I believe having a lot of packages (without allowing redundant packages) would be good, even if some of them are not as properly maintained as they could be. I would rather have 3 ISOs of very properly maintained software + 4 ISOs of averagely maintained packages + 4 ISOs of sparringly maintained software than just 3 ISOs of very properly maintained software. I feel that allowing relatively unused
I wonder why you are mentioning ISOs ?
I mention ISOs because I was replying to a message where someone was complaining about having 432 ISOs as part of OpenSUSE. Replace ISO for "RPM" and multiply the number by the average number of RPMs that fit on a CD in my post and my general idea would continue to apply.
Besides that, as you have read the threads about it, I suppose that you also noticed the complexity involved with how to best implement that process. We still have to discuss a lot to get there, we'll eventually do, and then maybe one could think about a process to integrate some of those packages into SUSE Linux. But that decision must be left to Novell alone.
I agree that this is a very complex process! That, however, shouldn't make us put off discussing it and actually implementing it. But yes, I can wait (until 10.0 is out). :)
Let's first try to find the best ways of integrating 3rd party repositories.
I can agree with that. Why not take that a bit further and make some of those packages from 3rd party repositories official packages? And actually include them in ISOs? I, though, don't feel this is very urgent and would be satisfied with what I believe is likely to happen: Novell gradually starting to include high-quality third party packages into the base distribution. For example, if someone makes a high quality package (for a not previously packaged program) and it becomes popular, I fail to see a reason not to include that package in the ISOs... and in this case, I believe it would be a good option for Novell to work directly with the original packagers (assuming they have done a good work) rather than take over control of the package.
In this case, if a package is poorly maintained, anyone should be allowed to contribute and help improve its quality.
Sure. We can do that with 3rd party repositories, but not with ISOs.
As I mentioned in my example, I don't see why high-quality packages from 3rd party repositories should be kept off the ISOs.
Is Debian offering installation support ? They're not.
They most certainly are. Look at: http://www.debian.org/support If you are refering to commercial support, look at http://www.debian.org/consultants , which lists consultants in over 50 countries. As you can see, the procedures in place around Debian allow these consultants to offer commercial support around it, even though they control Debian, as a whole, much less than Novell controls SuSE (since they have to go through the regular procedures).
[...] In their case, allowing anyone to create packages that are official part of the distribution has most certainly not decreased their overall quality.
It's true that the Debian packages are very high quality. But AFAIK that's because they're doing the exact opposite of what you're saying: they have *official maintainers* that are in charge of packages. They are *not* allowing "anyone" to create packages that make it into the "official" Debian distribution. It's quite a long and complex process of becoming an entitled official Debian package maintainer, they raise the bar quite high for someone to get there, and that's why they have good packages.
They *do* allow anyone to become a package maintainer, as long as a process is followed. You can see more information about it here: http://www.debian.org/doc/manuals/maint-guide/index.en.html They do allow anyone to become a Debian Developer! Anyone can create packages, by following a process and becoming what you're calling “official maintainers”. Sure, the process is slightly complex and long; they do "raise the bar", as you say. But it is an open and documented process that, if followed, allows you to directly participate on the construction of the distribution. It's much better than the “no, you can't do anything to control OpenSUSE in any way” approach. I was looking for something similar in OpenSUSE, which I suspect could also lead to us having packages of the quality that Debian users have come to expect. I suspected nothing like that did exist, so I wanted to get some reactions and see if we could start working on a proposal to allow third-party developers (like me; even though I do work in Novell, I would like my affiliation to OpenSUSE to be on exactly the same terms as that of third-party developers) to directly participate in building OpenSuSE.
In my case I would package the Chicken Scheme compiler (along with many extensions) and the Ion window manager. Sure, they are relatively unpopular, but having them part of the distribution would surely make the life of those who depend on them easier.
And you're going to do the installation support for those, right ? You're going to do all the tests to see whether they work properly in the distribution, right ?
Right. I will follow bugs registered in the bug tracker and attempt to keep my packages as properly maintained as I can, yes. If I fail to do so, I would expect some procedures that would allow others to take over me and modify the official packages for these programs. And I would also expect some procedures for taking off unmaintained packages that are not worth including. BTW (just because I'm curious), will Novell sell commercial support for the Linux SuSE OSS distribution?
Let's wait a little for the SUSE staff to get finished with that and I'm sure quite a few of them will jump actively into the discussion, and have their minds free enough to quickly get forward with that very critical topic.
Ok, lets do that. Thank you for your insights, Pascal. I appreciate them. Alejo. http://azul.freaks-unidos.net/ ---=( Comunidad de Usuarios de Software Libre en Colombia )=--- ---=( http://bachue.com/colibri )=--=( colibri@bachue.com )=---