA256

Hi,

I was wondering if or when we might see an update to keepass2  they
have version 2.36 out now and I'm stuck on 2.32 with Linux Mint 18.1
(Sarah).


System:Host: andrewm-Satellite-P50-A Kernel: 4.4.0-79-generic x86_64
(64 bit) Desktop: Cinnamon 3.0.7
   Distro: Linux Mint 18 Sarah
Machine:   System: TOSHIBA (portable) product: Satellite P50-A v:
PSPMHA-01D00L
   Mobo: TOSHIBA model: VG10S Bios: TOSHIBA v: 1.90 date: 09/19/2014
CPU:   Quad core Intel Core i7-4700MQ (-HT-MCP-) speed/max:
2400/3400 MHz
Graphics:  Card-1: Intel 4th Gen Core Processor Integrated Graphics
Controller
   Card-2: NVIDIA GK107M [GeForce GT 745M]
   Display Server: X.org 1.18.4 drivers: intel (unloaded:
fbdev,vesa) FAILED: nouveau
   tty size: 200x60 Advanced Data: N/A for root
Network:   Card-1: Qualcomm Atheros QCA9565 / AR9565 Wireless Network
Adapter driver: ath9k
   Card-2: Qualcomm Atheros QCA8171 Gigabit Ethernet driver: alx
Drives:HDD Total Size: 250.1GB (43.2% used)
Repos: Active apt sources in file: /etc/apt/sources.list.d/jgeboski.list
   deb
http://download.opensuse.org/repositories/home:/jgeboski/xUbuntu_16.04 ./
   Active apt sources in file: /etc/apt/sources.list.d/keybase.list
   deb http://prerelease.keybase.io/deb stable main
   Active apt sources in file:
/etc/apt/sources.list.d/official-package-repositories.list
   deb http://mirror.internode.on.net/pub/linuxmint-packages
sarah main upstream import backport
   deb http://mirror.optus.net/ubuntu xenial main restricted
universe multiverse
   deb http://mirror.optus.net/ubuntu xenial-updates main
restricted universe multiverse
   deb http://mirror.optus.net/ubuntu xenial-backports main
restricted universe multiverse
   deb http://security.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/ xenial-security main
restricted universe multiverse
   deb http://archive.canonical.com/ubuntu/ xenial partner
Info:  Processes: 270 Uptime: 1 day Memory: 4109.8/7895.2MB Client:
Shell (bash) inxi: 2.2.35

aptitude show keepass2
Package: keepass2   
State: installed
Automatically installed: no
Version: 2.32+dfsg-1
Priority: optional
Section: universe/utils
Maintainer: Ubuntu Developers 
Architecture: all
Uncompressed Size: 2,996 k
Depends: mono-runtime (>= 3.0~), libmono-corlib4.5-cil (>= 4.2.0),
libmono-system-drawing4.0-cil (>= 3.0.6), libmono-system-security4.0-cil
(>= 1.0), libmono-system-windows-forms4.0-cil (>= 1.0),
 libmono-system-xml4.0-cil (>= 4.2.0), libmono-system4.0-cil (>=
4.2.0), libx11-6 (>= 2:1.6.0)
Recommends: xsel
Suggests: keepass2-doc, mono-dmcs, xdotool
Description: Password manager
 KeePass is a easy-to-use password manager for Windows, Linux, Mac OS X
and mobile devices. You can store your passwords in highly-encrypted
databases, which can only be unlocked with one master
 password and/or a key file. A database consists of only one file that
can be transferred from one computer to another easily. KeePass can
import data from various file formats. The password list can
 be exported to various formats, including TXT, HTML, XML and CSV files.
Homepage: http://keepass.info/



Thanks
AndrewM

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Version: GnuPG v2

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tRWNUTOH6tQrlBg+jlMBAIsgfvOcieTHNPN2lKzQ/EF7wc7tiJQ6YcPzw/8SbRp2
=P9r3
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Re: Set environment variable globally

[Andrew Martin]

- Original Message -
> From: "J Fernyhough" <j.fernyho...@gmail.com>
> To: "amartin" <amar...@xes-inc.com>
> Cc: "ubuntu-devel-discuss" <ubuntu-devel-discuss@lists.ubuntu.com>
> Sent: Thursday, April 6, 2017 12:42:05 PM
> Subject: Re: Set environment variable globally

> On 06/04/17 16:36, Andrew Martin wrote:
>> 
>> It seems like that would have some performance impact. Setting TZ in the
>> /etc/environment file doesn't appear to be used by upstart or systemd, and
>> therefore apache2 doesn't use it either. How can I make it be used for 
>> services
>> started by either init system?
>> 
> 
> Not sure about upstart, but systemd should be straightforward enough.
> You can add environment variables through editing the unit file
> directly, or possibly better by:
> 
> 1) Adding a conf file, e.g. in
> /etc/systemd/system/apache2.service.d/tz.conf:
> 
> [Service]
> Environment="TZ=:/etc/localtime"
> 
> 2) globally for all units in /etc/systemd/system.conf, or e.g.
> /etc/systemd/system.conf.d/tz.conf:
> 
> [Manager]
> DefaultEnvironment="TZ=:/etc/localtime"
> 
> 
> You'll need to do a daemon-reload and a service restart to pick up the
> changes, but it should be there. Terrible, hacky, one-liner to check:
> 
> for p in $(pgrep -d" " apache2); do echo -e "$p:\n$(cat
> /proc/$p/environ)\n"; done
> 
> J

Thanks, this looks like it should work well. I can over most cases with
the following:

add this to /etc/systemd/system.conf.d/tz.conf for services:
[Manager]
DefaultEnvironment="TZ=:/etc/localtime"

add this to /etc/profile.d/tz.sh for login shells:
export TZ=:/etc/localtime

add this to /etc/bash.bashrc for interactive non-login shells:
export TZ=:/etc/localtime

add this to /etc/environment as a catch-all:
TZ=:/etc/localtime

Andrew

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Re: Set environment variable globally

[Andrew Martin]

- Original Message -
> From: "J Fernyhough" <j.fernyho...@gmail.com>
> To: "ubuntu-devel-discuss" <ubuntu-devel-discuss@lists.ubuntu.com>
> Sent: Wednesday, April 5, 2017 2:01:26 PM
> Subject: Re: Set environment variable globally

> On 24/03/17 21:19, Andrew Martin wrote:
>> Hello,
>> 
>> I recently saw this blog post regarding performance when the TZ environment
>> variable is not set:
>> https://blog.packagecloud.io/eng/2017/02/21/set-environment-variable-save-thousands-of-system-calls/
>> 
> 
> There's also a good deal of discussion on the HN thread:
> https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13697555

Thanks, I had not seen this!

> 
>> I tried defining TZ in /etc/environment and in /etc/profile.d/test.sh, but I
>> cannot get this environment variable to be available in all cases (e.g. if I
>> just execute bash without --login or if I run the sample c program provided 
>> in
>> the above article). How can I make the TZ environment variable defined
>> completely system-wide?
> 
> Before you go too far with that, is there a specific reason you want to
> do this? For example, there's not generally a lot of advantage unless
> you have a process that does a lot of timezone-based processing.
> 
> However, all you should need in /etc/environment is:
> 
> TZ=:/etc/localtime
> 
> or an equivalent TZ value, e.g.:
> 
> TZ=:Europe/London
> 

I've noticed apache2 reading /etc/localtime a lot when running; this is also
mentioned in the HN thread:
http://mail-archives.apache.org/mod_mbox/httpd-dev/20.mbox/%3CCAMDeyhzRAZ4eyz%3D%2BstA%3DwoTibM-W6QL8TqT%2BaPio07UddCz7Tg%40mail.gmail.com%3E

It seems like that would have some performance impact. Setting TZ in the
/etc/environment file doesn't appear to be used by upstart or systemd, and
therefore apache2 doesn't use it either. How can I make it be used for services
started by either init system?

Thanks,

Andrew

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Re: Set environment variable globally

[Andrew Martin]

- Original Message -
> From: "Gérard BIGOT" <gerard.bi...@gmail.com>
> To: "amartin" <amar...@xes-inc.com>
> Cc: "ubuntu-devel-discuss" <ubuntu-devel-discuss@lists.ubuntu.com>
> Sent: Friday, March 31, 2017 8:41:36 AM
> Subject: Re: Set environment variable globally

> Hi,
> 
> I added this line in /etc/environment since a long time :
> 
> TZ="Europe/Paris"
> 
> It gives me satisfaction.
> 
> With this line, upon reboot, I have :
> 
> ~$ echo $TZ
> Europe/Paris
> 
> Without TZ doesn't exist.
> 
Gérard,

I can't seem to get this to work on 16.04. Which shell are you using?
Have you customized your /etc/bash.bashrc or /etc/profile to source
/etc/environment? I don't see any mention of /etc/environment in the
bash manpage, so it seems like this file isn't being used. Also, how
can I make this environment variable available to all processes started
by upstart (14.04) and systemd (16.04)? I am concerned not only about
interactive processes but also scripts (e.g. started via cron) and
services (started via upstart or systemd).

Thanks,

Andrew

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Set environment variable globally

[Andrew Martin]

Hello,

I recently saw this blog post regarding performance when the TZ environment
variable is not set:
https://blog.packagecloud.io/eng/2017/02/21/set-environment-variable-save-thousands-of-system-calls/

I have noticed this problem when stracing running daemons on my systems and
would like to fix it. I reviewed the official Ubuntu documentation for where to
define environment variables:
https://help.ubuntu.com/community/EnvironmentVariables

I tried defining TZ in /etc/environment and in /etc/profile.d/test.sh, but I
cannot get this environment variable to be available in all cases (e.g. if I
just execute bash without --login or if I run the sample c program provided in
the above article). How can I make the TZ environment variable defined
completely system-wide?

Thanks,

Andrew

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How to specify GPU for Xorg in Xenial

[Andrew Musselman]

Hi list, I'm looking for a way to specify which GPU I'd like Xorg to use,
so I can devote another GPU to matrix math/CUDA.

I posted on the NVIDIA list but it may be more an Ubuntu question:

https://devtalk.nvidia.com/default/topic/977697/how-to-devote-one-gpu-to-cuda-the-other-to-desktop-graphics-in-ubuntu-16-04/

That references an older post which recommends adding a Device section to
xorg.conf, but in Xenial there isn't one of those.

If this is already documented, could someone point to any documentation
about how to achieve this?

I'm happy to update docs if there's an answer to how to do this.

Thanks!
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Re: Wrong version in version.hpp of ViennaCL library 1.7.1 installed by apt-get

[Andrew Musselman]

On Mon, Oct 17, 2016 at 10:04 AM, Nish Aravamudan <
nish.aravamu...@canonical.com> wrote:

> On 17.10.2016 [09:51:38 -0700], Andrew Musselman wrote:
> > Thanks; will let the upstream project know.
>
> Note that upstream already fixed this:
> https://github.com/viennacl/viennacl-dev/commit/
> 2287c217f03ce115cca0fd00c95ddf200badb2f9
>
> Seems like they should either release 1.7.2 or 1.7.1.1 to fix this
> issue.
>

So they did; will their release kick off a new version of the package
automatically?
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Re: Wrong version in version.hpp of ViennaCL library 1.7.1 installed by apt-get

[Andrew Musselman]

Thanks; will let the upstream project know.

On Mon, Oct 17, 2016 at 8:38 AM, Nish Aravamudan <
nish.aravamu...@canonical.com> wrote:

> On Sun, Oct 16, 2016 at 6:27 PM, Andrew Musselman
> <andrew.mussel...@gmail.com> wrote:
> > Notes at https://github.com/viennacl/viennacl-dev/issues/205
> >
> > I don't know if this is a ViennaCL release issue or a packaging issue so
> > posting both places.
>
> Looks to be an upstream issue with the release:
> https://github.com/viennacl/viennacl-dev/blob/release-1.7.
> 1/viennacl/version.hpp
>
> -Nish
>
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Wrong version in version.hpp of ViennaCL library 1.7.1 installed by apt-get

[Andrew Musselman]

Notes at https://github.com/viennacl/viennacl-dev/issues/205

I don't know if this is a ViennaCL release issue or a packaging issue so
posting both places.

Thanks!
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Re: Simple proxy queries wired France IPs

[Andrew Pollock]

On Sun, May 01, 2016 at 03:27:44PM +0200, Jakub Muszynski wrote:
> Hello
> 
> I was testing simpleproxy package
> simpleproxy  -L 15439 -R myaddress.com:5439  -v -t /tmp/trace
> 
> while reading /tmp/trace I've spotted strange rows in its verbose logging
> (it should contain "Read from: myaddres.com:5439")
> It does querry some *abo.wanadoo.fr <http://abo.wanadoo.fr> *hosts
> 
> The 'strings /tmp/trace | less " log:
> (...)
>  Read from: ANantes-655-1-144-239.w2-0.abo.wanadoo.fr:45039
> ---
> SELECT character_value, version() FROM
> INFORMATION_SCHEMA.SQL_IMPLEMENTATION_INFO WHERE implementation_info_id =
> '17' or implementation_info_id = '18'
>  Read from: ANantes-157-1-186-63.w2-0.abo.wanadoo.fr:5439
> ---
> character_value
> version
> (...)
> 
> *Package details:*
> *Package: simpleproxy*
> *Priority: optional*
> *Section: universe/net*
> *Installed-Size: 69*
> *Maintainer: Ubuntu Developers <ubuntu-devel-discuss@lists.ubuntu.com
> <ubuntu-devel-discuss@lists.ubuntu.com>>*
> *Original-Maintainer: Andrew Pollock <apoll...@debian.org
> <apoll...@debian.org>>*
> *Architecture: amd64*
> *Version: 3.4-5*
> *Depends: libc6 (>= 2.15)*
> *Filename: pool/universe/s/simpleproxy/simpleproxy_3.4-5_amd64.deb*
> *Size: 16834*
> *MD5sum: b1458997cde90a48f02e58a6dd97c71a*
> *SHA1: 4695e3bf2637a957f686ff2c5e0543db469b80e2*
> *SHA256: dcf773faa7a216745959505c9d4c1a62a854a359e40fe7de6a7df62652d65f38*
> *Description-en: Simple TCP proxy*
> * simpleproxy acts as a simple TCP proxy. It opens a listening socket on*
> * the local machine and forwards any connection to a remote host. It can be*
> * run as a daemon or through inetd.*
> *Description-md5: df90d17ba3792463ed98517f2afe2512*
> *Homepage: http://www.sourceforge.net/projects/simpleproxy
> <http://www.sourceforge.net/projects/simpleproxy>*
> *Bugs: https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+filebug
> <https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+filebug>*
> *Origin: Ubuntu*
> 
> I did look at tcpdump:
> 
> 12:31:54.815380 IP 10.18.0.6.45062 > 10.118.0.19.15439: Flags [P.], seq
> 617:689, ack 1060, win 254, options [nop,nop,TS val 402986021 ecr
> 57180214], length 72
> *12:31:54.815468 IP 10.118.0.19.58111 > 10.118.0.2.53: 10512+ PTR?
> 176.176.0.2.in-addr.arpa. (40)*
> *12:31:54.815705 IP 10.118.0.2.53 > 10.118.0.19.58111: 10512 1/0/0 PTR
> ANantes-650-1-45-6.w2-0.abo.wanadoo.fr
> <http://ANantes-650-1-45-6.w2-0.abo.wanadoo.fr>. (92)*
> 12:31:54.815746 IP 10.118.0.19.34040 > myaddress.com.5439: Flags [P.], seq
> 617:689, ack 1060, win 254, options [nop,nop,TS val 57180227 ecr
> 896665995], length 72
> 
> 12:31:54.836881 IP 10.118.0.19.34040 > myaddress.com.5439: Flags [.], ack
> 1152, win 254, options [nop,nop,TS val 57180233 ecr 89014], length 0
> *12:31:54.836932 IP 10.118.0.19.53146 > 10.118.0.2.53: 62285+ PTR?
> 63.21.0.2.in-addr.arpa. (40)*
> *12:31:54.837177 IP 10.118.0.2.53 > 10.118.0.19.53146: 62285 1/0/0 PTR
> ANantes-157-1-186-63.w2-0.abo.wanadoo.fr
> <http://ANantes-157-1-186-63.w2-0.abo.wanadoo.fr>. (94)*
> 12:31:54.837216 IP 10.118.0.19.15439 > 10.18.0.6.45062: Flags [P.], seq
> 1060:1152, ack 689, win 243, options [nop,nop,TS val 57180233 ecr
> 402986021], length 92
> 
> *dig -t ptr 160.176.0.2.in-addr.arpa*
> revils the same address
> 
> 
> It seems that it is only DNS querry, just for l*oggin porpouse,* I
> *haven't spot* any direct communication to *abo.wanadoo.fr hosts, but WHY
> does it even querry that hosts?
> 
> *strings /usr/bin/simpleproxy  |grep 'Read from'*
>  Read from: %s ---
> 
> 
> *grep /usr/bin/simpleproxy -e 63.21.0.2*
> [nothing]
> 
> I did try to look for a source code to see what is wrong.
> 
> Could anyone take a look is this package secure?

From a brief inspection of the source, I think the trace() function is
giving bogus input to the gethostbyaddr() call it makes to try and resolve
the IP addresses involved in the connection.

It's buggy, old code, and I don't think it's maintained upstream, so I might
just pull it from Debian.

Is there a better maintained alternative that you could use for your
particular use case if simpleproxy was no longer available? netcat springs
to mind, but it's probably less turnkey.


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libnss-winbind for Multiple Winbinds on One Ubuntu Installation.

[Andrew van Tilburg]

Dear libnss_winbind maintainers.

I am using Ubuntu 15.10 and Samba 4.1.17-Ubuntu with libnss-winbind.

I have a question re libnss_winbind, I was wondering if you could help me. Any 
information would be greatly appreciated.

I want to run two 'instances' of smbd and winbindd on the same machine so that 
I can authenticate users from two separate Windows AD domains and share a 
common set of files out to both. I cannot trust the two domains to each other 
as one is SBS.

I am doing this by making symbolic links to the smbd, nmbd and winbindd daemons 
and using separate config files for each. One of the smb.conf directives is 
winbindd:socket directory = . To run two winbindd daemons at once, a separate 
socket directory must be configured for each. When I do this winbind stops 
working. I think this is because  nss switch must be told about the two new 
winbind services with different socket locations.


 *   How can I create a new nss switch service which references the two new 
winbind services with the new socket directories ?

Regards.

Andrew van Tilburg
IT Manager
www.innerrange.com<http://www.innerrange.com/>

0448 166 970
03 9780 4312

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Re: Packer.io for Ubuntu?

[Andrew Starr-Bochicchio]

On Fri, Oct 30, 2015 at 1:35 PM, Martinx - ジェームズ
<thiagocmarti...@gmail.com> wrote:
> So, I'm curious to start packaging more Go projects for Ubuntu, just for 
> fun...
>
> What about packaging Packer.io for Ubuntu?
>
> Any directions?!

Hi Thiago!

The best way to get new software written in Go into Ubuntu is through
the pkg-go team in Debian.

You can find it's mailing list here:
https://lists.alioth.debian.org/mailman/listinfo/pkg-go-maintainers

And instructions on packaging Go project here:
https://pkg-go.alioth.debian.org/packaging.html

Packer is a great tool, and I've been using it myself. There are
already some folks working on getting it into Debian (which would lead
to it entering Ubuntu as well). You can follow those efforts here:

https://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/bugreport.cgi?bug=740753

Thanks!

-- Andrew Starr-Bochicchio

   Ubuntu Developer <https://launchpad.net/~andrewsomething>
   Debian Developer <http://qa.debian.org/developer.php?login=asb>
   PGP/GPG Key ID: D53FDCB1

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Re: kGraft/kPatch support in Ubuntu 15.10 or 16.04?

[Andrew Martin]

- Original Message -
 From: Andrew Martin amar...@xes-inc.com
 To: ubuntu-devel-discuss@lists.ubuntu.com
 Sent: Friday, August 14, 2015 11:13:27 AM
 Subject: kGraft/kPatch support in Ubuntu 15.10 or 16.04?
 
 Hello,
 
 I was very excited to see live kernel patching get accepted into the mainline
 kernel in 4.0. For server environments where uptime is crucial and rebooting
 servers to install kernel security fixes is very disruptive, the ability to
 live
 patch security fixes into the running kernel is a very desirable feature. Are
 there any plans to add support for the kGraft/kPatch support available in 4.x
 series kernels in Ubuntu Server 15.10 or 16.04? This would be a fantastic
 feature
 for the next LTS release!
 
 Thanks,
 
 Andrew Martin

Is there really no information about kGraft or kPatch support in Ubuntu?

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kGraft/kPatch support in Ubuntu 15.10 or 16.04?

[Andrew Martin]

Hello,

I was very excited to see live kernel patching get accepted into the mainline
kernel in 4.0. For server environments where uptime is crucial and rebooting
servers to install kernel security fixes is very disruptive, the ability to live
patch security fixes into the running kernel is a very desirable feature. Are
there any plans to add support for the kGraft/kPatch support available in 4.x
series kernels in Ubuntu Server 15.10 or 16.04? This would be a fantastic 
feature
for the next LTS release!

Thanks,

Andrew Martin

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Re: Kernel releases

[Andrew Martin]

- Original Message -
 From: Christopher Carlson christopher.carl...@zodiacaerospace.com
 To: Paul Smith p...@mad-scientist.net
 Cc: ubuntu-devel-discuss@lists.ubuntu.com
 Sent: Thursday, July 30, 2015 1:49:37 PM
 Subject: Re: Kernel releases
 
 Thank you for your reply, Paul.
 
 BTW, I'm running 14.04.2 LTS.x86_64.
 
 I also don't always restart, but I presume the only reason we got a kernel
 update is because of a bug or security, which encourages me to restart. It
 nags at me (not the system, but my concern that there's a problem lurking).
 
 My whining is brought on by my strong dislike of Microsoft, and I get
 irritated that I have to reboot my Windows 7 machine every week. To think
 that Ubuntu is following in their footsteps concerns me.
 
 Yes, I could scan the release notes to see if I really need this update, and
 thanks for the link. I've only got 57 of them on my system. Ugh. I have to
 clean up my /boot directory every couple of months or so to keep it
 reasonable.
 
 Anyway, I appreciate the time you took to respond to me.
 
 Sincerely,
 Chris Carlson
 

Chris,

Linux kernel 4.0 supports live-patching of the kernel, so perhaps we will see
this integrated into a future Ubuntu release, which would mean you wouldn't
have to reboot to install kernel security fixes:
https://lkml.org/lkml/2015/4/12/178

Andrew

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Backport latest stable virtualization packages to LTS

[Andrew Martin]

Hello,

I actively use the qemu-kvm and libvirt virtualization stack on the latest
Ubuntu server LTS release in a number of production systems. This
virtualization stack is stable, mature, and provides a great base on which to
host VMs. However, it seems that these packages are not updated once an LTS is
released, aside from security updates. I know that this is due to the Ubuntu
SRU (https://wiki.ubuntu.com/StableReleaseUpdates), however some major bugs have
been found that I think satisfy one of the When conditions. For example, I 
discovered a bug that would cause the on-disk XML for a VM defined by libvirt
to not be updated when a snapshot is taken:
https://www.redhat.com/archives/libvirt-users/2015-April/msg00078.html

The result would be that if the host is rebooted or the VM is shutdown, the
next time it starts up, it would use the previous snapshot, thus either failing
to start or invalidating the data on the current snapshot. I believe this
satisfies the Bugs which may, under realistic circumstances, directly cause a 
loss of user data bullet point on the SRU page.

I would really like to run a stable virtualization system on top of the latest
LTS, but it is hard when new stable releases are not available. Would it be 
possible for Ubuntu to actively support backporting the stable virtualization 
stack, e.g in a PPA? I see that the Ubuntu Virtualization Team exists on 
Launchpad, but does not appear to be active:
https://launchpad.net/~ubuntu-virt/+archive/ubuntu/ppa

Thanks,

Andrew Martin

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Re: Backport latest stable virtualization packages to LTS

[Andrew Martin]

- Original Message -
 From: Robie Basak robie.ba...@ubuntu.com
 To: ubuntu-devel-discuss@lists.ubuntu.com
 Sent: Friday, May 29, 2015 3:36:05 PM
 Subject: Re: Backport latest stable virtualization packages to LTS
 
 On Fri, May 29, 2015 at 03:27:33PM -0500, Andrew Martin wrote:
  Thanks for the clarification; I am glad to hear that the Cloud Archive
  PPA is fully supported for non-OpenStack deployments too.
 
 I'm not sure this is true. I have asked a colleague.

Thanks, I would appreciate clarification on this point.

 On Fri, May 29, 2015 at 01:42:34PM -0500, Andrew Martin wrote:
  ...however some major bugs 
 have
 been found that I think satisfy one of the When conditions. For example, I 
 discovered a bug that would cause the on-disk XML for a VM defined by libvirt
 to not be updated when a snapshot is taken:
 https://www.redhat.com/archives/libvirt-users/2015-April/msg00078.html

 Are there bugs in Launchpad for this? If not, then developers can assume
 that nobody is affected, and so they may not get fixed as there is
 presumably no upside and only the risk of regression.

This bug is very similar, except I can reproduce the problem on precise too:
https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/libvirt/+bug/1403841

From Eric Blake's commentsin the libvirt-users thread above, it sounds like 
there
were a number of improvements in several newer libvirt releases to address
problems where the active config was not being flushed to disk. It looks like 
the
particular code path in 1403841 has been fixed, however others seem to exist. 
I'm
not sure how feasible it would be to cherry-pick all fixes for this problem from
newer libvirt releases verses supporting a backport of newer stable libvirt.

Thanks,

Andrew

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Re: Backport latest stable virtualization packages to LTS

[Andrew Martin]

- Original Message -
 From: Martinx - ジェームズ thiagocmarti...@gmail.com
 To: Andrew Martin amar...@xes-inc.com, 
 ubuntu-devel-discuss@lists.ubuntu.com
 Sent: Friday, May 29, 2015 1:46:25 PM
 Subject: Re: Backport latest stable virtualization packages to LTS
 
 Hey Andrew,
 
 Both new QEmu and new Libvirt are available to Ubuntu Trusty, fully
 supported.
 
 Just install your Trusty and run the following commands:
 
 add-apt-repository cloud-archive:kilo
 apt-get update
 apt-get dist-upgrade
 
 or
 
 apt-get install ubuntu-virt-server
 
 That's it!
 

Hi Martinx,

Thanks for the clarification; I am glad to hear that the Cloud Archive
PPA is fully supported for non-OpenStack deployments too. It looks like
the Kilo release is only going to be supported for 18 months, not the
full 5-year period of the trusty LTS:
https://wiki.ubuntu.com/ServerTeam/CloudArchive

Because of this, should I be switching to the cloud-archive:m ppa
once it is made available? Is this the recommended path for updated
support of libvirt and qemu through the whole LTS lifecycle?

Thanks,

Andrew

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Re: dpkg packaging problems

[Andrew Shadura]

Hi,

Shared libraries losing the executable flag is the correct behaviour, you
s'shouldn't try to override that.

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Re: Planning to create a new distro of Ubuntu.

[Andrew Starr-Bochicchio]

On Thu, Nov 7, 2013 at 6:21 AM, Colin Watson cjwat...@ubuntu.com wrote:
 On Wed, Nov 06, 2013 at 02:13:21PM +0800, Ben Tinner wrote:
 On Mon Nov 4 12:41:29 UTC 2013, Daniel Holbach wrote:
 Are you planning to get the necessary packages into Ubuntu itself? That
 might help make maintenance a lot easier.

 The guys at MATE are currently attempting to upload the packages to Debian 
 but as of now there is little progress into it.

 The MATE repository have MATE packages for Ubuntu available, so I included 
 the MATE repo for the packages.

 Shall we pull all the MATE packages into the Ubuntu repo directly or we 
 build the sources ourselves?

 It would be far superior to fix the problem with uploading to Debian
 rather than working around it by uploading directly to Ubuntu or by
 maintaining a separate repository.  Unless there is a *lot* of effort
 available to deal with Ubuntu-local packaging, having the packages in
 Debian as well generally yields better results.

And there is in fact a team working on packaging MATE for Debian:
pkg-mate-t...@lists.alioth.debian.org

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Re: Is this so hard to fix? Or important?

[Andrew Starr-Bochicchio]

On Sun, Jun 9, 2013 at 10:25 AM, Rodney Dawes
rodney.da...@canonical.com wrote:
 Furthermore, as already stated, this is a bug in eog (or perhaps
 gdk-pixbuf), if it
 can't open an image file where the extension doesn't match the content.

https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/eog/+bug/172416
https://bugzilla.gnome.org/show_bug.cgi?id=490067

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Re: Aptitude installed by default on 13.10?

[Andrew Starr-Bochicchio]

On Tue, Apr 9, 2013 at 8:21 AM, Dmitrijs Ledkovs
dmitrij.led...@ubuntu.com wrote:
 I beg to differ:

 http://www.debian.org/doc/manuals/debian-faq/ch-pkgtools.en.html

 Official Debian docs, section 8.1.3 - aptitude:

 Note that aptitude is the preferred program for daily package management
 from console.


 Sure, that's why aptitude is seeded on ubuntu-server images, is in
 main and supported.

This is actually being debated over on debian-devel as we type. So
some piece of text from the Debian FAQ that simply hasn't been updated
in a long time doesn't trump anything.

The thread starts here:

http://lists.debian.org/debian-devel/2013/04/msg00322.html

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Re: How to Write Correct copyright File?

[Andrew Starr-Bochicchio]

On Wed, Feb 20, 2013 at 3:27 AM, Ade Malsasa Akbar teknol...@gmail.com wrote:
 Hello, it is the my first e-mail :)

Welcome!

 I wanna my copyright file inside debian/usr/share/doc/myapp/ become correct
 and Ubuntu Software Center detect my DEB as Open Source. I've followed what
 Debian Packaging Pages here and as addition, Lintian doesn't say any ERROR
 or WARNING about my copyright file. But Ubuntu Software Center says unknown
 at License field when open my DEB.

Your copyright file looks perfect. Unfortunately, software-center
still doesn't actually parse the copyright file to gather that
information. It seems to use License: Open Source or everything in
Ubuntu main and universe, Proprietary for things in restricted, and
Unknown for everything else. There is an open bug report about the
issue here:

https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/software-center/+bug/435183

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Re: Git-Cola maintainer?

[Andrew Starr-Bochicchio]

On Fri, Nov 30, 2012 at 6:55 AM, Jordon Bedwell jor...@envygeeks.com wrote:
 I'm wondering if there is an actual maintainer for Git-Cola or if it's
 really just managed by the world of Ubuntu developers and MOTU's and
 updated whenever.  I'm asking because in 12.04 we never got the new
 version of Git-Cola (1.7 or 1.8) and we are still on 1.4.*. even in
 Quantal we are stuck on an older version which lacks some new features
 that would be useful in 1.8 such as listing recent repos on the open
 dialog making it faster to work in Git-Cola.


git-cola doesn't have any Ubuntu specific changes. So it is currently
imported directly from Debian.  1.8.0-1  is availiable in the current
development release, raring. It is extremely unlikely that it will be
pushed into already released versions like 12.04. Your best bet is to
try and get it into the backports repositories. See:

https://wiki.ubuntu.com/UbuntuBackports#Requesting_a_Backport

Thanks,

-- Andrew Starr-Bochicchio

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Re: Update the 'tilda' package

[Andrew Starr-Bochicchio]

On Thu, Aug 23, 2012 at 6:49 AM, Lanoxx lan...@gmx.net wrote:
 the tilda package in Ubuntu has not been updated since 2009 and even in
 quantal the current packages are still from 2009. However the tilda source
 already contains some updates for a long time (for example to move the
 config files to an xdg folder). The last update in trunk contains a merge
 from github which happenend in April. So my question is, could someone
 please update the tilda version for quantal so that it contains the latest
 version?

Could you point to where the more current releases live?  The
SourceForge page [1] doesn't have anything newer than what is in the
archive. The Launchpad page [2] is only used for bug tracking. The
GitHub project [3] seems to just be an import from some other
repository (all the commits seem to be Davide Truffa authored 2 years
ago, lanoxx committed 5 months ago). There are no tagged releases
there.

[1] http://sourceforge.net/projects/tilda/
[2] http://launchpad.net/tilda
[3] https://github.com/tsloughter/tilda

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Re: Porting window-picker-applet to GTK+3

[Andrew Starr-Bochicchio]

On Sun, Feb 5, 2012 at 7:12 PM, Lanoxx lan...@gmx.net wrote:
 Hi,

 Back in November a wrote to this list that I was porting the
 window-picker-applet to GTK+3 so it can be used in the fallback mode of
 gnome 3.

 It took me a little longer to finish this but in the last days I have
 finished porting enough code that it now works on oneiric with GTK+3.
 I'm still working on getting rid of the remaining deprecated functions
 but if any one wants to take a look you can just clone the git
 repository on Github. I included a readme file so it should not be
 difficult to compile and install it:

 https://github.com/lanoxx/window-picker-applet

 Let me know you someone finds this useful.

Hi,

Most packages in Ubuntu are synced from Debian. If you haven't done so
yet, you might want to contact Guido Günther a...@debian.org. He was
the Debian maintainer of window-picker-applet, and might be interested
in reintroducing this to Debian.

Thanks,

-- Andrew Starr-Bochicchio

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Re: Proposal to delay release of Precise Pangolin

[Andrew Starr-Bochicchio]

On Wed, Oct 19, 2011 at 10:43 AM, Rodrigo Moya
rodrigo.m...@canonical.com wrote:
 I really think a bit more of time between the GNOME releases and the
 Ubuntu final release would help a lot in cleaning lots of these bugs.
 Usually, the x.x.1 release of GNOME is much better, since it includes
 lots of fixes for lots of issues as people start using the final stable
 release in their distros. So, getting x.x.1 in the final Ubuntu release
 would help a lot.

In this case, the LTS release will be after the  x.x.1 release of
GNOME, but not by much. GNOME 3.4.1 is scheduled for April 18th [0].
12.04 is scheduled for April 26th, but the Release Candidate is
scheduled for April 19th [1].

Of course, this is mostly a moot point for Precise. It's still under
discussion, but it seems like we're not going to have 3.4 in Precise.
According to the desktop team list the plan seem to be to stick with
3.2.x.

[0] https://live.gnome.org/action/show/ThreePointThree
[1] https://wiki.ubuntu.com/PrecisePangolin/ReleaseSchedule

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Re: python-gnomeapplet is not on Oneiric repositories

[Andrew Starr-Bochicchio]

On Thu, Aug 25, 2011 at 10:31 PM, Jeremy Bicha jer...@bicha.net wrote:
 Yes, Ubuntu Oneiric ships GNOME 3; Natty shipped GNOME 2.32. GNOME
 Panel 3 is available for install in the repositories but panel applets
 must be ported to gnome-panel 3 or else they simply won't run at all.
 python-gnomeapplet is no longer being developed as Python developers
 need to use GObject Introspection instead of PyGTK to work with GTK3.

 https://launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/gnome-python-desktop/2.32.0-0ubuntu4

Are we tracking this sort of thing in Universe anywhere? Any special tag?

There is a Debian usertag in BTS:

http://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/pkgreport.cgi?tag=applets-transition;users=pkg-gnome-maintain...@lists.alioth.debian.org

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Re: Firefox 5, reach 11.04?

[Andrew Starr-Bochicchio]

On Thu, Jun 23, 2011 at 1:00 AM, Chris Jones chrisjo...@comcen.com.au wrote:
 Simple question, will Firefox 5 reach Natty 11.04?
 Or will any releases part of the new rapid release cycle from Mozilla be
 held off until 11.10?

Already has...

$ apt-cache policy firefox
firefox:
  Installed: 5.0+build1+nobinonly-0ubuntu0.11.04.1
  Candidate: 5.0+build1+nobinonly-0ubuntu0.11.04.1
  Version table:
 *** 5.0+build1+nobinonly-0ubuntu0.11.04.1 0
500 http://mirror.cc.columbia.edu/pub/linux/ubuntu/archive/
natty-updates/main i386 Packages
500 http://mirror.cc.columbia.edu/pub/linux/ubuntu/archive/
natty-security/main i386 Packages
100 /var/lib/dpkg/status
 4.0+nobinonly-0ubuntu3 0
500 http://mirror.cc.columbia.edu/pub/linux/ubuntu/archive/
natty/main i386 Packages

Cheers,

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Re: Sync Request process questions

[Andrew Starr-Bochicchio]

On Tue, Dec 14, 2010 at 2:34 PM, Reuben Thomas r...@sc3d.org wrote:
 Hi,

 I recently filed an Ubuntu bug making a sync request:

 https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/sudo/+bug/689025

 I got what looks like a cut-and-paste response pointing me to:
 https://wiki.ubuntu.com/SyncRequestProcess

 It reads:

 Please update your bug so it follows the requirements for sync
 requests: https://wiki.ubuntu.com/SyncRequestProcess
 Please be aware that the Natty would automatically sync the version
 from Debian Squeeze if there were no Ubuntu specific changes in the
 package. The most important thing is therefore to check whether these
 changes are still needed.

 I have nothing against cut-and-paste responses per se, they are a
 useful way to save developer time in common situations. However, I
 have two problems with this one:

 1. Unlike many other excellent automatic responses, this one does not
 thank me for my bug report. It implies that for anything to be done
 for my bug report, I have to go and follow the instructions on the
 page pointed to. But why should I? I have reported the bug, I have not
 indicated that I am anything other than an ordinary user, why on earth
 would you think I have the time or indeed the skills needed to triage
 my own bug report against the criteria on this page? As it happens, I
 have both the time and the skills, but I still choose not to work on
 Ubuntu itself; I choose to spend my effort upstream (for example, I
 helped to make some improvements to sudo recently), and downstream (in
 this case, reporting this bug). In summary, this automatic response
 looks rather ungrateful.

First of all, thank you for your contributions and your thoughtful
email on Ubuntu development. You certainly targeted a number of pain
points (some of which we are very aware of) that make contributing to
Ubuntu as a bug reporter or developer more difficult than it should
be. As for this specific interaction, it seems to be a case of a bug
triager not being completely aware of Ubuntu development procedures.

 2. I went and had a look at the policy page on sync requests, and as
 the response to my bug report indicates, it mentions more than once
 that to justify a sync request, it should be proven that
 Ubuntu-specific changes are no longer needed in the new Debian version
 of the package. But the trouble is, there are situations such as the
 present in which they are still needed, and for a good reason: there
 are differences in policy between Ubuntu and Debian. So, the changes
 will need to be forward-ported. I can see nothing explicit in the page
 about this case, though common sense tells me that the Ubuntu-specific
 patches would need to be triaged.

What is needed in this case is a merge, not a sync. As the wiki page
points out, if Ubuntu-specific changes should be forward-ported, then
the package is not a candidate for syncing. It should probably include
a link directing readers to the page about merging
https://wiki.ubuntu.com/UbuntuDevelopment/Merging.

Of course you shouldn't need to worry about these things. In my
opinion, the triager show have thanked you for the report and mark the
bug as Triaged. This status implies that there is enough information
in the bug, and it is ready for a developer to look in to.

Thanks!

- Andrew Starr-Bochicchio

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Re: update-manager dropped from repository; friendly update method?

[Andrew Starr-Bochicchio]

On Sat, Nov 6, 2010 at 8:12 AM, Marius Gedminas mar...@pov.lt wrote:
 Curiously, I've update-manager 1:0.142.21, which is newer than the
 latest version in maverick-updates, 1:0.142.20.  How did I get it?
 Was it included in maverick-proposed at some point?

Yes.

update-manager (1:0.142.21) maverick-proposed; urgency=low

  * DistUpgrade/DistUpgradeQuirks.py:
- abort the upgrade if the user runs on a i586 or a i686
  with no cmov support (LP: #587186)

 -- Michael Vogt michael.v...@ubuntu.com   Fri, 15 Oct 2010 15:41:03 +020


Deleted on 2010-11-03 by Steve Langasek
verification-failed

https://launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/update-manager/+publishinghistory

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Re: maverick-proposed queue freeze

[Andrew Starr-Bochicchio]

On Tue, Oct 26, 2010 at 11:40 AM, Jamie Bennett
jamie.benn...@linaro.org wrote:
 Hi,

 According to the Linaro release process [1] the maverick-proposed queue
 will be frozen tomorrow. After this date no uploads should be accepted
 for -proposed until the queue unfreezes on 8th November 2010 without
 consultation with the Linaro release team [2]. The total freeze time
 will be 12 days.

 The freeze process was agreed at the platform sprint in Prague and has
 benefits for both Ubuntu and Linaro. This period should be used to flush
 the -proposed queue, testing, verifying and promoting to
 maverick-updates what is currently there. If you have an update that
 really must be added to the queue in the next 12 days please email the
 team[3] for feedback.

Is this for the entire archive; will it effect Universe/un-seed
packages as well? (BTW: Is there a Linaro package set? Is there a
canonical list of package sets anywhere?)

 The Linaro Release Candidate images will be created on the 1st November
 and the images will be verified until Final Release on the 10th
 November.

It might be nice if this information is included in the Ubuntu release
schedule as well for Ubuntu developers like myself who aren't
following Linaro development closely as this impacts our work.

Thanks,

Andrew Starr-Bochicchio

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Re: Question about this list

[Andrew SB]

On Thu, Jan 28, 2010 at 8:14 PM, Amahdy mrjava.java...@gmail.com wrote:
 Maybe I'm missing something here (like I said in my early first post), but I
 even don't know how to set a total delivery for all messages sent here, I
 only receive a digest and there is no option to receive
 instant-notification, although I believe mailman has this option but maybe
 the case here was disabled by an administrator or I'm doing something wrong
 and I can't find the way to do it... please advise?

Well, when you subscribed you must have selected to get the digest.
You can change your options here:

https://lists.ubuntu.com/mailman/options/ubuntu-devel-announce

-- Andrew SB

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Re: Question about this list

[Andrew SB]

On Wed, Jan 27, 2010 at 1:47 PM, Amahdy mrjava.java...@gmail.com wrote:
 2- I find it always difficult to keep updated with this kind of lists, what
 type of software do you use? please share it with me, I find it very
 difficult to rely on a kind of RSS because I want to hit reply and quote
 the part of the message that I like, is there an advanced feature for that?
 3- The OpenSource managers, why they prefer this kind of lists usually? it
 ends to be a very old fashion and not user friendly at all, or whatdya
 think?

Well, I'd say it's as user friendly as your email client, which is of
course the best tool to follow an email list.

I see you have a gmail address. If you are subscribed to the list
click show details and then Filter messages from this mailing
list. You can then set up a separate folder for the list and set it
to skip your inbox so it doesn't clutter more important emails.

-- Andrew SB

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Re: removing recommended packages from source packages

[Andrew SB]

On Tue, Jan 12, 2010 at 12:45 PM, John Vivirito gnomefr...@gmail.com wrote:
 On 01/12/10 12:36, John Vivirito wrote:
 hi I was doing some installs and i found that some source
 packages have recommends that we do not supply in archives and
 some that have no installation candidate. One example is
 firmware-linux and i cant find the source package that
 recommended it. Also if we provide recommend packages that are
 not in archives we are telling users  we do not have this
 package but feel free to get it from somewhere else
 AFAIK we do not support packages found outside of our archives.

 Now if this is left overs from Debian's packages i think we
 should either package the recommends or remove them from
 source. The one way i know how to find out source packages is
 to look while packaging/updating the packages, or maybe have a
 patch that searches and removes them.
 If someone knows a better way or a way to make a patch or add
 it in the rules file. I would go with a patch only because
 during merges we can keep them intact and not have to redo it
 for every merge.
 I do not have time for Lucid to look into this much further so
 if someone has any ideas or can draft up a patch please let me
 know.

 Sorry i had typo in address first time but here is the full post.

 also i reported a bug on this it is bug #506528
 here is the link:
 https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+bug/506528

This is something we already track. See the debcheck resilts on
qa.ubuntuwire.com:

http://qa.ubuntuwire.com/debcheck/debcheck.py?dist=lucidlist=relationship-Recommendsarch=ANY

- Andrew SB

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Re: Japanese Input with Karmic?

[Andrew SB]

2009/11/24 Kevin Fries kfr...@cctus.com:
 Does anybody here use Japanese input as a secondary language?

 My computer was installed using the default English language, but I need to 
 converse with Japanese people on a regular basis.  So, I went into the 
 System-Administration-Language Support just like I did on all the versions 
 of Ubuntu.  But SCIM does not seem to be popped up any more.  When I press 
 Ctrl-Space... nothing.  Right now while in Firefox, scim says that anthy is 
 active... does this look like Japanese.  Not to me either.


I don't generally have the need for secondary language input, so
hopefully someone more familiar will chime in. But I do know that ibus
has replace SCIM as Ubuntu's default input method in Karmic. [1] If
you did a fresh install of Karmic SCIM shouldn't be installed at all,
though it is still availiable in the repos.

To activate IBus and set it up, go to SystemPreferencesIBus Preferences

It can be called with Ctrl-Space just like SCIM.

Of course, this isn't very discoverable. I didn't have any idea what
an ibus was the first time it showed up in my menus. Luckily there has
already been a bug filed and a fix is about to be pulled in from
Debian which will give it a more descriptive name. [2]

Hope that helps...

- Andrew SB

[1] 
https://blueprints.edge.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+spec/desktop-karmic-input-methods
[2] https://bugs.edge.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/ibus/+bug/429986

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Re: Bug or feature on the Clock

[Andrew SB]

On Sat, Oct 31, 2009 at 11:45 AM, Alarcón Vladimir
vladimiralar...@yahoo.com wrote:
 Hi, I don't know if this is the right thread to post a missing feature I've 
 found.

 when I you click on the clock that appears by default in Ubuntu 9.04  9.10, 
 it shows you a calendar where weeks start on Sunday (thru Saturday). That's 
 fine for English, but in Spanish (maybe other languages too) weeks start on 
 Monday (thru Sunday).

 I looked in Preferences but I couldn't find any option to change the first 
 day of the week, as in Windows for example.

 Is it possible to submit a feature request here?

 I mean, is confusing (for me) to see weeks starting on Sunday.

What locale are you using? The different locales found under
/usr/share/i18n/locales/ have a first_weekday For cultures like
en_US were Sunday is considered the first day of the week, the line
should read  first_weekday 1 Cultures that begin the week on Mondays
should have  first_weekday 2 GNOME's calendar applet should follow
these settings.

If the locale setting for your culture is wrong, please file a bug
against the langpack-locales package.

Thanks!

- Andrew

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Re: Karmic Kernel Source throwing error when building v4l-dvb

[Andrew Barbaccia]

On Tue, Oct 6, 2009 at 10:14 AM, Andrew Barbaccia 
andrew.barbac...@gmail.com wrote:

  On Tue, Oct 6, 2009 at 3:54 AM, Nils Kassube kass...@gmx.net wrote:

 Andrew Barbaccia wrote:
  I'm trying to build the v4l-dvb tree.

 You mean the v4l-dvb tree from linuxtv.org, right?


 Yes that's the one.



  I believe my build environment
  is setup correctly as I have installed build-essential, linux-headers
  and linux-source. I have extracted the source, linked to
  /usr/src/linux and did the whole make oldconfig thing.

  Is there something missing from the linux-headers package? Did I
  configure something incorrectly?

 Maybe it is a problem with the v4l-dvb tree. Some time ago it didn't
 work for me with everything enabled but I had success with only those
 modules enabled which I needed for my hardware. You can run make
 menuconfig in the v4l-dvb directory and disable everything except what
 you really need.


 Nils


 I believe the problem exists somewhere with the module I was trying to
 compile also. When I download the saa7134-stable branch (which was merged
 into the linuxtv.org tree) I get the same errors.

 I found a thread here on linux-media mailing list:
 http://www.mail-archive.com/linux-me...@vger.kernel.org/msg06865.html

 But there is no resolution and I cannot seem to have make realize I have
 the full source installed.


For anyone else having this problem I was able to get some resolution from
the guys in #v4l on IRC.

Basically the Firedtv driver needs the entire kernel source to compile - not
just the headers. They said they are aware of the problem and will address
it at some point.

So a quick work around is to disable the firedtv driver by modifying the
./v4l/.config file and changing '=m' to '=n' on the firedtv line.

The longer solution is to install the kernel source and then modify the
makefile configuration options to use that instead of the headers (it will
default to using the headers still if not configured correctly). If you're
not using firedtv, this is not worth it.

Thanks all who helped!
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Re: Karmic Kernel Source throwing error when building v4l-dvb

[Andrew Barbaccia]

On Tue, Oct 6, 2009 at 3:54 AM, Nils Kassube kass...@gmx.net wrote:

 Andrew Barbaccia wrote:
  I'm trying to build the v4l-dvb tree.

 You mean the v4l-dvb tree from linuxtv.org, right?


Yes that's the one.



  I believe my build environment
  is setup correctly as I have installed build-essential, linux-headers
  and linux-source. I have extracted the source, linked to
  /usr/src/linux and did the whole make oldconfig thing.

  Is there something missing from the linux-headers package? Did I
  configure something incorrectly?

 Maybe it is a problem with the v4l-dvb tree. Some time ago it didn't
 work for me with everything enabled but I had success with only those
 modules enabled which I needed for my hardware. You can run make
 menuconfig in the v4l-dvb directory and disable everything except what
 you really need.


 Nils


I believe the problem exists somewhere with the module I was trying to
compile also. When I download the saa7134-stable branch (which was merged
into the linuxtv.org tree) I get the same errors.

I found a thread here on linux-media mailing list:
http://www.mail-archive.com/linux-me...@vger.kernel.org/msg06865.html

But there is no resolution and I cannot seem to have make realize I have the
full source installed.
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Karmic Kernel Source throwing error when building v4l-dvb

[Andrew Barbaccia]

I'm trying to build the v4l-dvb tree. I believe my build environment is
setup correctly as I have installed build-essential, linux-headers and
linux-source. I have extracted the source, linked to /usr/src/linux and did
the whole make oldconfig thing.

During the build I get errors like these:

make[2]: Entering directory `/usr/src/linux-headers-2.6.31-11-generic'
  CC [M]  /home/andrew/Technical/Source/v4l-dvb/v4l/firedtv-1394.o
/home/andrew/Technical/Source/v4l-dvb/v4l/firedtv-1394.c:21:17: error:
dma.h: No such file or directory
/home/andrew/Technical/Source/v4l-dvb/v4l/firedtv-1394.c:22:21: error:
csr1212.h: No such file or directory
/home/andrew/Technical/Source/v4l-dvb/v4l/firedtv-1394.c:23:23: error:
highlevel.h: No such file or directory
/home/andrew/Technical/Source/v4l-dvb/v4l/firedtv-1394.c:24:19: error:
hosts.h: No such file or directory
/home/andrew/Technical/Source/v4l-dvb/v4l/firedtv-1394.c:25:22: error:
ieee1394.h: No such file or directory
/home/andrew/Technical/Source/v4l-dvb/v4l/firedtv-1394.c:26:17: error:
iso.h: No such file or directory
/home/andrew/Technical/Source/v4l-dvb/v4l/firedtv-1394.c:27:21: error:
nodemgr.h: No such file or directory
/home/andrew/Technical/Source/v4l-dvb/v4l/firedtv-1394.c:37: warning:
'struct hpsb_iso' declared inside parameter list
/home/andrew/Technical/Source/v4l-dvb/v4l/firedtv-1394.c:37: warning: its
scope is only this definition or declaration, which is probably not what you
want
/home/andrew/Technical/Source/v4l-dvb/v4l/firedtv-1394.c: In function
'rawiso_activity_cb':
/home/andrew/Technical/Source/v4l-dvb/v4l/firedtv-1394.c:53: error:
dereferencing pointer to incomplete type
/home/andrew/Technical/Source/v4l-dvb/v4l/firedtv-1394.c:54: error: implicit
declaration of function 'hpsb_iso_n_ready'
/home/andrew/Technical/Source/v4l-dvb/v4l/firedtv-1394.c:61: error:
dereferencing pointer to incomplete type
/home/andrew/Technical/Source/v4l-dvb/v4l/firedtv-1394.c:62: error: implicit
declaration of function 'dma_region_i'
/home/andrew/Technical/Source/v4l-dvb/v4l/firedtv-1394.c:62: error:
dereferencing pointer to incomplete type
/home/andrew/Technical/Source/v4l-dvb/v4l/firedtv-1394.c:62: error: expected
expression before 'unsigned'
/home/andrew/Technical/Source/v4l-dvb/v4l/firedtv-1394.c:63: warning:
assignment makes pointer from integer without a cast
/home/andrew/Technical/Source/v4l-dvb/v4l/firedtv-1394.c:64: error:
dereferencing pointer to incomplete type
/home/andrew/Technical/Source/v4l-dvb/v4l/firedtv-1394.c:68: error:
dereferencing pointer to incomplete type
/home/andrew/Technical/Source/v4l-dvb/v4l/firedtv-1394.c:82: error: implicit
declaration of function 'hpsb_iso_recv_release_packets'
/home/andrew/Technical/Source/v4l-dvb/v4l/firedtv-1394.c: In function
'node_of':
/home/andrew/Technical/Source/v4l-dvb/v4l/firedtv-1394.c:87: error:
dereferencing pointer to incomplete type
/home/andrew/Technical/Source/v4l-dvb/v4l/firedtv-1394.c:87: warning: type
defaults to 'int' in declaration of '__mptr'
/home/andrew/Technical/Source/v4l-dvb/v4l/firedtv-1394.c:87: warning:
initialization from incompatible pointer type
/home/andrew/Technical/Source/v4l-dvb/v4l/firedtv-1394.c:87: error: invalid
use of undefined type 'struct unit_directory'
/home/andrew/Technical/Source/v4l-dvb/v4l/firedtv-1394.c: In function
'node_lock':
/home/andrew/Technical/Source/v4l-dvb/v4l/firedtv-1394.c:92: error: implicit
declaration of function 'hpsb_node_lock'
/home/andrew/Technical/Source/v4l-dvb/v4l/firedtv-1394.c:92: error:
'EXTCODE_COMPARE_SWAP' undeclared (first use in this function)
/home/andrew/Technical/Source/v4l-dvb/v4l/firedtv-1394.c:92: error: (Each
undeclared identifier is reported only once
/home/andrew/Technical/Source/v4l-dvb/v4l/firedtv-1394.c:92: error: for each
function it appears in.)
/home/andrew/Technical/Source/v4l-dvb/v4l/firedtv-1394.c:93: error:
'quadlet_t' undeclared (first use in this function)
/home/andrew/Technical/Source/v4l-dvb/v4l/firedtv-1394.c:93: error: expected
')' before 'arg'
/home/andrew/Technical/Source/v4l-dvb/v4l/firedtv-1394.c: In function
'node_read':
/home/andrew/Technical/Source/v4l-dvb/v4l/firedtv-1394.c:98: error: implicit
declaration of function 'hpsb_node_read'
/home/andrew/Technical/Source/v4l-dvb/v4l/firedtv-1394.c: In function
'node_write':
/home/andrew/Technical/Source/v4l-dvb/v4l/firedtv-1394.c:103: error:
implicit declaration of function 'hpsb_node_write'
/home/andrew/Technical/Source/v4l-dvb/v4l/firedtv-1394.c: In function
'start_iso':
/home/andrew/Technical/Source/v4l-dvb/v4l/firedtv-1394.c:114: error:
implicit declaration of function 'hpsb_iso_recv_init'
/home/andrew/Technical/Source/v4l-dvb/v4l/firedtv-1394.c:114: error:
dereferencing pointer to incomplete type
/home/andrew/Technical/Source/v4l-dvb/v4l/firedtv-1394.c:116: error:
'HPSB_ISO_DMA_DEFAULT' undeclared (first use in this function)
/home/andrew/Technical/Source/v4l-dvb/v4l/firedtv-1394.c:118: warning:
assignment makes pointer from integer without a cast
/home/andrew

Re: Integrating release schedules into google calendar (.ics)

[Andrew SB]

2009/9/27 shirish शिरीष shirisha...@gmail.com:
 Hi all,
  I'm sure there are lot of people who use .ics
 (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ICalendar) . I use google calendar. It
 would  be great if there was a standing RSS feed as well as the
 schedule that could trickle in my google calendar.

 I'm sure somebody may have already done it and/or documented the same.
 If somebody has, please direct me so I could benefit from the process.


Indeed there is:

http://people.ubuntu.com/~vorlon/UbuntuReleaseSchedule.ics

- Andrew Starr-Bochicchio

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Re: [Ubuntu-bugcontrol] Apport Hooks Task Force

[Andrew SB]

On Sun, Sep 20, 2009 at 10:00 AM, Sense Hofstede se...@qense.nl wrote:
 What should this operation do? The idea is to create an 'apport-hook' tag,
 report bugs against all packages (that don't have a hook yet) and start
 watching the bugs. Then we can write hooks and watch the tag for bugs that
 have a proper one attached. The Bugsquad could do the buggy part of the
 task, the MOTU and Ubuntu Developers can afterwards add the hooks to the
 packages (and help writing them).
 If we'd get the greatest part of our archive to have Apport hooks, it'll be
 much easier for us to cope with the many bug reports that inevitably are
 going to come when Karmic is released and we'd be able to learn how to deal
 with those kind of bug reports before the LTS will be there.

Are you suggesting filing bugs against _all_ packages without hooks?
That seems a bit over the top.

 Maybe it would be a good idea to devote a HugDay to this? It would at least
 be useful to create a wiki page an send an announcement to explain the
 procedure of adding hooks to packages.

This already exists more or less:

https://wiki.ubuntu.com/Apport/DeveloperHowTo


Some thing that I think would be extremely useful is a list of
_specific_ packages that hooks would be useful for. It seems as if
writing a hook is pretty trivial if you know any python at all. For
the most part, apport hooks simply collect logs or configuration files
that might be useful in debugging. A great task for the bug squad
could be to collect a list of common things that they need to ask for
when debugging specific packages. I know that I personally would love
to help out and write some hooks, but the packages that I'm mainly
interested in don't really have a need for them so far.

If there was a wiki page somewhere that mentioned that every time we
get a bug report for package foo we ask the reporter for foo.log, that
would be the perfect place of some one to jump in and write a hook. A
massive list of packages without hooks would be much less helpful.

Thanks!

- Andrew Starr-Bochicchio

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Re: [Ubuntu-bugcontrol] Apport Hooks Task Force

[Andrew SB]

On Sun, Sep 20, 2009 at 3:25 PM, Sense Hofstede se...@qense.nl wrote:
 Reporting bugs against every package would indeed result in a lot of new bug
 reports, but I do think that it would be a good way of keeping track of
 the implementation process. We could use python-launchpadbugs to make the
 task easier.

By my count there are only about 44 packages that currently have apport-hooks.

AFAICT, here is the total number of source packages in Karmic:

Number of source packages in karmic:
  main: 3229
  restricted: 7
  universe: 12403
  multiverse: 520

Totaling 16,159 source packages. Opening new bugs on nearly all of
them seems to be too broad to be helpful. While I think what you're
after is a great goal, I think we better reach it by narrowing our
scope and focusing on specific packages where the hooks will be most
useful. As someone who would be willing to write hooks and incorporate
them into a package, looking at a bug list of over 16,000 wouldn't
give me any idea where to start.

- Andrew Starr-Bochicchio

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Fwd: Distro Summit 2010: Call for Papers

[Andrew SB]

This was sent to debian-devel-announce. Seems as if it might be of
interest here...

- Andrew Starr-Bochicchio

-- Forwarded message --
From: Fabio Tranchitella fa...@tranchitella.it
Date: 2009/9/9
Subject: Distro Summit 2010: Call for Papers
To: debian-devel-annou...@lists.debian.org


===
CALL FOR PAPERS
===

Distro Summit 2010 is a one-day technical conference with a strong focus on
collaboration between Free Software distributions. The event is  hosted at
the linux.conf.au, which will be held in Wellington (New Zealand) on the
18-23 of January, 2010.

We are looking for proposals from any Free Software distribution, from the
typical full distributions (both linux and non-linux) to the niche market
derivatives.

In spite of the strong focus on collaboration between Free Software
distributions, topics may include packaging, maintenance, relationship with
upstream developers, release management and QA.

For more informtion, please visit: http://distrosummit.org.


Important dates
===

 * Call for papers ends: Wednesday 30 September 2009
 * Announcing the schedule: Friday 2 October 2009
 * Distro Summit 2010: 18/19 January 2010


Presentation types
==

We will accept proposals for:

 * 25 minute standard-length presentations;
 * 50 minute long presentations.

Session lengths include time for audience questions.

We intend for standard-length presentation to make up the vast majority of our
presentations. If you plan on submitting a proposal for a long presentation, a
willingness to present a standard-length presentation will impact positively on
your proposal.


Submit a proposal
=

To submit your proposal, we'll need the following information:

 * Your name, contact details and a short biography;
 * Your proposal title;
 * Intended audience;
 * An abstract;
 * Presentation outline;
 * Presentation type (standard-length or long).

To submit a proposal, or get more information, please write to
c...@distrosummit.org.


About the Distro Summit
===

The Distro Summit 2010 is a one-day developer conference with a strong focus on
collaboration between free software distributions hosted at the linux.conf.au
2010 (http://www.lca2010.org.nz). In addition to a schedule of technical,
social and policy talks, the Distro Summit provides an opportunity for
developers, contributors and other interested people to meet in person and work
together more closely.

Previous similar events have featured speakers from around the world. They have
also been extremely beneficial for developing key free software software
components and for improving collaboration and sharing between the different
distributions.


Target Audience
===

The Distro Summit is (mainly) a technical event, but this does not mean that
the only target audience are developers and maintainers of free software
distributions: the event will feature talks that range from the development to
real-world use cases, going through marketing and the social aspects of the
maintenance of free software distributions.

--
Fabio Tranchitella
on the behalf of the Distro Summit organizers

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Re: Downgrading packages after removing a repository

[Andrew Sayers]

Michael Bienia wrote:
snip
 Indepenent of how hard you make it to break an installation, there will
 be someone who managed to break it nonetheless and expects from you to
 unbreak it. And at the same time you will annoy experienced users who
 know what they are doing.

I don't follow this part.  Could you explain how the proposed solution 
(warnings on upgrade, warnings on downgrade) increases the number of 
people who expect Ubuntu to unbreak their system, or the number of 
annoyed experienced users?

- Andrew

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Re: Downgrading packages after removing a repository

[Andrew Sayers]

Michael Bienia wrote:
 On 2009-08-05 12:55:04 +0100, Andrew Sayers wrote:
 Michael Bienia wrote:
 snip
 Indepenent of how hard you make it to break an installation, there will
 be someone who managed to break it nonetheless and expects from you to
 unbreak it. And at the same time you will annoy experienced users who
 know what they are doing.
 I don't follow this part.  Could you explain how the proposed solution 
 (warnings on upgrade, warnings on downgrade) increases the number of 
 people who expect Ubuntu to unbreak their system, or the number of 
 annoyed experienced users?
 
 It was related to the part where you commented that if Ubuntu makes it
 possible to break installations (addind 3rd party repositories) it
 should also provide tools to unbreak it again.
 But perhaps I misunderstood it or read too much into it that if Ubuntu
 doesn't provide these tools, it shouldn't provide options to shoot
 oneself into the foot (possibly break an installation).
 
 Adding additional warnings might help if done right, but I currently see
 some problems I don't currently see a solution for:
 - you certainly won't warn on every upgrade else the warning is useless
   (when you warn about every possible upgrade the warning gets ignored:
the last 20 upgrades went fine, why should this one break things?)
 - how to identify repositories to warn about updates from?
 - you can't rely on apt (or dpkg) about the warning (how should it know
   which updates are safe and which not) and you can't rely on the
   packages itself either (which 3rd party package will contain a warning
   that it might break user data on downgrades?)
 
 Michael
 

These are very good points - how about warning when upgrading to a 
version with a different Origin, Label, Suite, Version, or Codename line 
in the Release file, or when enabling downgrades?

For example:

 These packages will be upgraded from repositories that are
 incompatible with their current repositories:

  * libfoo
* old origin: Ubuntu
* new origin: LP-PPA-andrew-bugs-launchpad-net
  * gbar
* old origin: LP-PPA-andrew-bugs-launchpad-net
* new origin: Evilsoft Inc.
* old label: Ubuntu
* new label: EvilWare
  * kqux
* old suite: jaunty
* new suite: karmic
* old codename: jaunty
* new codename: karmic
* old version: 9.04
* new version: 9.10

 WARNING: Incompatible repositories are not supported.
 Incompatible repositories can cause data loss, can make programs
 unable to run, and can even make your computer unable to boot.

And:

 WARNING: downgrades are not supported.

 Downgrading packages can cause data loss, can make programs
 unable to run, and can even make your computer unable to boot.

On the command-line, I would suggest printing the upgrade warning 
whenever relevant packages are apt-get installed or upgraded, and 
putting the downgrade warning next to the relevant command-line option 
in the man page.

In a GUI, I would suggest printing the upgrade warning whenever packages 
are installed or upgraded in any way, and printing the downgrade warning 
when the user clicks on some type of allow downgrades for this session 
button.

- Andrew

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Re: Downgrading packages after removing a repository

[Andrew Sayers]

You make a good point about breakage when packages are downgraded.  But 
it seems a little disingenuous for us to bend over backwards to make 
unsupported upgrades possible (adding a software sources menu item, 
putting PPAs in Launchpad, creating /etc/apt/sources.list.d/ and so on), 
then for us to walk away when those upgrades make systems unusable.

I also take your point that pain is an important way of communicating 
danger to users.  But making a system unusable seems like pushing a man 
off a cliff to warn him about the dangers of falling.

I would expect the message to be at least as effective if we had a GUI 
to say warning: may cause breakage on upgrade, warning: breakage 
caused on downgrade, and breakage evident from the loss of 
configuration data.  If that's acceptable to you, and if C's blueprint 
idea seems okay, then I'll include the GUI suggestions in the blueprint.

- Andrew

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Downgrading packages after removing a repository

[Andrew Sayers]

I've found a bug (or maybe it's a feature request) in apt (or maybe it's 
in software-properties-gtk).  I'd like to get people's opinions about 
where this is best reported, and what the report should say.

When you add a repository to your computer, then remove that repository, 
it's not obvious how to downgrade packages that are no longer available.

Normally this is a minor irritant, but it can be a security issue, or 
can even make recovery very hard indeed.  Here are three user stories to 
illustrate the issue:


Anna added a PPA through Synaptic  Settings  Repositories, which 
upgraded emacs.  She didn't like the upgraded version, so she removed 
the repository.  She scrambled around for a while, before realising she 
could get her old emacs back by removing it then reinstalling.

Tim added a repository from a random website through System  Admin  
Software Sources, then updated and was notified that a new version of 
debconf was available.  He installed the upgrade, then realised that the 
upgrade had been downloaded from the new repository.  Realising he'd 
been tricked, he removed the new repository and assumed that debconf had 
been uninstalled as well.

Bob, thinking that a Debian-based distribution should be okay with 
Debian packages, followed command-line instructions to create 
/etc/apt/sources.list.d/debian-unstable.  Once his Ubuntu/Debian hybrid 
was installed, he rang his technical friend to clear up the mess.  The 
friend tried every apt-get command he knew, before gradually realising 
that he had to run apt-cache showpkg name, find the package version, 
do apt-get install name=ubuntu version, and repeat many, many times.


Ideally, I would like well-advertised command-line and GUI options that 
can downgrade packages to the latest downloadable version.  Something 
like this for example:

1) Add a --ignore-status option to apt-get, which forces it to ignore 
package versions listed in /var/lib/dpkg/status.  This would let sudo 
apt-get --ignore-status install ubuntu-desktop clear up most any problem.

2) When apt-get update deletes a file in /var/lib/apt/lists/, print a 
warning for every installed package that's just become non-downloadable, 
something like the latest version of package is no longer 
downloadable.  You may want to run `apt-get --ignore-status install 
package`

3) Provide similar functionality to (1) and (2) through synaptic

4) Provide similar functionality through AppCenter

Would you find this too intrusive?  Not intrusive enough?  Should I 
forget about Synaptic now that AppCenter is coming along, or should I 
focus on getting functionality into APT that can later be made available 
through the GUI?

- Andrew

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Re: Error while building a package in Karmic, no /usr/share/cdbs/1/rules/ocaml.mk

[Andrew SB]

On Thu, Jul 30, 2009 at 4:29 PM, David MENTREdmen...@linux-france.org wrote:
 Hello,

 I'm trying to build packages for Ubuntu Karmic (and learning Ubuntu
 packaging in the process). I'm following instructions at:
  https://wiki.ubuntu.com/PackagingGuide/Recipes/Debdiff

 I have an error at step 7 when doing debuild:
 
  $ debuild -S -us -uc
  dpkg-buildpackage -rfakeroot -d -us -uc -S
 dpkg-buildpackage : définir CFLAGS à la valeur par défaut : -g -O2
 dpkg-buildpackage : définir CPPFLAGS à la valeur par défaut :
 dpkg-buildpackage : définir LDFLAGS à la valeur par défaut : 
 -Wl,-Bsymbolic-functions
 dpkg-buildpackage : définir FFLAGS à la valeur par défaut : -g -O2
 dpkg-buildpackage : définir CXXFLAGS à la valeur par défaut : -g -O2
 dpkg-buildpackage: paquet source ocaml-libvirt
 dpkg-buildpackage: version source 0.6.1.0-1ubuntu1
 dpkg-buildpackage: source changé par David MENTRE dmen...@linux-france.org
  fakeroot debian/rules clean
 debian/rules:23: /usr/share/cdbs/1/rules/ocaml.mk: No such file or directory
 debian/rules:24: /usr/share/cdbs/1/rules/patchsys-quilt.mk: No such file or 
 directory
 make: *** Pas de règle pour fabriquer la cible « 
 /usr/share/cdbs/1/rules/patchsys-quilt.mk ». Arrêt.
 dpkg-buildpackage: erreur: fakeroot debian/rules clean a produit une erreur 
 de sortie de type 2
 debuild: fatal error at line 1334:
 dpkg-buildpackage -rfakeroot -d -us -uc -S failed
 

 Indeed, those ocaml.mk and patchsys-quilt.mk files are missing.

You seem to need to have the packages quilt and ocaml-nox installed in
order to build that source package.

- Andrew


 Any idea of what should I do to have those files?

 I'm trying to modify and build that package:
  http://packages.debian.org/source/unstable/ocaml-libvirt
 [ I have dget'ed .dsc in the above page. ]

 I'm working in an up-to-date amd64 Karmic in a VirtualBox virtual
 machine.

 Sincerely yours,
 david
 --
 GPG/PGP key: A3AD7A2A      --     dmen...@linux-france.org
  5996 CC46 4612 9CA4 3562  D7AC 6C67 9E96 A3AD 7A2A

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Re: The google custom search - perhaps it went there by itself?

[Andrew Sayers]

Vincenzo Ciancia wrote:
 The fact that there is nobody willing to reply (I posted a similar 
 message one year ago, so this is certainly not a matter of time) can 
 mean only two things:
 
 1) on this list, nobody knows the answer. I think this is likely. Then, 
 the custom search should be removed from firefox. Nobody knows why it is 
 there.
 
 2) someone knows, but they are ashamed to tell the truth. This is likely 
 too. If you just want to adopt a marketing strategy, damnit, just admit 
 it. The majority of users including myself will continue to use ubuntu. 
 But why silence? This is really worrying.

Hi Vincenzo,

With all due respect, I think you're missing a more likely possibility:

Developers look at the level of bitterness in this thread, and at the 
ratio of people that have been attacked vs. people that have been 
treated respectfully, do a quick cost:benefit analysis of posting, and 
decide that they're better off keeping quiet.

I understand that you're annoyed because you feel an issue that's 
important to you has been ignored for a long time, but venting your 
feelings to the list is never productive.  You are more likely to get 
useful responses if you focus on constructive areas of debate, and 
ignore irrelevant sub-threads wherever possible.  Doing so will make 
your thread look more attractive to potential posters.

- Andrew

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Re: Reporting usability problems: please be more tolerant when you triage bugs!

[Andrew Sayers]

Hi Vincenzo,

You might have more luck if you describe your changes as feature 
requests.  Whether or not you personally think they're bugs, calling 
them new features should avoid the always been that way reaction from 
developers.

You might also want to try helping out with the improved me too 
blueprint: https://blueprints.launchpad.net/malone/+spec/improved-me-too 
- useful me too data would let you argue that behaviour is non-obvious.

- Andrew

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Re: Standing in the street trying to hear yourself think

[Andrew Sayers]

I think the FAQ/flowchart/chatroom model could work very well in other 
places, but the Signpost is just about pointing people in the right 
direction - providing solutions is outside our modest scope.

You've already got a chatroom in #ubuntu, so the next thing is to start 
writing answers.  I would suggest that interested people clear their 
weekend to trawl through the forums and/or the #ubuntu logs at 
irclogs.ubuntu.com, then write them up on the wiki somewhere.  With 
luck, a hierarchy of questions will become apparent before all that 
answer-writing drives you completely insane :)

I plan to be in #ubuntu-signpost most of the time this week and over the 
weekend, so pop in if you want to talk about any of this.

- Andrew

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Re: Standing in the street trying to hear yourself think

[Andrew Sayers]

I think the model we're heading towards with the signpost is that the 
wiki page contains questions that have been asked before, while IRC and 
the wiki discussion page are for new questions.

If it works, I think #ubuntu might want to look at the signpost model. 
Being able to click I have a problem with my hardware - video card - 
NVidia card - unsupported NVidia card would satisfy a bunch of users 
without needing direct support, and would make it easier to direct 
people towards the level 2 tech support channels.

Done right, a signpost-like model could also ensure that level 2 support 
requests are well formulated.  Leaf nodes for unknown problems might 
look like this:

BEGIN WIKITEXT

=== Modern NVidia card with no known issues ===

Your problem is not covered by this guide. Go to #ubuntu-video and say 
I have a problem with my modern NVidia card (TYPE).  This card has no 
known issues.  My problem is: PROBLEM.  Make sure to replace TYPE and 
PROBLEM with the type of card you have and the problem you're having 
with it.

END WIKITEXT



About people asking already-answered questions - As I half-suggested in 
another post, I think the second-order problem here is that many 
approaches make it easier to post than to search.  I would recommend 
forums drowning in deja vu to try putting roadblocks between the user 
and the send message button.  Preferably, these roadblocks should be 
in the form of search buttons :)

I also think there's a third-order problem here: developers don't have 
to-the-eyeball strategies for delivering their content.  Expecting users 
to trawl through old posts seems intuitively reasonable, but the 
evidence is that it doesn't work that way.

Here's a nice demonstration that convinced me of the need for software 
to deliver information right into the user's eyeball.  It doesn't work 
unless you actually do it, so please have a go - I promise it's not a trick.

BEGIN DEMONSTRATION

For this demonstration, you'll need a thumb and a digital watch.

Hold your thumb at arm's length and stare at your thumbnail for a 
moment.  Then place your watch over your thumb, such that the seconds 
counter is over your thumbnail.  With your thumb still at arm's length, 
stare at your thumbnail and count the seconds going by.  You should be 
able to count the seconds easily.

Now place your watch to the left of your thumb, such that the seconds 
counter is jammed against the side of your thumbnail.  With your thumb 
at arm's length, stare at your thumb and try to count the seconds go by. 
  You might be able to detect when there's a change, but will be 
completely unable to read the numbers.

90% of the rod and cone cells in your entire eye are pointed at an area 
about the size of your thumbnail.  So information just one thumbwidth 
away from the point you're focussing on is almost impossible to take in.

END DEMONSTRATION

To solve the third-order problem, I recommend putting the above 
demonstration in front of developers' eyeballs :)

- Andrew

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Menu category for GPS application (gpxviewer)

[Andrew Gee]

Hi,

I'm the developer of gpxviewer, an application that allows users to
import GPS traces and view details about them and the trace plotted on a
map.

I'm now packaging this for Ubuntu. I set the category for the desktop
file to Education. I did this because JOSM, the openstreetmap editing
application, used Education for their category.

But after speaking with Ampelbein in #ubuntu-motu, I realised that this
probably wasn't a suitable category. But the struggle is trying to find
a suitable category.

Does anyone have a good idea on what to categorise the application as?

Regards,
Andrew Gee.

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Re: Standing in the street trying to hear yourself think

[Andrew SB]

On Fri, Jul 3, 2009 at 12:39 PM, Evaneapa...@gmail.com wrote:
 On Fri, Jul 3, 2009 at 12:36 PM, Andrew SB a.star...@gmail.com wrote:

 On Fri, Jul 3, 2009 at 12:27 PM, Evan R. Murphyevanrmur...@gmail.com
 wrote:
  I would propose that we have a better metric for selecting the best
  answer, in that the person posing the question could select the
  answer that fixed the problem for them,  again this ties in with the
  task orientated nature of this approach. A question like how do i get
  the audio level to persist on my aspire one would generally solicit a
  number of answers, but only if the answer fixes the problem for the
  questioner should it be chosen as the best answer.
  [...]
 
  I like this. So maybe a rating system more along the lines of, Did
  this answer fix your problem?, instead of, Digg it.

 Some thoughts:

 This sounds just like Launchpad Answers to me. How would the idea
 you're talking about differ?

 What could we do to encourage more people to use LP Answers?

 What does it lack, or is it simply a matter of promotion / awareness?

 I've been subscribed to this list and filing bugs for over a year now, and I
 hadn't even heard of Launchpad Answers before now. Maybe I live under a
 rock, but I think promotion / awareness would go a long way.


Check it out. Click on the Answers tab in Launchpad. It can be used by
distros, packages, or projects. EG:

Distributions:

https://answers.launchpad.net/ubuntu

Specific packages:

https://answers.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/openoffice.org

Upstream projects:

https://answers.launchpad.net/awn-extras

Honestly, I find using it for Ubuntu as a whole a bit overwhelming,
and I don't really pitch in much there. But I try to keep up with it
for specific packages I maintain and upstream projects I work on.

Maybe a good start could be getting http://www.ubuntu.com/support and
http://www.ubuntu.com/support/communitysupport to feature it more
prominently.

But really, it's only as helpfully as the people tracking it and
providing answers...

- Andrew

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Re: Standing in the street trying to hear yourself think

[Andrew Sayers]

Evan wrote:
 Launchpad is for bug reporting and tracking, beyond that I have no idea 
 where the actual division of responsibilities lies. Perhaps clarifying 
 that (ex: Wiki is for Howtos only, forums are only for ...) and then 
 providing a meta-support page for each topic would help. So somebody 
 looking for help from Ubuntu gets directed to support.ubuntu.com/Audio 
 http://support.ubuntu.com/Audio. This would have links such as:
 
 I want to know how to do something (wiki)
 I want to report a bug on the topic (lp)
 I think I have a bug but I'm not sure (lp answers?)
 I have a question or suggestion concerning the future of the topic 
 (devel-discuss)
 None of the above (#ubuntu-signpost)

I'm coming to a similar conclusion from the opposite direction.  A quick 
chat in #ubuntu-signpost lead me to start writing this:

https://help.ubuntu.com/community/Signpost

Hopefully people will go to the wiki signpost first, and 
#ubuntu-signpost if they fall off the bottom of the flowchart.  If that 
happens, we can update the signpost with answers from every individual 
question.

It'll probably take me a few days to add all the signage I can think of, 
and it would be great if you could add signs to resources you know about.

- Andrew

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Re: Standing in the street trying to hear yourself think

[Andrew Sayers]

The Ubuntu community is growing, and as Evan mentioned, our current 
channels of communication can only support a finite rate of messages. 
So there are only two possible solutions: increase the supply of 
meat-bandwidth, or decrease the demand.  Other posts have interesting 
ideas about increasing supply, so I'd like to suggest a way of 
decreasing the demand.  This would involve trying to find higher-order 
issues when someone asks a question - the trail of logic that lead them 
(and therefore others) to demand bandwidth in the first place.

As some people might remember, I wrote a survey about noise on the list 
a few months ago.  The response was fairly clear, but didn't demonstrate 
any overwhelming pressure, and my impression was that the list 
coincidentally became less noisy at about the same time.  So I did 
something I rarely do - wrote up my conclusions and shelved them for 
later reference[1].  Those conclusions might be interesting in this 
debate, although they're fairly specific to this list.

Thinking back on the survey, one of the meta learning points is that 
most Ubuntu people get far more exercised by specific cases than by 
statistics.  Another example is the way there's always a clamour to 
improve apport, but popcon's significant opportunities seem to be 
provoke a more relaxed attitude amongst would-be beneficiaries.  Though 
we few evidence-zealots keep chipping away, the fact is that getting the 
majority of Ubuntu folk interested in a problem means presenting them 
with an individual they can help.

This suggests a solution I've pulled together from a couple of Joel on 
Software articles[2][3]: when someone comes to you with a problem, first 
fix the presenting problem, then fix the second-order problem that 
caused it, then the third-order problem, and so on back to the original 
source.  Although this significantly increases the amount of work per 
issue, it's more than offset by the reduction in the number of issues.

Here's an example:

An e-mail recently came to the list[4] asking about adding a feature to 
the panel.  This seems to me like an upstream issue, not something for 
the list.

I e-mailed the author suggesting he take the issue up upstream (fixing 
the first-order bug), and politely inquired what lead him here.  He said 
that he'd read the text at [5], which suggested feature requests go to 
ubuntu-devel.  Realising that a non-developer probably shouldn't be 
posting to -devel, he decided to post here.  This suggests two 
second-order bug fixes to me:

* The page at [5] should suggest -devel-discuss rather than -devel
* The page at [5] should talk about filing feature requests upstream

Fixing these second-order issues would shut down a whole category of 
misdirected posts, but we can still look at a third-order bug: people 
don't know where to post messages.  A possible fix would be:

* Create #ubuntu-signpost, a place for people to be pointed in the right 
direction

That would be a fairly easy channel to support, and would reduce the 
amount of noise created by a much wider category of issues.

Fixing the first-, second- and third-order bugs would probably reduce 
traffic to the list by about one post every few months, so I would 
expect it to pay for itself in time spent within a year or so.  That's 
not much on its own, but a community-wide effort would soon add up.

So to conclude, my suggestion is that we politely ask people about the 
higher-order issues that lead them to send messages.  These might be bad 
documentation, not enough search, actual program bugs, or any number of 
other things.  Taking extra time to address higher-order issues will 
stop similar issues from occurring again in future, significantly 
reducing demand for bandwidth in the long-run.

Also, I'll be on #ubuntu-signpost later if anyone wants to join me, but 
right now it's way past my bedtime :)

- Andrew

[1]https://lists.ubuntu.com/archives/ubuntu-devel-discuss/2009-February/007122.html

[2]http://www.joelonsoftware.com/articles/customerservice.html,
(section 1, fix everything two ways)

[3]http://www.joelonsoftware.com/items/2008/01/22.html

[4]https://lists.ubuntu.com/archives/ubuntu-devel-discuss/2009-July/008969.html

[5]http://www.ubuntu.com/community/reportproblem

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Re: Fallback plan if Empathy isn't ready for Karmic?

[Andrew Sayers]

Martin Pitt wrote:
 Andrew Sayers [2009-06-22 19:04 +0100]:
 There's currently a big push to make Empathy the default IM client in 
 Karmic, even though the version in Jaunty still has grave issues - for 
 example, MSN doesn't work at all for me[1].
 
 We don't propose to retroactively default to it in Jaunty. :-)

Hi Martin,

My point here wasn't clear - Empathy hasn't had a full round of testing 
in a stable version of Ubuntu, because the version in Jaunty isn't 
usable as a day-to-day IM client.  Discussions in this thread and the 
guidelines thread show that it's not even going to have a full round 
of testing in an alpha/beta, because the version in Karmic also isn't 
usable as a day-to-day IM client.

I'm glad to hear that upstream is so active, but a usable version will 
have to land very soon in order for the small band of Karmic testers to 
give it enough use to clear out all the bugs that will come from a large 
number of Ubuntu newbies.  I'll ask again nearer the time about how 
things are progressing.

- Andrew

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Re: Provide a GUI option in the installer to enable popcon

[Andrew SB]

On Wed, Jun 24, 2009 at 12:02 PM, Matthew Paul Thomasm...@canonical.com wrote:
 The absolute size of a sample is more important, statistically, than its
 relative size. In other words, 1136581 popcon submissions is a large
 enough sample regardless of how many Ubuntu users there are in total.
 What is more important now is reducing bias -- bias towards current
 users against potential users, towards users who fiddle with settings
 against users who don't, and so on.

I was recently looking up some info for the upstream author of a
package I maintain in Debian and Ubuntu, and I saw that number. It's
pretty impressive that we have over one million submissions from an
opt-in program. In fact, Debian's number seems to be at only 84894.

One thing I'd like to see though is for Ubuntu to have package report
pages like Debian does. I.E.:

http://qa.debian.org/popcon.php?package=empathy

- Andrew Starr-Bochicchio
  Ubuntu Developer

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Re: Provide a GUI option in the installer to enable popcon

[Andrew Sayers]

Matthew Paul Thomas wrote:
 Andrew Sayers wrote on 23/06/09 17:55:
 
 We're constantly trying to make the Ubuntu installation process simpler.
 And explaining the Popularity Contest in an understandable way, in the
 installer which is completely out of context, would be quite difficult.
 
 As part of the AppCenter design work, I hope to make the popcon option
 more prominent in context.

That's a good point, and AppCenter looks very interesting indeed.  I 
look forward to playing with it!

- Andrew

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Re: Empathy is not in line with the much discussed guidelines

[Andrew Sayers]

Nicolò Chieffo wrote:
 you should use git master before giving points ;)

Could you give us some idea of when a testable version will land in 
Karmic?  We've got two months left until the final decision on whether 
this becomes as significant a part of Ubuntu as Firefox or OpenOffice, 
so it would be nice to have more than a few weeks of testing by people 
who don't feel like compiling their IM client from source every day.

- Andrew

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Provide a GUI option in the installer to enable popcon

[Andrew Sayers]

This argument must have been had before, but recent events have prompted 
me to suggest it anyway:

The submit statistical information page in System 
Administration  Software Sources  Statistics should be
presented during the installation process.  The box should
be checked by default in pre-RC versions of Ubuntu, and
unchecked in stable versions.

This would enable or disable the Ubuntu Popularity Contest 
(popcon.ubuntu.com), which is currently installed but disabled by default.

This would allow us to make decisions based on far better information, 
such as:

* Calculating a precise trade-off between number of users and number
   of bytes, to help decide which programs go on the CD
* Checking whether applications aren't getting bug reports because they
   don't have bugs or because people aren't using them
* Spotting sudden spikes or drops in program usage that suggest a bug
   has been introduced (or give hints as to the seriousness of a bug)
* Testing whether ordinary users are going out of their way (not) to use
   a particular program

It's not currently possible to make strong claims based on popcon data, 
because only a small number of people bother to hunt it out and check 
the box.  This is a self-reinforcing problem: why should I bother if the 
data is worthless anyway?

It strikes me as reasonable to enable this by default in pre-RC versions 
(why are you running alpha/beta software if not to give feedback?), and 
reasonable to at least ask in final versions (even the laziest user is 
enabled to make his or her individual contribution).

If just 1% of Ubuntu users tick the box, that gives us enough data to 
improve Ubuntu by justifying our decisions with evidence.

- Andrew

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Re: Provide a GUI option in the installer to enable popcon

[Andrew Sayers]

Mackenzie Morgan wrote:
 On Tuesday 23 June 2009 1:36:21 pm Siegfried-Angel wrote:
 If I remember correctly there is already such an option in the installer.
 
 I think he wants it to be more prominent, not hidden behind advanced, that 
 way it gets more use.

I wasn't aware of the feature, so I'll stand corrected on that point :)

I'll change my original suggestion to either the popularity contest 
should draw a statistically significant number of ordinary users, or it 
should be taken out of the default install.  Otherwise, it's just 
wasting space.

IMHO, the best solution would be to enable popcon by default in 
alpha/beta versions, and as Mackenzie says, make it more prominent for 
everyone else.

This could have a transformative effect on the development process with 
very little work, which I think is worth a single extra question for 
users.  Aside from anything else, the lack of flamewars would make this 
list far more productive.

- Andrew

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Re: Provide a GUI option in the installer to enable popcon

[Andrew Sayers]

Caroline Ford wrote:
 2009/6/23 Andrew Sayers andrew-ubuntu-de...@pileofstuff.org:

 IMHO, the best solution would be to enable popcon by default in
 alpha/beta versions, and as Mackenzie says, make it more prominent for
 everyone else.

 This could have a transformative effect on the development process with
 very little work, which I think is worth a single extra question for
 users.  Aside from anything else, the lack of flamewars would make this
 list far more productive.
 
 Only if you think that the alpha and betatesting community are
 representative of the wider user base, which they are unlikely to be.

That's a very good point - to get usable data, popcon.ubuntu.com would 
have to offer raw results by version.  For example, we would need to 
download the raw data for Karmic alpha/beta versions, and for the Karmic 
final version.  Then we could subtract one from the other to get 
approximate results for non-beta users.

That would pose some minor privacy issues, and would take a bit more 
work (which I'll happily volunteer to do), but I still think the 
benefits would far outweigh the costs.

- Andrew

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Fallback plan if Empathy isn't ready for Karmic?

[Andrew Sayers]

There's currently a big push to make Empathy the default IM client in 
Karmic, even though the version in Jaunty still has grave issues - for 
example, MSN doesn't work at all for me[1].

The plan is to make sure that these bugs are all fixed in time for 
Karmic, but what's the backup plan if there are still showstoppers when 
the release starts to get closer?  More precisely, when, where and how 
should people speak up if Empathy still has showstopping bugs?

Obviously it would be undesirable to try retrofitting Pidgin back in 
after the feature freeze, but I could see arguments for requiring 
notification earlier (default apps need more time) or later (Pidgin's 
already been well tested).

- Andrew

[1]https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/haze/+bug/338891

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Re: about empathy as the default IM application

[Andrew Sayers]

Peteris Krisjanis wrote:
 
 I like this idea. This could be not only limited to Pidgin, but other
 software, like Xchat, for example.
 
 Go ahead, create blueprint for this.
 

With apologies for the delay, please see:

https://blueprints.edge.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+spec/install-programs-from-migration-assistant

Comments and additional applications would be most welcome!

- Andrew

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Re: about empathy as the default IM application

[Andrew Sayers]

Thanks for these links.  Now you remind me, I do remember a flurry of 
activity in August, which I'd put out of my mind when it didn't get any 
traction.

I'll try to listen in during the next UDS, but it looks like there 
aren't many archives kept around for those of us that want to go in and 
see what happened in the past.  Is it worth asking Canonical to archive 
the IRC logs next time, and to convert the streams to OGG format for 
later downloading?

- Andrew

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UDS Remote Participation (Was Re: about empathy as the default IM application)

[Andrew SB]

On Fri, Jun 19, 2009 at 8:00 AM, Andrew
Sayersandrew-ubuntu-de...@pileofstuff.org wrote:
 I'll try to listen in during the next UDS, but it looks like there
 aren't many archives kept around for those of us that want to go in and
 see what happened in the past.  Is it worth asking Canonical to archive
 the IRC logs next time, and to convert the streams to OGG format for
 later downloading?

I also think it would be nice if the audio streams could be archived.
It would make it easier for people out of timezone to keep up on what
goes on. How feasible would this be for future UDSs?

Also, I wonder if there's been any progress with the plenary session
videos for UDS Karmic... The only videos I seem to be able to find are
from karaoke. While they're pretty entertaining, I still hope to watch
some more informative videos. =)

- Andrew Starr-Bochicchio

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Re: about empathy as the default IM application

[Andrew Sayers]

I guess my previous message wasn't clear - I'm not making an argument 
here from personal preference, I'm trying to file a bug in Ubuntu 
itself.  Specifically, that dropping Pidgin will cause a regression in 
the user experience for migraters.

I'm also not arguing that migraters are incapable of learning new 
things, just that they shouldn't be asked to learn a new IM program at 
the same time as they're learning where their start menu went.  I would 
have no problem, for example, with asking updaters whether they wanted 
to switch to Empathy.

This decision was made at UDS with no input from, or output to, the 
wider community.  Brainstorm has never heard of Empathy, and I've never 
seen it get more than luke warm support on this list.  While I agree 
with UDS in general, saying at UDS it was already decided that Empathy 
would ship with Karmic the decision has already been made for us 
goes completely against the grain of open source development.

- Andrew

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Re: about empathy as the default IM application

[Andrew Sayers]

Hi Dan,

About halfway through this reply, a compromise occurred to me: get 
migration-assistant to install Pidgin if it's detected.  If that works, 
it would get rid of many of the issues I've been complaining about, at 
least for migraters that plan to dual boot.  This post covers some 
underlying issues, as well as problems that might still apply to people 
that (e.g.) get Ubuntu with a new PC.

I'll send another reply to discuss the migration-assistant approach, so 
please hold off until then :)

dan wrote:
 I think we're missing some context.  At least I was.  Correct me if I'm 
 wrong, but what you're trying to say is:
 
 When migrating users from Windows to Ubuntu, you start by migrating them 
 to existing cross platform applications, like Pidgin.  If Pidgin is 
 removed as the default IM application, further training will be needed 
 for the new Ubuntu users.

That's almost what I'm saying, but misses a few crucial points:

On your first day in Linux, you're bombarded by new things.  How do I 
copy+paste?  Why doesn't weird hardware issue work?  Where's my C: 
drive?  What's the equivalent of all the programs I forgot about, but 
now realise I use all the time?  And so on.

IM is one of the programs people use on their first day, and it's one of 
the programs that needs to work before you can get help from a friend 
without paying a phone bill.

So my first point is not just that migraters will need extra training, 
but that they will need to work this out on their own, at a time when 
they're completely overloaded, and liable to fall back on old habits. 
Old habits usually means typing the name of a program into Google, 
then clicking the first link they see, or following the first set of 
instructions they can find.  When I've been the friend that migraters 
contact, this has always ended badly.

My second point is that changing in Karmic, rather than (for example) 
making a big fanfare about how we'll change after the next LTS, would be 
unfair on people who have taken the time to plan for this during the 
past year or two.

   ...  I think the 
 difficulty for you is that in Ubuntu we're looking for the best *Ubuntu* 
 experience, not necessarily the best migration experience.  It would be 
 nice if those two interests were 100% aligned, but sadly they are not, 
 in this specific case.

I agree with this, up to a point.  Unless you're planning to forcibly 
uninstall Pidgin when people upgrade, application defaults are only 
relevant to people doing a fresh install.  Migraters are an important 
subset of installers, so their needs should be carefully considered.

As always, this is a balancing act between the desire to create a system 
that people can get into, and the desire to create a system that people 
will like once they have got into it.  I wouldn't complain if the 
argument for Empathy were overwhelming, but all I've heard boils down to:

* it's a bit nicer
* it's a bit better integrated
* it has voice+video support
* it means we can stop dealing with the Pidgin guys
* all the bugs it has will definitely be fixed by release day
* users will file loads of new bugs after release day (!)
* if you don't like it, you can always install Pidgin

Maybe there's a stronger argument and I just haven't heard it, but this 
feels like it's putting the interests of developers ahead of users.  It 
certainly doesn't feel like the sort of urgent issue that's worth 
throwing away months of preparatory work by soon-to-be-migraters.

 Regarding UDS, and the decisions made there, I dont see how those 
 sessions could be any more inclusive.  There is news and blogs and 
 information flowing out of there almost 24x7 for a week.  The session 
 schedules are published.  And there are resources for how you can 
 participate, even if you are not able to attend.  UDS is probably the 
 most democratic, inclusive, open source (to misuse the phrase), 
 developer summit ever.

That's good to hear.  Is there a central point with a list of these 
blogs and news sites?  My experience has been the community going dark 
for a week, so I'd appreciate a bit of light :)

I've not been able to find any discussion of Empathy online before this 
week, and I can't find it in the schedules or the list of discussions. 
Could you point to somewhere that the arguments are laid out?

- Andrew

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Re: about empathy as the default IM application

[Andrew Sayers]

As promised, this reply will concentrate on working around problems 
faced by migraters by patching migration-assistant.  I would be willing 
to put programming time into the ideas suggested here.

As I stated in another post, the best Linux migration strategy involves 
two stages: new apps/same OS, then new OS/same apps.  The migration 
assistant automatically configures a few applications based on your old 
settings, which can be extremely useful to migraters.  I propose we get 
migration-assistant to install (equivalents of) the user's old applications.

Installing the user's old apps would give them a personalised 
experience, and would help document the what's the Linux equivalent of 
application X? issue.  Because the experience would be tailored to the 
specific user, there's no concern about degrading everyone else's 
experience for the sake of some migraters.

This would mean that migraters don't get the standard Ubuntu 
experience out of the box.  But that strikes me as a valid choice for a 
user to make.

Obviously, Pidgin would be an application that should be installed. 
Other applications I've recently seen a need for include Skype, GMail 
notifier, and whatever the current equivalent of xmms is.

As I mentioned in another message, this wouldn't do anything for 
migraters that get Ubuntu with a new PC.  I personally doubt that many 
people move to Linux with no dual booting period in between, but I would 
be willing to look at providing a similar facility by adapting 
migration-assistant to zip up some files under Windows, then unzip them 
under Linux.

- Andrew

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Re: about empathy as the default IM application

[Andrew SB]

On Wed, Jun 17, 2009 at 3:00 PM, Andrew
Sayersandrew-ubuntu-de...@pileofstuff.org wrote:
 I've not been able to find any discussion of Empathy online before this
 week, and I can't find it in the schedules or the list of discussions.
 Could you point to somewhere that the arguments are laid out?

        - Andrew

It can be hard to keep up with all the different news and on-goings,
but this is hardly out of no where. See:

Blue print about this registered on 2008-08-01:
https://blueprints.edge.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+spec/replace-pidgin-with-empathy

In depth usability study done in August 2008:
https://wiki.ubuntu.com/EmpathyVsPidginUsability

Call for testing on this list on Aug 8, 2008:
https://lists.ubuntu.com/archives/ubuntu-devel-discuss/2008-August/005070.html

Just a couple of many forum threads:
http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=885548
http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=1154769

Info on remote UDS participation:
https://wiki.ubuntu.com/UDSKarmic/RemoteParticipation

- Andrew Starr-Bochicchio

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Re: My Suggestions on ISSUE, MOTD, lsb-base-logging.sh

[Andrew Sayers]

I got halfway through a project that would solve broadly the same 
problems as your /etc/issue proposal. It faltered when Launchpad kept 
attaching the blueprint to Drupal and the merge proposal didn't go anywhere.

The would-be blueprint is still available[1], the bug in Launchpad has 
been fixed[2], and the merge proposal is still awaiting review[3].  If 
anyone can suggest a plan to get the merge looked at, the rest should 
only be a few days of work.

- Andrew

[1]https://wiki.ubuntu.com/BlueScreenOfLife
[2]https://bugs.launchpad.net/blueprint/+bug/320889
[3]https://code.launchpad.net/~andrew-bugs-launchpad-net/friendly-recovery/ubuntu/+merge/3642

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Re: shameful censoring of mono opposition

[Andrew Sayers]

Hi Mark,

I think I understand now why you and the list have been butting heads so 
much.  I'd like to present my theory, then explain how you can be more 
productive in advocating to developers.

At a Fortune 500 company, I would expect that advocacy is very political 
- it's important to create (the perception of) a group of winners that 
do what you want, and a group of losers that don't.  Competition, and 
fear of losing out, are very strong incentives for people in those 
organisations - if they didn't want to win, they wouldn't be in the 
Fortune 500.

Among open source developers, advocacy needs to be much more logical - 
it's important to explain how doing what you want achieves the 
developer's goals.  Scratching an itch is widely recognised as the 
most common incentive for open source developers, and any talk that 
doesn't help them scratch their personal itch isn't productive.

Telling open source developers that they should want to scratch a 
different itch won't work.  It's like telling people they should be 
attracted to a different gender, or should have a different taste in 
music - you don't get to choose what your interests are.

Talking about winning and losing also won't work.  Open source is 
just coming out of a stage where you had to join the losing team in 
order to get in.  In a few years, you might start to see developers 
appear that wanted to join the winning team, but right now anyone that's 
been around long enough to be really effective is for OSS whether it 
wins or loses.

Finally, creating rifts between groups won't work.  Development is about 
sharing a bad idea around until it becomes good, so people that like to 
blacklist those with bad ideas generally don't become developers.

Put simply, Fortune 500 advocacy is like Fortune 500 business - 
confident, aggressive, and victorious.  OSS developer advocacy is like 
OSS development - methodical, inclusive, and accurate.

I discussed a specific model elsewhere[1] that could be used for 
advocacy.  It boils down to stating your premise, explaining your 
reasoning, then arriving at a conclusion.  I recommend you try it out, 
as it will work much better around here.

- Andrew

[1]https://lists.ubuntu.com/archives/ubuntu-devel-discuss/2009-June/008533.html

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Re: shameful censoring of mono opposition

[Andrew SB]

On Tue, Jun 9, 2009 at 7:58 PM, David
Schlesingerdavid.schlesin...@access-company.com wrote:
 Mark Fink continues to scribble:

 luckily only stupid people who can't think for themselves fawn over
 MONO...some of the forum moderators are novell employees (or people
 who drink they're koolaid)...

 Wasn't it you who was complaining not long ago about personal attacks...?
 I'll refrain from pointing out the general illiteracy of your message, but
 it's doubtless apparent to anyone for whom English isn't a second language
 as well as many for whom it is.


I can't believe that I got drawn into this, but here's my two cents.

This thread has been about personal attacks from the beginning. In the
same breath as talking about supposed censorship the OP was also
calling for banning a volunteer Ubuntu developer who simply works on
mono-related packaging. (Since there's been a lot of lip service about
some sort of wider respect from the Linux community, I think it's
worth mentioning that said developer's collaboration with Debian is a
great model for gaining respect.) He was also calling for the firing
of a Canonical employee for simply having written a program in C#
before being hired by Canonical, where as far as I can tell he isn't
involved in any work around mono at all. Nearly every message from the
OP has accused that Novell or Microsoft employees are some how
infiltrating Ubuntu with out any evidence at all. While there might be
merits in discussing the inclusion of mono in a default Ubuntu install
or issues about forum moderation, neither has been the OP's real
purpose. All he has done from the beginning is make slanderous claims
that verge on paranoid delusions. If anyone who hadn't made up their
mind on this issue has read this thread, I can't imagine they would
come away with a positive view of the anti-mono viewpoint. The OP has
done his cause a great disservice.

Don't bother directly replying to me. I've wasted all together too
much time that I could have used to do something productive for Ubuntu
by reading this tripe

- Andrew Starr-Bochicchio
  Ubuntu Developer

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Re: shameful censoring of mono opposition

[Andrew Sayers]

Christopher Chan wrote:
 These are about 'standards'. Can there really be a technical argument 
 between using say the metric system versus the foot/yard or the ounce/pound?

Yes:

1) state your technical requirements
2) state the relevant properties of each standard
3) argue about which properties best match which requirements
4) profit

For example:

1) I want a system of measurements that:

* minimises the amount of learning necessary in schools
* is controlled by an international body which represents my interests
* allows easy comparisons between different quantities

2)

Imperial units:
* Older people know Imperial, they can spend the time to teach kids
* Kids who have learnt from (grand)parents needn't learn in school
* Imperial uses multiple words per unit (inch, foot, yard)
* Imperial is controlled by the British government
* Imperial is widely use in places that won't go away (e.g. roads)
* Older people will never know anything but imperial
* You can't make comparisons unless you know what the quantities mean

Metric units:
* Metric only requires knowledge of base 10, except to count time
* Kids already need to learn base 10, and to count time
* Metric uses a single word per unit (metre, litre)
* Metric is controlled by SI
* Because it uses base 10, metric is very easy to compare

3) If we started over from scratch, the benefits of imperial would be 
moot.  But we're not, so moving away from imperial would cause 50+ years 
of difficulty comparing quantities.  But if the move to metric is 
successfully completed, we'll have hundreds or thousands of years of upside.

4) Being an optimist about how much time we've got on this planet, I 
vote metric.  Intelligent people may disagree, especially if they have 
different requirements.  I respect those that disagree, and accept that 
the requirements I've laid out do not necessarily reflect the 
requirements of the Ubuntu project.



Contentious issues can be argued civilly, you just need to be a bit 
careful about it.  When discussing topics that can get religious, please 
consider a premise-reasoning-conclusion model like the above.

 - Andrew

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Re: Ubuntu Desktop Unit Consistency (LP: #369525)

[Andrew Sayers]

Mike Jones wrote:
 This discussion has gone on long enough that I'm no longer able to tell 
 what we are discussing.

Neal posted a GNOME bug report 
(http://bugzilla.gnome.org/show_bug.cgi?id=554172) which I think sums up 
the issues really well.

I agree with Evan that there are two issues:

a) What should be expressed as powers of 2 vs. powers of 10?
b) What names should we use for powers of 2 and 10?

As to (a):

There are a few places where there is a strong technical reason to 
prefer powers of 2.  For example, memory is designed in such a way that 
you will always have a round number of bytes in base 2, but never in 
base 10.  Everywhere else, there are strong arguments on both sides, 
including for instance:

* 30 years of precedent for base 2 in the computing community
* 300 years of precedent for base 10 in the scientific community
* Interoperatibility with other systems (e.g. Windows)
* Compliance to relevant standards (e.g. POSIX)

So far as I can tell, everyone has made up their mind about which of 
these issues outweigh which other issues.  Further debate is likely to 
produce lots of heat and little light.

As to (b):

I think the issue can be summarised like this:

As developers of the English language, we get words from the dictionary 
(our upstream provider), and hand them on to users (our downstream 
receiver).

We have agreement that the words are defined upstream as 
kilo=1000/kibi=1024, but do not have agreement on whether a valid bug 
report has been filed by downstream.

This is a serious issue because the English language has a long and 
proud tradition of being modified solely through patches working their 
way upstream.  Some people believe that any attempt to impose words from 
the top is an inappropriate attempt to grab power, which should be 
resisted on principle.  Some people believe this is an especially 
egregious example because the computing community was hardly consulted 
at all, and strongly objected where it was consulted.

My personal opinions:

My understanding is that GNOME shies away from configuration options 
where possible, whereas KDE quite likes them.  As such, I doubt that 
GNOME developers would be willing to make this configurable.  Even if 
they did, you still have to discuss which option is the default.

As I mentioned elsewhere[1], not all standards are equal.  It's 
important that we consider standards seriously, but that doesn't mean 
automatic adoption.

As far as I'm concerned, the most important thing is that the UI uses 
words consistently.  A close second-most important thing is that the UI 
uses words that users can understand and mentally manipulate.

I have no strong opinion right now about whether giga should mean 10^9 
or 2^30, but I do have a strong opinion that ordinary users can't define 
the word at all.

IMHO, the only words that are widely recognised by ordinary users are 
million, billion etc.  As Scott mentioned, the definitions for these 
words vary[2], but I believe this can be managed with localisations.

Since ordinary users don't have any words for large powers of 2, I would 
expect them to have difficulty thinking in base 2 no matter what words 
are used.  Here's a thought experiment: in base 6, try calculating 4 + 
4.  Even if you understand perfectly what I mean, I bet you have to use 
your fingers :)

- Andrew

[1]https://lists.ubuntu.com/archives/ubuntu-devel-discuss/2009-June/008376.html
[2]http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Long_and_short_scales

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Re: On apturls and repositories

[Andrew Sayers]

Assessment of PPAs sounds to me like peer review.  That would be a big 
job to implement, but IMHO benefits would go far beyond a web of trust. 
  Of course, I'm not volunteering to do it :)

- Andrew

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Re: Ubuntu Desktop Unit Consistency (LP: #369525)

[Andrew Sayers]

Scott James Remnant wrote:
 On Tue, 2009-06-02 at 08:57 +0200, Martin Pitt wrote:
 
 Max Bowsher [2009-06-01 23:41 +0100]:
 To my mind, the power-of-2 grouping is sufficiently intrinsic to the
 nature of bytes, whilst the kibi mebi gibi tebi stuff not only sounds
 and looks stupid, but loses a great deal of clarity by making all of the
 prefixes differ only in a single syllable.
 As far as I can see, the predominant opinion seems to be to fix 701.2
 MB to be 735.2 MB, not 701.2 MiB.

 Agree.
 
 That way we show a correct figure, and nobody needs learn a new unit.
 
 It also happens to match the standard for storage and bandwidth, and is
 what other operating systems are also tending to use (thus it's more
 likely this is what packaging will use).
 
 Scott
 

This is perhaps a bit heretical, but how about correcting 701.2 MB to 
735.2 million bytes?  As well as the heat produced by the MB/MiB 
debate in the computer community, laypeople only seem to understand 
mega and giga by mapping them to million and billion.

Using the longer term meets Scott's criteria, makes Ubuntu more 
accessible, and saves us all a bunch of time explaining what a terabyte 
is when our parents start getting them.  Even in a small dialogue box, a 
size of 735.2 mln doesn't take many more pixels.

- Andrew



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Re: Ubuntu Desktop Unit Consistency (LP: #369525)

[Andrew Sayers]

snip - using million and mln rather than mega and MB)

Scott James Remnant wrote:
 ... this is yet another strange postfix or unit that users would
 have to learn.
 
 735.2 MB is not confusing if it means ~735,200,000 bytes.

That's a good point for the short form, so long as the UI spells out 
elsewhere what MB means.

How about using million bytes by default, and MB where there's a 
significant pixel constraint?  That explains things to the user of 
average curiosity, and doesn't require any terminology they haven't used 
before.

- Andrew

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Re: Ubuntu Desktop Unit Consistency (LP: #369525)

[Andrew Sayers]

Scott James Remnant wrote:
 What would you use for the thousand million bytes case? :)
 
 HINT: the meaning of billion differs between thousand million and
 million million depending on your location.
 
 Most people in the metric-speaking world know what Kilo means, and have
 proved themselves able to learn Mega, Giga, etc.

Billion increasingly means 10^9 - Wikipedia claims[1] that the long 
scale is mostly used in non-English-speaking regions, so it's safe to 
use billion unless the localisation in use says otherwise (at which 
point, locale-specific words are needed anyway).

I agree that people can learn what mega and giga mean, so long as you 
give them the opportunity to learn.  Using million bytes 
interchangeably with MB gives significantly more people that opportunity.

Mega is also a problem because accessibility isn't just about the 
ability to understand something, it's about the amount of mental effort 
required.  Grab a non-technical friend or family member and ask them how 
many million in a billion, then how many kilobytes in a megabyte. 
You'll find they have to think longer and harder to answer the second 
question, if they can do it at all.  I'm not clear what extra value 
mega provides that's worth so many wasted cycles.

- Andrew

[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Long_and_short_scales

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Re: Ubuntu Desktop Unit Consistency (LP: #369525)

[Andrew Sayers]

That grab a friend experiment is one of those posts where my inner 
science geek betrays me.  I chose kilo and mega instead of mega 
and giga so that I would be less likely to skew the experiment by 
asking the same exact question twice in a row with different phrasing. 
A more robust methodology would allow for valid comparison between 
million and mega... I don't suppose you know any identical twins 
with a penchant for answering simple maths questions? ;)

When I asked my father, he understood that a kilobyte was less than a 
megabyte, which was less than a gigabyte.  But he had no idea how much 
less - he would have believed me if I said a gigabyte was 10 or 10,000 
megabytes.

I actually like your MP3 player example by the way - if I told my dad 
that his MP3 player had a capacity of 4 billion bytes, and an average 
MP3 was 4 million bytes, he'd be able to do exactly the calculation you 
described.  With MB and GB, he'll need a pencil and paper no matter how 
many times I explain it.

- Andrew

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Re: Support data gathering tool

[Andrew SB]

2009/5/31 Przemysław Kulczycki przemekkulczy...@gmail.com:
 Ubuntu needs a data gathering tool for user support and bug reporting.
 Currently when filing bug reports users have to manually run lots of
 commands (dmesg, lspci, lsusb, lsmod, alsa-something...) for
 troubleshooting their issues.

 Ubuntu should have a tool to gather all necessary system logs for
 reporting bugs and asking for support on answers.launchpad.net.

 I work for Sun and I find their Explorer tool very handy.
 It collects many system logs and outputs of system commands to show the
 system configuration and issues to the support team. It also has some
 options to skip some logs when the customer feels if it will violate his
 privacy.
 Red Hat has something similar, though not as developed as Explorer.
 Their sos (son of sysreport) tool is GPLed and could be tweaked to run
 on Debian/Ubuntu.

 Suse used to have Siga, now they have supportconfig, but I'm not
 familiar with it.

 There is also an independent distro-agnostic tool called Linux Explorer
 but it may be a bit outdated now.

 Having an explorer-like tool in Ubuntu would benefit both desktop and
 server users.
 Bugreporting would be much easier. You would only have to run one
 command, maybe with some options, to provide all the data needed for the
 bug troubleshooters.
 Example options could be:
 toolname -audio
 toolname -usb
 toolname -kernel
 toolname -all
 toolname -xorg
 toolname -network

 Appropriate options would be used for relevant problem types (ie. -audio
 for sound problems).

 Links:
 Red Hat: sosreport, earlier: sysreport
 https://hosted.fedoraproject.org/sos/
 Suse: supportconfig, earlier: Siga
 http://en.opensuse.org/Supportutils
 Sun/Solaris: Explorer
 http://sunsolve.sun.com/explorer
 Independently developed Explorer-clone for Linux:
 http://www.unix-consultants.co.uk/examples/scripts/linux/linux-explorer/

 Check out the Explorer page and its documentation to see how it's useful.
 http://sunsolve.sun.com/search/document.do?assetkey=1-9-82329-1
 --
 ## Przemysław Kulczycki  Azrael Nightwalker ##
 # jabber: azrael[na]jabster.pl | tlen: azrael29a #
 ### www: http://reksio.ftj.agh.edu.pl/~azrael/ ###

Ubuntu already uses a tool called Apport along with the command-line
tool ubuntu-bug. [1] How do these tools differ?

Apport already has the ability to be extended through the use of
per-package hooks. [2] Most relevant information that should be
provided with a bug report for a specific package can be retrieved
using them.

Maybe we should have some sort of wizard for when a user attempts to
use apport and they don't know the package. E.g. If they know the
problem is in the audio stack but not exactly where. There's still a
lot of relevant information that apport could collect.

I think the real issue is: how do we better encourage users to use the
tools that already exist?

[1] https://wiki.ubuntu.com/Apport
[2] /usr/share/doc/apport/package-hooks.

- Andrew Starr-Bochicchio
Ubuntu Developer

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Re: Current situation of amarok, and of latex tools

[Andrew Sayers]

Jan Claeys wrote:
 A lot of people run unstable during alpha  beta, but many do it in a VM
 or on an old spare system.  That doesn't help find regressions that are
 hardware-related, of course, and in general those systems might not see
 the same sort of use that people's main computers see.
 
 And to be honest, I don't see how we can make more people use alpha
 versions on their I need this for work system...

Recycling my chroot idea from before, how about encouraging people to 
install Alpha versions in a chroot?  You could use localfs to graft your 
real /home in if you wanted.  A bit of grub trickery would even let you 
boot right into the chroot, with the alpha kernel, when you had enough 
free time to give it a go.

- Andrew

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Put other releases in a chroot (was Re: Current situation of amarok, and of latex tools)

[Andrew Sayers]

Regressions occur in Ubuntu releases.  As mentioned elsewhere, this is 
to be expected, and may be for the best.  But if you've spent 6 months 
getting Intrepid just how you like it, starting over again with Jaunty 
can be a pain.

So how about we offer the user the opportunity to `cp -l /bin /etc /usr 
/lib* /sbin /usr /var /chroots/jaunty` when they upgrade to Karmic? 
Then with a bit of shell trickery, they can run their old version of 
amarok just by running jaunty amarok.  It wouldn't take up that much 
space on a modern hard drive, especially using hard links, and would 
solve a lot of these headaches.

Similarly, how about we offer the user the opportunity to `debootstrap 
jaunty /chroots/intrepid --include=ubuntu-desktop` if they install 
Karmic from scratch?  That gives new users similar access to Jaunty.

Finally, how about upgrading debootstrap in Jaunty when Karmic is 
released, so that people can install it in a chroot, and try before they 
buy?

- Andrew

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Re: Current situation of amarok, and of latex tools

[Andrew]

On Thu, May 14, 2009 at 7:55 AM, John McCabe-Dansted gma...@gmail.com wrote:
 AFAICT Amarok didn't just have a couple of annoying bugs, it was never
 really ready for widespread use. According to Jeff Mitchel We've
 maintained that until 2.1, most users should stick with 1.4.
 Unfortunately, just as Intrepid shipped with the
 it's-not-meant-to-be-a-user-release KDE 4.1, Jaunty shipped with
 Amarok 2.0.


I don't use Amarok and only pop into KDE every once and awhile in
order to track how it's shaping up, but I found this assertion a bit
strange due to all the hype I heard around Amarok2. I thought maybe
it's because I mainly read developer blogs that were targeted at other
developers. So I went and checked out Amarok's homepage [1], and see
no mention of the Amarok 1.X series on the front page. Their download
pages are no different. The Kubuntu [2] page offers Stable version:
Amarok 2.0.x and Development version: Amarok 2.1 The same is true
of the source download page. [3]

If its developers really think that users should stick with 1.4 they
aren't doing a good job promoting that.

[1] http://amarok.kde.org/
[2] http://amarok.kde.org/wiki/Download:Kubuntu
[3] http://amarok.kde.org/wiki/Download:Source

- Andrew Starr-Bochicchio

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Re: Need advice on versioning scheme for project in Ubuntu

[Andrew]

On Fri, May 8, 2009 at 3:42 PM, Francesco Fumanti
francesco.fuma...@gmx.net wrote:
 Hello,


 Could anybody please give me any advice about how to handle the
 versioning of a project hosted on launchpad with the aim to match the
 Ubuntu release schedule?

 The help pages of launchpad suggest to keep the front of developing in
 trunk. On the other hand, I suppose that it is advisable to have a
 series for each Ubuntu release (hardy, jaunty, karmic,...) for potential
 bug fixes after the ubuntu release has gone final.

[snip]

 Could anybody please tell me or point me to instructions about how this
 problem is usually approached?

There's many ways to go about it. The suggestion on LP is just that, a
suggestion. Feel free to use what ever system works best for you. That
said, a common way to work is to do development in trunk. Once you are
getting ready to release, you can branch the release series from
trunk. Then you make no more major changes or additional features on
that branch. You can release stable point releases from that branch,
cherry-picking only bug fixes from trunk.

- Andrew

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Re: Applet drivemount improvement

[Andrew]

On Tue, May 5, 2009 at 1:06 PM, Martin Bammer mr...@gmx.at wrote:
 Hi,

 I've extended the applet drivemount with a simple but useful feature.
 With the patch it shows activity in the drive icon by switching between
 different icons. Additionally it shows the current transfer rates and
 the total read and written bytes in the tooltip.

[snip]

 Would be great to see this patch in one of the next releases.

 Cheers, Martin

Hi,

I haven't reviewed the patch, but it sounds like it adds quite a bit.
You should submit it directly upstream to GNOME for review.

File a bug against the drivemount component of gnome-applets:

http://bugzilla.gnome.org/enter_bug.cgi?product=gnome-applets

You might have to rebase your patch against the current development
branch. You can browse the source here:

http://git.gnome.org/cgit/gnome-applets/tree/drivemount

Thanks for you efforts.

- Andrew Starr-Bochicchio
Ubuntu Contributing Developer

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Re: gnome-colors icons for karmic koala

[Andrew]

On Mon, May 4, 2009 at 10:29 AM, solaris manzur sl.sola...@gmail.com wrote:
 http://code.google.com/p/gnome-colors/

 please this icon pack is extraordinary


Needs-Packaging Bug: https://bugs.edge.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+bug/261988
Debian ITP: http://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/bugreport.cgi?bug=520681
Packaging Branch:
https://code.edge.launchpad.net/~gnome-colors-packagers/gnome-colors-pkg/debian
Debian Mentors:
http://mentors.debian.net/cgi-bin/sponsor-pkglist?action=details;package=gnome-colors

(Any DD's on the list willing to sponsor an upload ;-) )

- Andrew Starr-Bochicchio

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Re: background collection is horrible

[Andrew]

On Mon, May 4, 2009 at 11:03 AM, Oliver Grawert o...@ubuntu.com wrote:
 hi,
 Am Montag, den 04.05.2009, 16:58 +0200 schrieb Oliver Grawert:
 hi,
 Am Montag, den 04.05.2009, 09:48 -0500 schrieb solaris manzur:
  /usr/share/backgrounds/space-01.jpg to space-05.jpg collection is
  horrible, old and low resolution wallpapers, no one uses them, so
  please replace or remove them, in http://www.deviantart.com we could
  find some high resolution wallpapers.
 ...

 oh, and i replied to fast, i didnt notice where i replied to actually,
 that should surely better go to:
 https://lists.ubuntu.com/mailman/listinfo/ubuntu-art

 (as well as your icon request in the other thread)

Is it really the correct place to discuss removing a package from the
default install?

From the ubuntu-art's wiki page:

The goal of the Artwork Team is to produce artwork for the
community side of Ubuntu.

The Artwork Team aims to enrich Ubuntu by designing high quality,
original and beautiful themes to be available in the repo as an
*alternative* to the default look.  [1]

It might be a good place to organize an effort for a
community-wallpapers package (there was one in edgy), but that team
has no say in any of the default artwork included with Ubuntu. Efforts
from ubuntu-artwork's community-themes package were promote to main in
the form of the gnome-themes-ubuntu package and wallpapers created and
shared by people on the list have sometimes been chosen to be the
default wallpaper, but the decisions were never discussed on that
list. They were made unilaterally by Canonical.

Sending people there to complain about the default artwork or about
other packages included in the default install is at best futile and
at worst disruptive to the work going on there.

- Andrew Starr-Bochicchio

[1] https://wiki.ubuntu.com/Artwork/

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Re: Looking at Package Management for Karmic or Karmic+1

[Andrew Barbaccia]

 Now that the Updates Available window opens by itself, it may help for
 it to contain a checkbox for installing future updates by default.


+1.

I would say keep the current update workflow but add a line about click
here to automatically update in the future.
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Re: Argyll sync from Debian

[Andrew]

On Mon, Apr 6, 2009 at 7:17 AM, Patrice Vetsel ubu...@kagou.fr wrote:
 -BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-
 Hash: SHA1

 I don't know where to ask for. I'm hoping thta a motu will take this wish.
 Is it possible (or is it too late) to have argyll package in ubuntu
 mirrors ?

 This package is new under Debian, and it's a very great and usefull tool !
 http://packages.debian.org/sid/argyll



Hi Patrice,

Unfortunately, at this point in the release cycle it is too late to
include new packages. It's well past Feature Freeze. The good news is
that once the archives for Jaunty+1 (aka Karmic) open, it will be
synced automatically to Ubuntu. At that point you might want to
request a backport to Jaunty. Please see:

https://help.ubuntu.com/community/UbuntuBackports#How%20to%20request%20new%20packages

Thanks,

- Andrew Starr-Bochicchio
Ubuntu Contributing Developer

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Re: Ubuntu-devel-discuss Digest, Vol 29, Issue 10

[Andrew]

On Sun, Apr 5, 2009 at 7:52 PM, solaris manzur sl.sola...@gmail.com wrote:
 i want to see tooltips when hovering files with the mouse, in nautilus,
 pleasee!!


This is known upstream. You can follow the progress here:

http://bugzilla.gnome.org/show_bug.cgi?id=147642

But please don't spam the upstream bug like you have done on the
launchpad bug and now are doing on this mailing list. Comments like
this are useless.

If you feel the need to comment, provide constructive ideas and
feedback, not one line demands. Those won't get you anywhere.

Thanks,

- Andrew

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Re: lxde and nm-applet situation is worse: Jaunty python upgrade prevents pygtk apps from working

[Andrew]

On Sat, Mar 28, 2009 at 6:27 PM, Derek Broughton de...@pointerstop.ca wrote:
 Paulo Silva wrote:

 Well, i'm not yet using Jaunty (still on Interpid) - and i got an
 annoying situation having both LXDE and Gnome installed - a dependence
 named lxnm, not only it's not working, as well it removes by conflict
 nm-applet (network-manager-gnome package), and if we insist
 reinstalling LXDE, we take the risk on being completelly offline (if
 we only have wireless access), like happened to me.

 I think it were a MOTU 'disaster' on marking lxnm package as
 conflicting with network-manager-gnome

 I commented it at the LXDE mailing list, and they didn't like it at all as
 well

 I hope this situation can be fixed soon - and helping people who want
 to use LXDE working with nm-applet (network-manager-gnome package), or
 having the freedom of choice - even from a larger wireless managers
 diversity (which may help us to know which ones are the very better)

 I'm not really sure what your issue is here, but there are a few things that
 come to mind.

 1) there should be a meta-package for network connections, which things like
 network-manager should provide

 2) LXDE is the real problem here - if it wants to run on Ubuntu, it really
 needs to work with network-manager, because that's our default network
 manager (???).   If it can, then it can provide a dependency on lxnm |
 network-manager (surely not network-manager-gnome).  I'd be really,
 really, surprised if this can't be fixed merely by providing those
 alternate dependencies on the package and no other change.

 3) I'm not sure network-manager really needs to be so exclusive, but there
 must be _some_ network control applications that can't be installed,
 because surely only one application can be managing any given connection.
 --
 derek



As to this being a  MOTU disaster, lxnm is synced directly from
Debian with no Ubuntu changes. You might want to file a bug in Debian
or contact the Debian maintainer. The same Debian maintainer seems to
maintain the whole LXDE stack, and undoubtedly knows this package
better than us. He very well might have a good reason for the
Conflicts on network-manager.

See:

http://packages.qa.debian.org/l/lxnm.html

- Andrew Starr-Bochicchio
Ubuntu Contributing Developer

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Re: Remove app via apt-get from menu

[Andrew Barbaccia]

 Anyway, what if the user wants to remove the Freecel game, but want to
 keep the others? That's almost impossible, cause they belong to a single
 package.


Possibly the immediate fix is to allow users to simply remove the item from
the menu and not remove the package from the system?
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VPN package installer UI (old nework offline icon)

[Andrew Barbaccia]

Going OT, would any one go For or Against having NM vpn option auto
 launching some kind of VPN friendly UI to get the NM-pptp/openvpn/cvpn like
 we do for codecs?


Changed the subject to something more appropriate...

This was misleading to me as well (as I just setup a VPN last night for a
colleague for the 1st time). I had to use the web to determine what the next
steps were. I agree something should popup with package-install suggestions
like the codec window.

-
Andrew
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Re: Remove app via apt-get from menu

[Andrew Barbaccia]

I agree. Two places to accomplish the same thing seems confusing.


On Thu, Mar 19, 2009 at 2:48 PM, Jonh Wendell wend...@ubuntu.com wrote:

 Em Qui, 2009-03-19 às 19:41 +0100, Vincenzo Ciancia escreveu:
  On 19/03/2009 Joao Pinto wrote:
  
   +1
  
   Mosf of the times we realize the bunch of applications that we no
   longer use/need when we search on the menu.
 
  I think linuxmint already has this so it's just a matter of shameless
  free-software-blessed copying?
 
  Vincenzo

 Why can't the user go to add/remove programs to uninstall them if [s]he
 went there to install in the first place?
 --
 Jonh Wendell
 http://www.bani.com.br


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Re: Remove app via apt-get from menu

[Andrew Barbaccia]

 *When I load up the Application menu, I want to run a particular
 application*. I'm trying to get things done. Interrupting that process to
 search for a package in a package manager, gets nothing accomplished. But if
 I could right click and deal with 90% of the process *from the menu*, my
 system would undoubtedly be less cluttered and I'd be happier.


Very fair points.

We should consider prompting a dialogue asking to remove only the menu item
or the application/package from the system.

We also have to consider what happens if we remove something like
gnome-terminal which in case will remove gnome-desktop and then cause
things to not get updated in the future...

-a
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