Re: variants Re: Re: debian vs ubuntu and knoppix
On Oct 12 2005, Alvin Oga wrote:
> On Wed, 12 Oct 2005, kangja wrote:
> > i don't understand all these variants. why not just continue with debian
> > alone?
>
> because:
> e) they don't know how to provide patches/enhancements/new-packages into
> the main debian core
Please, don't spread FUD or incorrect facts, Alvin.
I don't know if you have noticed, but some key Debian Developers now
work for Ubuntu.
If you don't believe me, see the changelogs of highly important packages
like the glibc, gcc, python, GNOME, just to cite a few.
Please, tell me again if you can really say that they "don't know" how
to provide the enhancements to Debian. Perhaps you don't read
changelogs?
The Ubuntu people are synchronizing their work with Debian all the time
and the few packages that don't have common maintainers with Debian
proper have the patches available for anybody via web and a source
control repository.
I used to be afraid of using anything but Debian, but I am considering
using Ubuntu for friends that want to experience something different
from the Windows world. I still like Debian for my own use, though.
Also, Ubuntu has taught some things to Debian proper: the fact that they
have not proper maintainership, but all the developers can work on any
package means that one of the worst problems that I see with Debian has
just been solved.
It is frequent the case in Debian where you file a bug (sometimes of
high relevance *and* with a patch ready for comsumption) and the
maintainer just sits there, doing nothing, sometimes for *way* more than
one year.
Do you want me to provide you with concrete examples or do you want them
spoon-fed to you?
This is frustrating to say the least. The solution that Debian has been
adopting (as an evolution) is team-maintainership (see the vrms project
on both the BTS and on svn.debian.org to see what I mean---actually see
almost anything on alioth.debian.org and you'll get what I mean).
I hope this helps to make you see the light that a different experiment
can be a way to improve the original project. Just like egcs has been
merged back into GCC.
Regards, Rogério Brito.
P.S.: Here goes a disclaimer: I was almost prepared to fork vrms as I
saw the sad state in which it was. Thankfully, Bdale Garbee was kind
enough to understand the situation and agree with team maintainership
for the package, of which I am now a joint admin (with bdale) on
alioth.
--
Rogério Brito : rbrito@ime.usp.br : http://www.ime.usp.br/~rbrito
Homepage of the algorithms package : http://algorithms.berlios.de
Homepage on freshmeat: http://freshmeat.net/projects/algorithms/
Reply to: