Slightly OT: Debian Community Poll

Slightly OT: Debian Community Poll

[Ludovic Brenta]

I received this as part of a Debian Project News newsletter by email;
I thought maybe some of you on comp.lang.ada might like to respond.
This is only "slightly" off-topic since we talk a lot about Debian on
this newsgroup :)

Debian Community Poll
---------------------

After getting the idea during the recent Mini Debian Conference [8] in
Berlin, Torsten Werner prepared [9] a poll for users of the Debian
Operating System [10] asking different types of questions like the
usage
of derivatives, about the Debian Free Software Guidelines [11] and
firmwares and of course releases.

   8 : http://wiki.debconf.org/wiki/Miniconf-LT-Berlin/2010
   9 : http://twerner.blogspot.com/2010/06/debian-community-poll.html
   10 : http://tinyurl.com/3y33ska
   11 : http://www.debian.org/social_contract#guidelines

The Poll is available at http://tinyurl.com/3y33ska [12]. Torsten asks
to
spread the link to as many users as possible.

   12 : http://tinyurl.com/3y33ska

Re: Slightly OT: Debian Community Poll

[Georg Bauhaus]

On 14.06.10 14:37, Ludovic Brenta wrote:
> I received this as part of a Debian Project News newsletter by email;
> I thought maybe some of you on comp.lang.ada might like to respond.
> This is only "slightly" off-topic since we talk a lot about Debian on
> this newsgroup :)
> 
> Debian Community Poll
> ---------------------
> 
> After getting the idea during the recent Mini Debian Conference [8] in
> Berlin, Torsten Werner prepared [9] a poll for users of the Debian
> Operating System [10] asking different types of questions like the
> usage
> of derivatives, about the Debian Free Software Guidelines [11] and
> firmwares and of course releases.
> 
>    8 : http://wiki.debconf.org/wiki/Miniconf-LT-Berlin/2010
>    9 : http://twerner.blogspot.com/2010/06/debian-community-poll.html
>    10 : http://tinyurl.com/3y33ska
>    11 : http://www.debian.org/social_contract#guidelines
> 
> The Poll is available at http://tinyurl.com/3y33ska [12]. Torsten asks
> to
> spread the link to as many users as possible.
> 
>    12 : http://tinyurl.com/3y33ska

Is everyone aware that Debian politics will from then on refer
to these market research results, if they can be called results?
(I'm not saying I'm for or against it.)

Incidentally, the survey is
"Powered by Google Text & Tabellen" ...

Re: Slightly OT: Debian Community Poll

[Yannick Duchêne (Hibou57)]

Le Mon, 14 Jun 2010 14:37:38 +0200, Ludovic Brenta  
<ludovic@ludovic-brenta.org> a écrit:
> The Poll is available at http://tinyurl.com/3y33ska [12]. Torsten asks
Occasional users can fill the poll too or not ?
 From time to time, I use it on an USB drive and via Telnet for a server.
As I don't know, I will not fill the poll unless you confirm it's OK.

-- 
There is even better than a pragma Assert: a SPARK --# check.
--# check C and WhoKnowWhat and YouKnowWho;
--# assert Ada;
--  i.e. forget about previous premises which leads to conclusion
--  and start with new conclusion as premise.

Re: Slightly OT: Debian Community Poll

[Ludovic Brenta]

Yannick Duchêne wrote on comp.lang.ada:
> Ludovic Brenta a écrit:
>> The Poll is available athttp://tinyurl.com/3y33ska[12]. Torsten asks
>
> Occasional users can fill the poll too or not ?
>  From time to time, I use it on an USB drive and via Telnet for a server.
> As I don't know, I will not fill the poll unless you confirm it's OK.

Since the poll is about various long-term issues with Debian (non-free
software, release cycle) I would say: respond only if you use Debian,
or one of its derivatives, regularly.

--
Ludovic Brenta.

Re: Slightly OT: Debian Community Poll

[Dmitry A. Kazakov]

Hi Ludovic!

As a Debian insider do you know the reason why Debian packages seem so
outdated? It is not only gcc, I am packaging my stuff for Debian and to my
amazement discovered that GtkSourceView is ancient. (Let's forget about apt
used instead of rpm and yum (:-))

Is it Debian policy or lack of resources?

-- 
Regards,
Dmitry A. Kazakov
http://www.dmitry-kazakov.de

Re: Slightly OT: Debian Community Poll

[Ludovic Brenta]

"Dmitry A. Kazakov" <mailbox@dmitry-kazakov.de> writes:
> Hi Ludovic!
>
> As a Debian insider do you know the reason why Debian packages seem so
> outdated? It is not only gcc, I am packaging my stuff for Debian and
> to my amazement discovered that GtkSourceView is ancient. (Let's
> forget about apt used instead of rpm and yum (:-))

(you're right, apt did automatic package dependencies long before yum
even existed :) )

> Is it Debian policy or lack of resources?

Which GtkSourceView package are you talking about and which version of
Debian are you running?

http://bugs.debian.org/558676 RM: gtksourceview -- ROM; old, superseded, unmaintained upstream

http://packages.debian.org/source/sid/gtksourceview2

says the current version is 2.10.3-1; is that "ancient"?

PS. Debian policy is to *always* build packages on unstable unless you
want to fix a security bug in stable.

-- 
Ludovic Brenta.

Re: Slightly OT: Debian Community Poll

[Dmitry A. Kazakov]

On Mon, 14 Jun 2010 22:46:50 +0200, Ludovic Brenta wrote:

> Which GtkSourceView package are you talking about and which version of
> Debian are you running?

The latest one, fully updated:

Distributor ID:	Debian
Description:	Debian GNU/Linux 5.0.4 (lenny)
Release:		5.0.4
Codename:		lenny

dpkg -l shows:

libgtksourceview2.0-dev 2.2.2-1

Linking to it gives unresolved references:

gtk_source_view_set_mark_category_background
gtk_source_view_get_mark_category_background
gtk_source_view_set_draw_spaces
gtk_source_language_manager_guess_language

> http://bugs.debian.org/558676 RM: gtksourceview -- ROM; old, superseded, unmaintained upstream
> 
> http://packages.debian.org/source/sid/gtksourceview2
> 
> says the current version is 2.10.3-1; is that "ancient"?

That could be better (by comparing version numbers (:-)), the only question
is how to get at it. Update/upgrade does not help.

> PS. Debian policy is to *always* build packages on unstable unless you
> want to fix a security bug in stable.

Yet gcc is still at 4.3.

-- 
Regards,
Dmitry A. Kazakov
http://www.dmitry-kazakov.de

Re: Slightly OT: Debian Community Poll

[Georg Bauhaus]

Dmitry A. Kazakov wrote:
> On Mon, 14 Jun 2010 22:46:50 +0200, Ludovic Brenta wrote:
> 
>> Which GtkSourceView package are you talking about and which version of
>> Debian are you running?
> 
> The latest one, fully updated:
> 
> Distributor ID:	Debian
> Description:	Debian GNU/Linux 5.0.4 (lenny)
> Release:		5.0.4
> Codename:		lenny
> 
> dpkg -l shows:
> 
> libgtksourceview2.0-dev 2.2.2-1

>> http://packages.debian.org/source/sid/gtksourceview2
>>
>> says the current version is 2.10.3-1; is that "ancient"?
> 
> That could be better (by comparing version numbers (:-)), the only question
> is how to get at it. Update/upgrade does not help.

2.10.3-1 is from the "testing" distribution (sid).

Re: Slightly OT: Debian Community Poll

[Ludovic Brenta]

"Dmitry A. Kazakov" <mailbox@dmitry-kazakov.de> writes:
> On Mon, 14 Jun 2010 22:46:50 +0200, Ludovic Brenta wrote:
>
>> Which GtkSourceView package are you talking about and which version of
>> Debian are you running?
>
> The latest one, fully updated:
>
> Distributor ID:	Debian
> Description:	Debian GNU/Linux 5.0.4 (lenny)
> Release:		5.0.4
> Codename:		lenny
>
> dpkg -l shows:
>
> libgtksourceview2.0-dev 2.2.2-1

OK, that's Debian 5.0 "Lenny" which was released in February 2009.  No
wonder the packages in it are > 1.5 years old.

> Linking to it gives unresolved references:
>
> gtk_source_view_set_mark_category_background
> gtk_source_view_get_mark_category_background
> gtk_source_view_set_draw_spaces
> gtk_source_language_manager_guess_language
>
>> http://bugs.debian.org/558676 RM: gtksourceview -- ROM; old, superseded, unmaintained upstream
>> 
>> http://packages.debian.org/source/sid/gtksourceview2
>> 
>> says the current version is 2.10.3-1; is that "ancient"?
>
> That could be better (by comparing version numbers (:-)), the only question
> is how to get at it. Update/upgrade does not help.
>
>> PS. Debian policy is to *always* build packages on unstable unless you
>> want to fix a security bug in stable.
>
> Yet gcc is still at 4.3.

Feel free to continue using stable as your main system; you can either
upgrade it to unstable or install unstable in a chroot, see [1].

[1] http://lists.debian.org/debian-ada/2010/02/msg00003.html

If you want to upgrade your main system instead, there is an
Ada-specific recipe for that in the upcoming Debian Policy for Ada
(Fifth Edition) which I'm about to publish in a few days (I'm waiting
for the availablility of GNAT GPL 2010):

http://green.ada-france.org:8081/revision/file/77ab86dc2e38b0012c38bae2d61dd134d2c1db70/debian-ada-policy.texi

Look for "In-place upgrades".

-- 
Ludovic Brenta.

Re: Slightly OT: Debian Community Poll

[Dmitry A. Kazakov]

On Tue, 15 Jun 2010 08:23:13 +0200, Ludovic Brenta wrote:

> Feel free to continue using stable as your main system; you can either
> upgrade it to unstable or install unstable in a chroot, see [1].
> 
> [1] http://lists.debian.org/debian-ada/2010/02/msg00003.html

Thank you for the information. I will try this.

-- 
Regards,
Dmitry A. Kazakov
http://www.dmitry-kazakov.de

Re: Slightly OT: Debian Community Poll

[Dmitry A. Kazakov]

On Tue, 15 Jun 2010 01:25:41 +0200, Georg Bauhaus wrote:

> Dmitry A. Kazakov wrote:
>> On Mon, 14 Jun 2010 22:46:50 +0200, Ludovic Brenta wrote:
>> 
>>> Which GtkSourceView package are you talking about and which version of
>>> Debian are you running?
>> 
>> The latest one, fully updated:
>> 
>> Distributor ID:	Debian
>> Description:	Debian GNU/Linux 5.0.4 (lenny)
>> Release:		5.0.4
>> Codename:		lenny
>> 
>> dpkg -l shows:
>> 
>> libgtksourceview2.0-dev 2.2.2-1
> 
>>> http://packages.debian.org/source/sid/gtksourceview2
>>>
>>> says the current version is 2.10.3-1; is that "ancient"?
>> 
>> That could be better (by comparing version numbers (:-)), the only question
>> is how to get at it. Update/upgrade does not help.
> 
> 2.10.3-1 is from the "testing" distribution (sid).

Yes, and?

The things missing in the stable package of GtkSourceView are at least one
year old. I am wondering why this key GTK package is so poorly packaged.

-- 
Regards,
Dmitry A. Kazakov
http://www.dmitry-kazakov.de

Re: Slightly OT: Debian Community Poll

[Ludovic Brenta]

Dmitry A. Kazakov wrote on comp.lang.ada:
> On Tue, 15 Jun 2010 01:25:41 +0200, Georg Bauhaus wrote:
>> Dmitry A. Kazakov wrote:
>>> On Mon, 14 Jun 2010 22:46:50 +0200, Ludovic Brenta wrote:
>>>> Which GtkSourceView package are you talking about and which version of
>>>> Debian are you running?
>>>
>>> The latest one, fully updated:
>>>
>>> Distributor ID:        Debian
>>> Description:   Debian GNU/Linux 5.0.4 (lenny)
>>> Release:               5.0.4
>>> Codename:              lenny
>>>
>>> dpkg -l shows:
>>>
>>> libgtksourceview2.0-dev 2.2.2-1
>>>
>>>> http://packages.debian.org/source/sid/gtksourceview2
>>>>
>>>> says the current version is 2.10.3-1; is that "ancient"?
>>>
>>> That could be better (by comparing version numbers (:-)), the only question
>>> is how to get at it. Update/upgrade does not help.
>
>> 2.10.3-1 is from the "testing" distribution (sid).
>
> Yes, and?
>
> The things missing in the stable package of GtkSourceView are at least one
> year old. I am wondering why this key GTK package is so poorly packaged.

It is not a key GTK+ package (few other packages depend on it) and it
is not poorly packaged. The only problem is your expectation that a
1.5-year-old stable (i.e. "long term support") distribution should
contain packages that are less than one year old. If you want recent
packages, you should use testing (like I do) or unstable.

--
Ludovic Brenta.

Re: Slightly OT: Debian Community Poll

[Dmitry A. Kazakov]

On Tue, 15 Jun 2010 02:06:15 -0700 (PDT), Ludovic Brenta wrote:

> Dmitry A. Kazakov wrote on comp.lang.ada:
>> On Tue, 15 Jun 2010 01:25:41 +0200, Georg Bauhaus wrote:
>>> Dmitry A. Kazakov wrote:
>>>> On Mon, 14 Jun 2010 22:46:50 +0200, Ludovic Brenta wrote:
>>>>> Which GtkSourceView package are you talking about and which version of
>>>>> Debian are you running?
>>>>
>>>> The latest one, fully updated:
>>>>
>>>> Distributor ID: � � � �Debian
>>>> Description: � Debian GNU/Linux 5.0.4 (lenny)
>>>> Release: � � � � � � � 5.0.4
>>>> Codename: � � � � � � �lenny
>>>>
>>>> dpkg -l shows:
>>>>
>>>> libgtksourceview2.0-dev 2.2.2-1
>>>>
>>>>> http://packages.debian.org/source/sid/gtksourceview2
>>>>>
>>>>> says the current version is 2.10.3-1; is that "ancient"?
>>>>
>>>> That could be better (by comparing version numbers (:-)), the only question
>>>> is how to get at it. Update/upgrade does not help.
>>
>>> 2.10.3-1 is from the "testing" distribution (sid).
>>
>> Yes, and?
>>
>> The things missing in the stable package of GtkSourceView are at least one
>> year old. I am wondering why this key GTK package is so poorly packaged.
> 
> It is not a key GTK+ package (few other packages depend on it) and it
> is not poorly packaged.

If you build a GUI, an ability to render and edit texts is not always, but
often, essential. Now I am not certain if other GTK parts are actual. There
might be issues, e.g. older GTK versions had nasty problems with drop down
windows.

>The only problem is your expectation that a
> 1.5-year-old stable (i.e. "long term support") distribution should
> contain packages that are less than one year old.

I indeed had this expectation. Staying under the shower of meaningless
"security updates" and other mess, I hoped that some useful packages might
get actualized as well. My fault. (:-))

> If you want recent
> packages, you should use testing (like I do) or unstable.

I will. Even GNAT GPL has shorter cycles. There should be a reason...

-- 
Regards,
Dmitry A. Kazakov
http://www.dmitry-kazakov.de

Re: Slightly OT: Debian Community Poll

[Ludovic Brenta]

Dmitry A. Kazakov wrote on comp.lang.ada:
>>> The things missing in the stable package of GtkSourceView are at least one
>>> year old. I am wondering why this key GTK package is so poorly packaged.
>
>> It is not a key GTK+ package (few other packages depend on it) and it
>> is not poorly packaged.
>
> If you build a GUI, an ability to render and edit texts is not always, but
> often, essential. Now I am not certain if other GTK parts are actual. There
> might be issues, e.g. older GTK versions had nasty problems with drop down
> windows.

That is correct but most applications that need to display text use
widgets other than GtkSourceView, like e.g. GtkTextView or simply
GtkLabel. GtkSourceView is, in fact, quite heavy and specialized. It
might be exactly what you need but that only makes it a "key" widget
for your particular application, not for all of GTK+ or GNOME.

>> If you want recent packages, you should use testing (like I do) or unstable.
>
> I will. Even GNAT GPL has shorter cycles. There should be a reason...

The reason for the 1-year release cycle of GNAT GPL is that it also
serves for the GNAT Academic Program, so its release cycle matches
that of university curricula, i.e. 1 year. The release date (May-June
each year) is, in fact, intended to make it easy for professors to
migrate to the latest version while preparing their courses for the
next year to begin in September.

The reason for the longer life cycle of Debian is to match the
expectations of conservative server administrators. They buy a new
server and install Debian N on it and do not want any changes in the
software except, reluctantly, for security bugs. 3 or 4 years later
they buy a new server, install Debian N+1 on it, migrate their data
and scrap the old server. After each stable release of Debian, they
receive one year of security support for the previous stable release,
so they can plan their server upgrades.

Since you are neither an academic nor a conservative server
administrator, as an individual user administering only your own
machine, you have no reason to lock yourself into a release cycle at
all; you can upgrade as seldom or as often as you want to. As a
developer of a future Debian package, you however must build on
unstable; hence my suggestion to use whatever you want as a user and
an unstable chroot for your Debian packaging.

Since we're now way (as opposed to "slightly") off-topic on
comp.lang.ada, I suggest we followup on debian-ada@lists.debian.org.

--
Ludovic Brenta.

Re: Slightly OT: Debian Community Poll

[Dmitry A. Kazakov]

On Tue, 15 Jun 2010 06:56:51 -0700 (PDT), Ludovic Brenta wrote:

> Dmitry A. Kazakov wrote on comp.lang.ada:
>>>> The things missing in the stable package of GtkSourceView are at least one
>>>> year old. I am wondering why this key GTK package is so poorly packaged.
>>
>>> It is not a key GTK+ package (few other packages depend on it) and it
>>> is not poorly packaged.
>>
>> If you build a GUI, an ability to render and edit texts is not always, but
>> often, essential. Now I am not certain if other GTK parts are actual. There
>> might be issues, e.g. older GTK versions had nasty problems with drop down
>> windows.
> 
> That is correct but most applications that need to display text use
> widgets other than GtkSourceView,

They might implement their own. I suppose that GPS does this. But it has
very complex ones. For an average end user GtkSourceView is the best
available solution in terms of functionality/implementation expenses.

> like e.g. GtkTextView or simply
> GtkLabel. GtkSourceView is, in fact, quite heavy and specialized.

GtkSourceView is built on top of GtkTextView in order to replaces it.
GtkTextView is barely usable as a text renderer/editor. As for being
heavy-weight, this argument makes little sense because text buffer and text
view load the whole file. So it is heavy from the start per design.
GtkSourceView maybe worsen that (due to use of regex patterns), but who
cares in these days and under UNIX!?

>>> If you want recent packages, you should use testing (like I do) or unstable.
>>
>> I will. Even GNAT GPL has shorter cycles. There should be a reason...
> 
> The reason for the 1-year release cycle of GNAT GPL is that it also
> serves for the GNAT Academic Program, so its release cycle matches
> that of university curricula, i.e. 1 year.

I don't believe that is the reason. (Even if AdaCore would say so. (:-)) 

> The reason for the longer life cycle of Debian is to match the
> expectations of conservative server administrators. They buy a new
> server and install Debian N on it and do not want any changes in the
> software except, reluctantly, for security bugs. 3 or 4 years later
> they buy a new server, install Debian N+1 on it, migrate their data
> and scrap the old server.

That answers my question! Outdated packages is Debian policy.

-- 
Regards,
Dmitry A. Kazakov
http://www.dmitry-kazakov.de

Re: Slightly OT: Debian Community Poll

[Ludovic Brenta]

Dmitry A. Kazakov wrote:
>> The reason for the longer life cycle of Debian is to match the
>> expectations of conservative server administrators. They buy a new
>> server and install Debian N on it and do not want any changes in the
>> software except, reluctantly, for security bugs. 3 or 4 years later
>> they buy a new server, install Debian N+1 on it, migrate their data
>> and scrap the old server.
>
> That answers my question! Outdated packages is Debian policy.

Not policy; just a consequence. Also, that depends on the definition
of "outdated".  To a conservative server administrator, a 3-year-old
package can be perfectly up-to-date if it serves its purpose and has
no security bug; this is their choice, not yours. Please do not impose
your definition of "outdated" on everyone else and do not disparage
the hard work that Debian Developers put in quality control. You, an
Ada software engineer, should know better than "the latest is always
the greatest".

You deleted the other half of what I said, so I'll paste it here for
reference:

>> Since you are neither an academic nor a conservative server
>> administrator, as an individual user administering only your own
>> machine, you have no reason to lock yourself into a release cycle at
>> all; you can upgrade as seldom or as often as you want to. As a
>> developer of a future Debian package, you however must build on
>> unstable; hence my suggestion to use whatever you want as a user and
>> an unstable chroot for your Debian packaging.

This second half was for you, Dmitry, and I am a bit sad that you
chose to ignore it. Please re-read it aloud, slowly.

--
Ludovic Brenta.

Re: Slightly OT: Debian Community Poll

[Dmitry A. Kazakov]

On Tue, 15 Jun 2010 08:30:59 -0700 (PDT), Ludovic Brenta wrote:

> Please do not impose
> your definition of "outdated" on everyone else and do not disparage
> the hard work that Debian Developers put in quality control.

Outdated = not current, obsolete.

> You, an
> Ada software engineer, should know better than "the latest is always
> the greatest".

True, but it is up to the authors, in this case of GtkSourceView, to decide
what is "greatest" and what is stable.

>>> Since you are neither an academic nor a conservative server
>>> administrator, as an individual user administering only your own
>>> machine, you have no reason to lock yourself into a release cycle at
>>> all; you can upgrade as seldom or as often as you want to. As a
>>> developer of a future Debian package, you however must build on
>>> unstable; hence my suggestion to use whatever you want as a user and
>>> an unstable chroot for your Debian packaging.
> 
> This second half was for you, Dmitry, and I am a bit sad that you
> chose to ignore it. Please re-read it aloud, slowly.

I cut it, because there was no need to comment it. It would be off-topic to
dispute over conservatism, why Ada users are more conservative than server
administrators, who are the target customers of Linux distributions.

-- 
Regards,
Dmitry A. Kazakov
http://www.dmitry-kazakov.de

Re: Slightly OT: Debian Community Poll

[Stephen Leake]

"Dmitry A. Kazakov" <mailbox@dmitry-kazakov.de> writes:

> On Tue, 15 Jun 2010 08:30:59 -0700 (PDT), Ludovic Brenta wrote:
>
>> Please do not impose
>> your definition of "outdated" on everyone else and do not disparage
>> the hard work that Debian Developers put in quality control.
>
> Outdated = not current, obsolete.

"not current" is _not_ the same as "obsolete"!

"not current" means "there is a later version"

"obsolete" means "there is absolutely no reason to use this package".

If the FTP package in Debian Lenny allows you to transfer files between
machines, it is not "obsolete". The fact that the FTP package in Debian
Squeeze has a couple more minor features does not change that fact.

-- 
-- Stephe

Re: Slightly OT: Debian Community Poll

[Dmitry A. Kazakov]

On Wed, 16 Jun 2010 02:13:11 -0400, Stephen Leake wrote:

> "Dmitry A. Kazakov" <mailbox@dmitry-kazakov.de> writes:
> 
>> On Tue, 15 Jun 2010 08:30:59 -0700 (PDT), Ludovic Brenta wrote:
>>
>>> Please do not impose
>>> your definition of "outdated" on everyone else and do not disparage
>>> the hard work that Debian Developers put in quality control.
>>
>> Outdated = not current, obsolete.
> 
> "not current" is _not_ the same as "obsolete"!
> 
> "not current" means "there is a later version"

Yes. Outdated may mean either.

(Comma in dictionary definitions means "or")
 
> "obsolete" means "there is absolutely no reason to use this package".

No. Obsolete is not current, not belonging to the present time, out of use,
out of date, unfashionable.

That does not automatically imply anything about whether you should or not
use it. E.g. I must use the obsolete GNAT under Linux, because there is no
newer one.

> If the FTP package in Debian Lenny allows you to transfer files between
> machines, it is not "obsolete". The fact that the FTP package in Debian
> Squeeze has a couple more minor features does not change that fact.

Ada 83 is obsolete
Ada 95 is not current
(:-))

-- 
Regards,
Dmitry A. Kazakov
http://www.dmitry-kazakov.de