Re: The number of popcon.debian.org-submissions is falling

[Petter Reinholdtsen <pere@hungry.com>]

[Tim Clewlow]
> Winning a popularity contest just isn't one of my motivations.
>
> Cheers, Tim.
>
> PS - If you want to record how many people are using different
> things, then perhaps if the update servers record IP addresses and
> requested updates then this could give you more data as it does not
> require a system has specifically installed a popcon type
> application for this method to work.

This should not the motivation for submitting information to
<URL: http://popcon.debian.org/ >.  We are not really trying to figure
out how many people are using Debian, we are trying to figure out
which packages are being used in Debian.  And for this it is valuable
to have as many submit information about the packages they have
installed and are using.

The popcon data is used to make sure the most used packages are on the
first installation CD and DVD, and to focus the project QA and other
resources on the packages used by the most people.  It is also used
when evaluating if a package should be dropped when is orphaned, and
many other similar decisions.  In short, the popcon data is used in a
lot of ways in the project, and because of this it is important to get
as many submitters are possible, to make sure the popcon data is
representative of our installation base.

Happy hacking
-- 
Petter Reinholdtsen