Bits from the packages.debian.org maintainer
Hi.
Since I seem to sense an increased stream of offers to help out with
packages.d.o coming my way (but maybe that is just wishful thinking ;)
I wanted to give a short update on the development of the current code
and the status of the infrastructure so that nobody can claim he wanted
to help but failed due to lack of information.
- The code in the CVS is seriously lacking in many regards, especially
update and CGI speed. It runs pretty stable though and since we
excluded robots from using the CGI scripts it seems to run with at
least enough speed to keep any big complaints from rising.
(If anyone is interested, packages.d.o currently has
about 200,000 page hits a day, with a notable decrease
- up to 50,000 - during the etch freeze and a similar increase after
release)
- packages.d.o is currently run on puccini.d.o, this host is
exclusivly used for this purpose. Adminstration is be done
by group pkg_maint, current members are Martin 'Joey' Schulze
and me.
- The same code is also used to create the page
http://packages.ubuntu.com, see branch ubuntu in CVS.
packages.ubuntu.com is run a private server of mine and
only administrated by me.
- Everybody with write access to the website has also write access
to this part of the CVS. The code run on packages.d.o is
updated once a day during the update cron job. Since there
is no staging ground for changes, any commits should be made
with extreme care...
- Last year Jeroen van Wolffelaar and I started to develop a new
version with the goal to make dynamic page generation possible
which allows for faster update of information and more flexible
presentation. We coordinated our work by using a SVN repository
located at http://svn.wolffelaar.nl/
- This development was stalled several times when he and/or I had no time
to actively pursue it.
- In April 2007 I decided to revive the development to get the code
in a state ready for deployment. Since I was by then inititated
in the wonders of distributed scm, I decided to move the code to
yet another repository:
http://source.djpig.de/git/?p=packages.git;a=summary
(for cloning use git://source.djpig.de/git/packages.git)
There is also a ubuntu branch there but it is in a rather
sorry state atm regarding site layout.
- I think the new code is currently in a state where it could be
safely deployed to packages.d.o but I'm currently waiting for
an etch upgrade of the host since the code has grown some dependencies on
stuff only available in etch. The next possibility for this
to happen is probably during Debconf.
- I don't know yet how to handle the SCM stuff when the code
is to be deployed.
- You can try out this new code base at http://packages.debian.net/
(Might be slightly out-of-date sometimes since I don't run the
cronjob as often as possible to give packages.ubuntu.com more
ressources)
- Bug reports and patches against this version are very much welcome,
please send them directly to me (but feel free to CC debian-www
if you want to have an open discussion on the matter in question).
- Bug reports and patches against the version currently in use should
be directed to the BTS as usual.
- If there is interest we can make a little improvised BoF about
packages.d.o at Debconf.
Gruesse,
--
Frank Lichtenheld <djpig@debian.org>
www: http://www.djpig.de/
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