Bikeshedding
Hi *,
"More of a comment than a question..."
On Wed, Mar 20, 2019 at 06:17:00AM -0400, Sam Hartman wrote:
> I am disappointed when people leave bitter and disheartened.
That's still kind-of better than if they're bitter and disheartened,
but won't go away though!
One of the things I often think helps let people avoid getting bitter
and disheartened despite differences of opinion is the ability to carve
out their own space where they can do what they want. For the problems
we used to have -- "vi vs emacs", "gnome vs kde", "exim vs postfix vs
qmail", "systemd vs sysv", "ppc vs x86", "amd64 vs ia64" -- we've been
really good at letting people with different opinions get their way
without that causing problems for anyone else. To me "main vs non-free"
and even "stable vs testing vs unstable" match with that philosophy too,
if not as well. [0]
But we've got lots of new problems where that doesn't work so well:
people who want to quickly develop stuff with random libraries vs people
who don't want to run "curl http://... | sudo bash"; people who want to
make big changes to everything in the distro vs people who don't want
their packages to get broken due to the latest fad, etc.
A few years ago, we had a plan that (IMO) would have made a big
improvement there:
https://lists.debian.org/debian-devel/2013/05/msg00131.html
https://lists.debian.org/debian-devel/2015/09/msg00340.html
https://lists.debian.org/debian-devel/2015/09/msg00404.html
Did anything happen to that? (Or perhaps, that's better phrased as:
did anything cause it to stall other than ENOTIME?) I'm guessing not? [1]
Unless the things that caused it to stall were legal concerns or a need
for separated hosting/mirror infrastructure, that might not be something
the DPL can make much better. Perhaps if Joerg quits DAM due to being DPL
and ftpmaster due to having to re-delegate it, the combination of those
might leave him with more time for dak development despite also being DPL?
FWIW, I think giving every DD their own bikeshed that they can paint
whatever colour they like would be by far the biggest improvement possible
in Debian today. [2]
As a result, I kind of disagree with Joerg's statement in his platform
that "As the DPL is not the lead of actual technical development, it is
not for the DPL to find technical solutions for the challenges we face"
-- I think spending time making a huge technical improvement for the
project, like bikesheds, would be the best way to demonstrate leadership
(whether done by the DPL or not), and honestly I'd be more impressed
seeing a DPL do that compared to a DPL spending a year's time focussed
on mediating disputes and PR. Obviously, YMMV.
Anyway, some explicit questions if that's any help:
* Debian is made up of a lot of policies, and rules; and often has a
lot of arguments and hurt feelings. Debian's also made up of a lot of
genius (and admittedly not so genius) code and technical achievements.
Usually, DPLs seem to spend all their time dealing with policies and
conflicts, rather than technical stuff.
Do you think it makes sense to put some real effort in moving the
balance the other way? If so, how?
* Do you think bikesheds are actually a bad idea, or know of any other
particular roadblocks in the way of making bikesheds happen? If Joerg
is too busy to do it, do you have any ideas on how others could make it
happen (within Debian, not as a derivative of some sort)? If elected,
would you help remove those roadblocks?
* As far as technical projects go, is there anything you think would
have more of an impact than having bikesheds available to every DD?
(Or, if you think bikesheds are a bad idea, what's the biggest positive
impact technical project, in your opinion?)
Cheers,
aj
[0] I think the idea of mandating everyone use "dh" is a bit weird here;
if we made rules like that, then everyone would have been forced to
use debhelper or debmake and we would have had to have a big policy
debate before rolling it out, rather than "just doing it"... I
think that's the sort of setup that would have prevented "dh" ever
getting written in the first place, and I don't think it's far off
from saying it's the sort of policy that caused dh's inventor to
move on from Debian...
[1] https://lists.debian.org/debian-dak/2018/04/msg00039.html
https://lists.debian.org/debian-dak/2018/04/msg00040.html
[2] For example, want to do a big change but are stymied because some
maintainer isn't using dh and doesn't want to manually update their
package? Fork the entire archive into your own bikeshed and just do
it. After you've fixed the bugs, it's a lot easier to say "here's a
working solution, please consider the patches", and if there's still
opposition, a lot easier to have a useful debate on a list or with
the tech ctte about which is the best approach when they're both
implemented. And in the meantime anyone who cares can just use the
bikeshed, so they don't have to wait.
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