Re: Orphaned packages with very low popcon numbers
Hi Nathanael! You wrote: > "Very low" is defined as less than 20 installations. Votes are noted only for > packages which aren't "no files". > With 13184 installations reporting to popcon, 20 installations represents > less than one installation in 500. > I think all of these are candidates for removal. I haven't checked whether > any of > them are ITAed at this point though. > > Would it be considered OK to go through and start filing removal requests for > those which > (a) aren't ITAed, and > (b) have been orphaned for more than, say, three months > (c) don't have some special reason why popcon would be unrepresentative > (d) don't have any other special reasons to stay in Debian Well, as long as there are no RC bugs, and the packages are in testing, I really see no need to remove them. Even if only a few people use the package, why annoy them by removing it from Debian? -- Kind regards, ++ | Bas Zoetekouw | GPG key: 0644fab7 | || Fingerprint: c1f5 f24c d514 3fec 8bf6 | | [EMAIL PROTECTED], [EMAIL PROTECTED] | a2b1 2bae e41f 0644 fab7 | ++ -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of "unsubscribe". Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: Orphaned packages with very low popcon numbers
Bas Zoetekouw wrote: > Hi Nathanael! > > You wrote: > >> "Very low" is defined as less than 20 installations. Votes are noted only >> for >> packages which aren't "no files". >> With 13184 installations reporting to popcon, 20 installations represents >> less than one installation in 500. >> I think all of these are candidates for removal. I haven't checked whether >> any of >> them are ITAed at this point though. >> >> Would it be considered OK to go through and start filing removal requests >> for those which >> (a) aren't ITAed, and >> (b) have been orphaned for more than, say, three months >> (c) don't have some special reason why popcon would be unrepresentative >> (d) don't have any other special reasons to stay in Debian > > Well, as long as there are no RC bugs, and the packages are in testing, > I really see no need to remove them. Even if only a few people use the > package, why annoy them by removing it from Debian? How can we be sure the packages are of decent quality if almost noone uses them? How can we be sure there are (almost) no unreported RC bugs for instance? Cheers Luk -- Luk Claes - http://people.debian.org/~luk - GPG key 1024D/9B7C328D Fingerprint: D5AF 25FB 316B 53BB 08E7 F999 E544 DE07 9B7C 328D signature.asc Description: OpenPGP digital signature
Re: Orphaned packages with very low popcon numbers
This one time, at band camp, Luk Claes wrote: >How can we be sure the packages are of decent quality if almost noone >uses them? How can we be sure there are (almost) no unreported RC bugs >for instance? If a tree falls in a forest, and no-one is there to hear it, does it make a sound? How can you be sure there are no unreported RC bugs in the popular packages? In other words, if almost no-one uses them, does it matter if the packages are of decent quality? Also, if almost no-one uses them, how do you know they're of bad quality? I think you should be looking for some additional metrics for package removal, such as age, date of last upload, for example, in addition to size of install base, before deciding that a package is stale. (Because IMHO, if a package has no bugs filed against it, you can't honestly say you want to file for removal because it's potentially buggy.) -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of "unsubscribe". Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: Orphaned packages with very low popcon numbers
Jamie Wilkinson wrote: > This one time, at band camp, Luk Claes wrote: >> How can we be sure the packages are of decent quality if almost noone >> uses them? How can we be sure there are (almost) no unreported RC bugs >> for instance? > > If a tree falls in a forest, and no-one is there to hear it, does it make a > sound? > > How can you be sure there are no unreported RC bugs in the popular packages? It's all about the likelihood... > In other words, if almost no-one uses them, does it matter if the packages > are of decent quality? Also, if almost no-one uses them, how do you know > they're of bad quality? It does matter if they are of decent quality as we need to support them (mirrors, infrastructure, security support etc.). I don't say they are of bad quality, don't turn my words... > I think you should be looking for some additional metrics for package > removal, such as age, date of last upload, for example, in addition to size > of install base, before deciding that a package is stale. (Because IMHO, if > a package has no bugs filed against it, you can't honestly say you want to > file for removal because it's potentially buggy.) Note that besides not being used by many people, the packages are orphaned and will be tested to the points: >>> (a) aren't ITAed, and >>> (b) have been orphaned for more than, say, three months >>> (c) don't have some special reason why popcon would be unrepresentative >>> (d) don't have any other special reasons to stay in Debian Cheers Luk -- Luk Claes - http://people.debian.org/~luk - GPG key 1024D/9B7C328D Fingerprint: D5AF 25FB 316B 53BB 08E7 F999 E544 DE07 9B7C 328D signature.asc Description: OpenPGP digital signature
Re: Orphaned packages with very low popcon numbers
Hi Luk! You wrote: > > In other words, if almost no-one uses them, does it matter if the packages > > are of decent quality? Also, if almost no-one uses them, how do you know > > they're of bad quality? > > It does matter if they are of decent quality as we need to support them > (mirrors, infrastructure, security support etc.). I don't say they are > of bad quality, don't turn my words... ATM, the support costs of removing the packages are much bigger than just letting them sit in the archive. > > I think you should be looking for some additional metrics for package > > removal, such as age, date of last upload, for example, in addition to size > > of install base, before deciding that a package is stale. (Because IMHO, if > > a package has no bugs filed against it, you can't honestly say you want to > > file for removal because it's potentially buggy.) > > Note that besides not being used by many people, the packages are > orphaned and will be tested to the points: > > >>> (a) aren't ITAed, and > >>> (b) have been orphaned for more than, say, three months > >>> (c) don't have some special reason why popcon would be unrepresentative > >>> (d) don't have any other special reasons to stay in Debian Well, I could agree with removing packages if, in addition to the cited citeria: (i) there are RC or important bugs (or many normal bugs) or (iia) there are very few users (in the bottom 1% of popcon number or so, not sure how much votes that would translate to, 20 sounds a bit high IMO), and (iib) there are replacement packages in the archive that deliver similar functionality. In other cases, IMO, it's a lot of work to check and remove the packages (both for the QA and the FTP teams), without any real gain for the project. -- Kind regards, ++ | Bas Zoetekouw | GPG key: 0644fab7 | || Fingerprint: c1f5 f24c d514 3fec 8bf6 | | [EMAIL PROTECTED], [EMAIL PROTECTED] | a2b1 2bae e41f 0644 fab7 | ++ -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of "unsubscribe". Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: Orphaned packages with very low popcon numbers
Bas Zoetekouw wrote: > Well, as long as there are no RC bugs, and the packages are in testing, > I really see no need to remove them. Even if only a few people use the > package, why annoy them by removing it from Debian? I'd prefer Debian releases to consist of properly supported packages as much as possible. It's not as if we want to forcibly delete the packages from our user's machines, we'd just acknowledge that they aren't maintained anymore. Kind regards T. -- Thomas Viehmann, http://thomas.viehmann.net/ -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of "unsubscribe". Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: Orphaned packages with very low popcon numbers
Bas Zoetekouw wrote: > Hi Luk! Hi Bas > You wrote: > >>> In other words, if almost no-one uses them, does it matter if the packages >>> are of decent quality? Also, if almost no-one uses them, how do you know >>> they're of bad quality? >> It does matter if they are of decent quality as we need to support them >> (mirrors, infrastructure, security support etc.). I don't say they are >> of bad quality, don't turn my words... > > ATM, the support costs of removing the packages are much bigger than > just letting them sit in the archive. > >>> I think you should be looking for some additional metrics for package >>> removal, such as age, date of last upload, for example, in addition to size >>> of install base, before deciding that a package is stale. (Because IMHO, if >>> a package has no bugs filed against it, you can't honestly say you want to >>> file for removal because it's potentially buggy.) >> Note that besides not being used by many people, the packages are >> orphaned and will be tested to the points: >> > (a) aren't ITAed, and > (b) have been orphaned for more than, say, three months > (c) don't have some special reason why popcon would be unrepresentative > (d) don't have any other special reasons to stay in Debian > > Well, I could agree with removing packages if, in addition to the cited > citeria: > > (i) there are RC or important bugs (or many normal bugs) > > or > > (iia) there are very few users (in the bottom 1% of popcon number or >so, not sure how much votes that would translate to, 20 sounds a >bit high IMO), and It's not about votes, but about installations, votes should be less or equal than the amount of installations... 20 is less than 1 in 500, so that is also less than 1% in my world... > (iib) there are replacement packages in the archive that deliver >similar functionality. This could be looked at, though I don't know if it's worth the trouble for almost unused packages. Though I'm sure ftp-master would decide on that if we would ask for removal... > In other cases, IMO, it's a lot of work to check and remove the > packages (both for the QA and the FTP teams), without any real gain for > the project. I don't see how it can be still a lot of work now? The real gain is less packages to support which many people already told us would be a good thing... Cheers Luk -- Luk Claes - http://people.debian.org/~luk - GPG key 1024D/9B7C328D Fingerprint: D5AF 25FB 316B 53BB 08E7 F999 E544 DE07 9B7C 328D signature.asc Description: OpenPGP digital signature
Re: Unsuccessfull try to report a bug with fix against yaboot (orphaned) via mail
On Thu, Jun 08, 2006 at 06:26:51PM +0200, Holger Levsen wrote: > have you been able to submit that bug report now? Yes. Its now bug #372780. After changing the mail-program (max os mail --> mutt) it works. Friendly Peter Voigt -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of "unsubscribe". Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: Orphaned packages with very low popcon numbers
Thomas Viehmann <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes: > I'd prefer Debian releases to consist of properly supported packages as > much as possible. It's not as if we want to forcibly delete the packages > from our user's machines, we'd just acknowledge that they aren't > maintained anymore. Me too, but I wonder if we are actually achieving that goal. Consider a package which is in this category. Right now it gets some level of maintenance; it gets bugfixes for RC bugs at least, and other such things happen. It gets security updates as we know about them, and so forth. If it gets dropped entirely, then the user doesn't get any notice of that fact; their system just keeps on going as before. Except that the package now gets *no* updates instead of minimal ones. Thomas -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of "unsubscribe". Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: Orphaned packages with very low popcon numbers
Thomas Bushnell BSG wrote: > Thomas Viehmann <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes: > >> I'd prefer Debian releases to consist of properly supported packages as >> much as possible. It's not as if we want to forcibly delete the packages >> from our user's machines, we'd just acknowledge that they aren't >> maintained anymore. > > Me too, but I wonder if we are actually achieving that goal. > > Consider a package which is in this category. Right now it gets some > level of maintenance; it gets bugfixes for RC bugs at least, and other > such things happen. It gets security updates as we know about them, > and so forth. Actually, it doesn't. :-P It's a nice dream, but with hundreds of QA-maintained packages, these nearly-unused ones mostly do not get even basic maintenance. > If it gets dropped entirely, then the user doesn't get any notice of > that fact; their system just keeps on going as before. Until they run dselect and it shows up as a "local/obsolete" package: that's how I generally get notice of dropped packages. I don't know what other frontends do, but they ought to do something similar. > Except that > the package now gets *no* updates instead of minimal ones. > > Thomas -- Nathanael Nerode <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Bush admitted to violating FISA and said he was proud of it. So why isn't he in prison yet?... -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of "unsubscribe". Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: Orphaned packages with very low popcon numbers
Bas Zoetekouw wrote: > Well, as long as there are no RC bugs, and the packages are in testing, > I really see no need to remove them. Well, *if* they are in good shape and require absolutely *no* maintenance, they should be kept, yes. Blackbook may be in this situation. (Checks: blackbook is dead upstream and is missing the required copyright statement in debian/copyright, so no.) (However, it's only been orphaned since April, so it wouldn't be a candidate.) c2hs certainly isn't (it's uninstallable, and it's two upstream releases out of date). (However, it's only been orphaned since May, so it also wouldn't be a candidate.) Just to start in on the list. I strongly suspect that most of these packages, even the ones with "0 bugs", are going to turn out to require maintenance. If they require *any* maintenance, they are a waste of our time. QA has hundreds of packages to maintain, most of which have far, far more users. (Some have several thousand popcon installations.) Requiring maintenance includes being out of date with respect to upstream, any packaging bugs, "important" bugs, bugs regarding transitions, etc. And if there are no users, we can't actually expect most of these bugs to be reported. RC bugs are *far* too high a threshhold for removal of unmaintained packages. > Even if only a few people use the > package, why annoy them by removing it from Debian? Keeping out-of-date, unmaintained packages in Debian is not a service, even to the users of the package, who will generally be better served by installing the upstream tarball directly (I'm sure there are exceptions for packages with particularly awful upstream distribution formats, but those fall under the "special cases" category). In fact, it constitutes a trap for the unwary. Bas wrote later: > Well, I could agree with removing packages if, in addition to the cited > citeria: > > (i) there are RC or important bugs (or many normal bugs) Or even a few normal bugs. :-) > or > > (iia) there are very few users (in the bottom 1% of popcon number or > so, not sure how much votes that would translate to, 20 sounds a > bit high IMO), and Packages rank from 1 to 22692. Bottom 1% would be rank 22467 and below. This is in the "0 installations" category: the top rank for a 0-installations package is 22416. The top rank for a 19-installations package (my cutoff choice) is 15339, or approximately the bottom 32.5%. I am only looking at stuff which is *orphaned*, however. > (iib) there are replacement packages in the archive that deliver > similar functionality. Pain in the neck to find out. I would be OK with this if you added: (iii) package is significantly out of date with respect to upstream > In other cases, IMO, it's a lot of work to check and remove the > packages (both for the QA and the FTP teams), without any real gain for > the project. Well, IMO, the gain is as such. (1) fewer packages for QA to maintain. QA maintenance requires at least identifying when a package is severely out of date with respect to upstream, fixing any RC bugs which may crop up, etc. It doesn't get done, but it needs to. The fewer package which are lying around, the more likely that this will actually get done for the packages which need it. (2) fewer junk packages to mislead unwary users. It is really perverse to offer blackbook, which is dead upstream and unmaintained in Debian, to Debian's users. IMNSHO, packages which have no maintainer and look unlikely to acquire one should be removed from Debian by *default*, and kept only if there's a good reason to keep them. A significant number of users is usually a good reason, hence the filter for packages with very few (if any) users. -- Nathanael Nerode <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Bush admitted to violating FISA and said he was proud of it. So why isn't he in prison yet?...
Re: Orphaned packages with very low popcon numbers
Nathanael Nerode <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes: > If they require *any* maintenance, they are a waste of our time. QA has > hundreds of packages to maintain, most of which have far, far more users. > (Some have several thousand popcon installations.) Um, great. I've been quite happy not to spend time on them. I'm curiously amused that the "don't spend time on them!" crowd is now spending time on them. Why? The "just ignore them" strategy hasn't been a disaster so far; why not continue it? Thomas -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of "unsubscribe". Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]
