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Re: Areas of Emdebian to integrate into Debian



Hi,

2011/4/3 Neil Williams <codehelp@debian.org>:

> I think you'll find it to be the ftpmaster who makes the call for what
> actually gets into the ftp archive. buildd and kernel can put stuff
> elsewhere but what gets onto ftp.debian.org is down to ftpmaster.

Sure, arm kernel packages have been accepted since long now. How you
produce those packages is not their call is what I mean.

> Emdebian is frequently asked for kernels and we don't have the
> resources to support more than one or two kernel packages for arm let
> alone other architectures - cross-built or not.

That's wrong, we can build as many binaries as we want, from upstream
kernel sources. Simtec has already been doing so, long time, see
http://armlinux.simtec.co.uk/kautobuild/

> Q: How do I put Emdebian on this ARM board?
> A: Do you have a kernel?
>
> You've seen that as often as I have.

At Emdebian we have always been focusing to provide rootfs, so
targetting software integrators that know what they do, not random
final users.

> Don't you think that if everyone combines patches we at least have a
> chance of getting a starting point for people to use for their own
> boards? It won't support every esoteric connection on the board
> necessarily but at least it might get people started.

kernel is very machine dependent. I really do not see the option right
now to create a universal kernel which works for all platforms without
significant amount of work. I wish I was wrong.

> Time is also lost when patches aren't prepared for mainline and have to
> be manually updated for a newer kernel version which isn't as new as
> mainline.

But who does the work in mainline, synced with merge windows, does it
automagically happen?

> If we can, try to help get useable kernel packages into Debian for arm
> to support Emdebian users? I don't know, I'm asking.

Today I have been building kernels for EfikaMX, but those are not
welcome at Debian, mainly because security team would not like to
support different source code bases on next release, hence ftpmasters
will reject those from the archive, but if we setup a lower policy on
Emdebian, Emdebian could build them and produce complete images
(kernel+rootfs). Then Emdebian might as well have to deal with
bootloaders configuration per device.

> Yes, time is short but the choice is: Should Emdebian people (not just
> developers) spend time (often alone) porting old patches to new kernel
> versions or spend (potentially less) time working with others to
> combine patches into a form which can be suitable for mainline? It's
> less time overall.

Ah! If they do that would be great.

Best regards,
-- 
 Héctor Orón  -.. . -... .. .- -.   -.. . ...- . .-.. --- .--. . .-.

"Our Sun unleashes tremendous flares expelling hot gas into the Solar
System, which one day will disconnect us."

-- Day DVB-T stop working nicely
Video flare: http://antwrp.gsfc.nasa.gov/apod/ap100510.html


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