ATrpms for Fedora 8; EOL for Fedora Core 6
by Axel Thimm
ATrpms is officially launching Fedora 8 support for i386, x86_64 and
ppc.
http://ATrpms.net/dist/f8/
o The actual download location is http://dl.atrpms.net/. Mirrors are
listed at http://atrpms.net/mirrors/
o "stable", "testing" and "bleeding", the three subrepos per
distribution are not cumulative inclusive on the server
side.
E.g. you need to add "stable" for "testing", and both "stable"
and "testing" for "bleeding".
ATrpms is a 3rd party general purpose package repository. It currently
supports
o F8/i386, F8/x86_64, F8/ppc, F7/i386, F7/x86_64, F7/ppc, FC6/i386,
FC6/x86_64, FC6/ppc
o RHEL5/i386, RHEL5/x86_64, RHEL4/i386, RHEL4/x86_64, RHEL3/i386,
RHEL3/x86_64
FC6 support will be EOL'd once the Fedora Project drops support for it
(e.g. on December 7, 2007).
Configuration for package resolvers (replace i386 with x86_64 or ppc
as needed)
o yum
[atrpms]
name=Fedora 8 - i386 - ATrpms
baseurl=http://dl.atrpms.net/f8-i386/atrpms/stable
o smart
[atrpms]
name=Fedora 8 - i386 - ATrpms
baseurl=http://dl.atrpms.net/f8-i386/atrpms/stable
type=rpm-md
o apt
repomd http://dl.atrpms.net f8-i386/atrpms/stable
you can provide feedback or request support on the ATrpms lists
(http://lists.atrpms.net/), or the common bug tracker
(http://bugzilla.atrpms.net/).
Enjoy!
--
Axel.Thimm at ATrpms.net
16 years, 4 months
rpm.livna.org repositories for Fedora 8 (Werewolf) now available
by Thorsten Leemhuis
On behalf of the Livna ( http://rpm.livna.org ) contributers I'd like to
announce the availability of the Livna package repository for Fedora 8
(Werewolf). The Livna repository hosts software as RPM packages which
cannot be shipped in the official Fedora repository for various reasons
and supports the i386, x86_64 and ppc architectures.
Using the Livna repository gives your Werewolf the ability to play all
kinds of audio such as MP3 files and plays DVDs. Additionally Livna
offers the ATI and Nvidia closed-source drivers in a Fedora-compatible
rpm package for the Fedora users whose videocards are not yet fully
supported with the stock open source drivers.
You can browse the repository at http://rpm.livna.org/fedora/8/ To make
it available on a freshly installed Fedora 8 system run the following
command:
{{{
$ su -c 'rpm -ivh http://rpm.livna.org/livna-release-8.rpm'
}}}
Further below you'll find some more examples on getting the important
bits for a modern system installed from livna.
On another note, I have some sad news:
Fedora 8 will be the last release livna will be offering its add-on
packages for. But don't despair, the future is bright: The Livna
contributers are busy working together with the guys behind dribble and
freshrpms to offer a unified repository in the future bringing you
games, multimedia software and other tools from a single source. This
merged repository is called "RPM Fusion"; you can find more information
about it at http://rpmfusion.org/
Interested? Want to help? Then don't hesitate and subscribe to the
developers mailing lists at
http://lists.rpmfusion.org/mailman/listinfo/rpmfusion-developers
or meet us in the #rpmfusion channel on freenode.
That's all folks. Thank you for your attention and we wish you a very
pleasant flight with the newly released Fedora 8 together with the Livna
repositories.
Bye!
Thorsten Leemhuis
== More details ==
Ladies and gentleman, the pilot has informed me that we've reached our
travel altitude. You can now loosen your seatbelt's and our flight
attendants will be with you shortly for refreshments. Still aboard and
reading? Great, here are some more informations for the curious:
=== Reminder for the folks that plan to yum-update to Fedora 8 ===
If you have livna-packages installed on your system and plan to
live-update to Fedora 8 using yum then please leave the livna-repos
enabled for the big "yum update" run. Then you'll get all the updated
packages from livna as well, which is important, as their dependencies
get fulfilled by the Fedora 8 packages -- that's not the case for the
old Livna packages that might still be installed on your Fedora system.
=== Examples to get the most important bits from livna ===
Once you installed the release-rpm you can install software using the
graphical software installation tool called pirut, which is part of
Fedora. You as root-users can also use yum on a command line to install
packages; for example:
* if you'd like to install xine as a video-player run
{{{
# yum install xine-lib-extras-nonfree xine
}}}
* if you prefer mplayer run
{{{
# yum install mplayer-gui
}}}
* if you prefer vlc run
{{{
# yum install vlc
}}}
* if you want to get the latest nvidia graphic drivers for modern cards
and the stock Fedora kernel run
{{{
# yum install kmod-nvidia
}}}
and restart X.
* if you want to get the latest amd graphic drivers for the stock Fedora
kernel run
{{{
# yum install kmod-fglrx
}}}
and restart X.
* you want to get MP3-Support in Gnome apps? run
{{{
# yum install gstreamer-plugins-ugly
}}}
* you're using KDE? Well, then run:
{{{
# yum install k3b-extras-nonfree kdemultimedia-extras-nonfree
}}}
=== Problems? ===
Let us know via http://bugzilla.livna.org/
=== Need support? ===
Many people in #fedora on freenode, on fedora-list(a)redhat.com and in the
forums know how to help.
=== Developer contact ===
Meet us in #livna on freenode or join the mailing list at
http://livna.org/mailman/listinfo/freeworld
=== EOF ===
End of file
16 years, 4 months
Fedora 8
by Max Spevack
On Thursday November 8th (about 3:00 PM GMT), Fedora 8 will go live to
the world, and you will be able to download it at
http://fedoraproject.org.
The bits are all finalized, the mirrors are synced, and the torrents are
primed. But until we flip the switch, you will have to tide yourself
over with this -- my personal Fedora 8 release announcement.
Fortunately, it's pretty long, so if you read it all, Fedora 8 might be
released by the time you have finished!
----
Fedora Core 1 was released on November 6, 2003. That is almost exactly
4 years ago to the date. There are a lot of people reading this who
were users, developers, or both of Fedora Core 1. I wasn't even a part
of the Fedora community back then -- I remember reading about it on
Slashdot and thinking "Red Hat would be a fun place to work some day".
I have been part of the Fedora Project for a little less than 2 years,
but I know enough of the people who have been there since day 1 to
recognize the tremendous strides that have been taken between version 1
and version 8 of this distribution.
Our community has grown, both the folks within Red Hat who are lucky
enough to spend their days working on Fedora and the folks in our
volunteer community who give so generously of their time and talents.
We have seen Fedora Extras go from an idea to a reality to such a
tremendous success that it led to the complete restructuring of Fedora's
development processes.
We have seen the emergence of infrastructure and translation teams that
are world-class in their abilities and achievements.
We have seen many of the brightest software engineers anywhere, some as
Red Hat employees and some as volunteers, continue to produce innovative
work with an "upstream first" mentality that benefits not just Red Hat
and Fedora but the entire free software community.
The Fedora Project on the whole -- not just the Linux distribution that
it produces -- today is consistent, reliable, and moving in the right
direction. I am fortunate to have the opportunity to be a part of that.
----
One of the goals that we specifically chose for Fedora 8 was to use it
as the release that gets us back on track in terms of predictability. We
picked two dates -- Halloween and May Day -- that are 6 months apart,
and for the foreseeable future it is Fedora's goal to release as close
to those two dates as possible.
Fedora 7 was released on May 31st. Fedora 8 arrives on November 8th.
In the software world, getting within one week of a date that was picked
six months earlier is considered successful, and I think that everyone
in our development and contributor community should be proud of the fact
that we put together a quality release that includes lots of new
features in exactly 23 weeks.
----
Fedora's development priorities tend to come in cycles. If you think
back to the Fedora Core 6 release cycle, you will remember that a
significant portion of the engineering goals for that release were
driven by the knowledge that Fedora Core 6 would be the upstream for Red
Hat Enterprise Linux 5. Everyone knew going in that Fedora Core 6 would
be more "corporate" than "community". And that was ok, because we also
knew that once Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5 was released, the Fedora
Project would be able to spend its next several releases focused on its
community-related priorities. Fedora 9 will probably start to see the
pendulum swing back in the other direction, as Red Hat Enterprise Linux
6 starts to materialize on the horizon.
Fedora 7 and Fedora 8 need to be thought of together in that context --
the community's goals and priorities being paramount. The overarching
goal for both of these releases has been in the realm of custom spins.
We debuted this model in Fedora 7 with pungi, livecd-creator, and
revisor. Fedora 8 has expanded this further, and has proven the
hypothesis of "if we give people the tools, they will come".
Fedora 8 brings with it a developer spin, a games spin, and an
electronic lab spin, in addition to the GNOME and KDE desktop spins that
were first part of Fedora 7.
Additionally, we have seen organizations like Creative Commons use the
Fedora build tools in the past year as the basis for their own custom
Linux projects, built using Fedora as its foundation.
----
There are a tremendous number of new features in Fedora 8 -- too many
for me to list here. But there is an excellent release summary on the
Fedora Project wiki that I encourage you to read if you want more
specifics about Fedora 8.
* http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Releases/8/ReleaseSummary
If you are interested in running Fedora 8 entirely off of a USB key, we
have an article in Red Hat Magazine that can help you.
* http://www.redhatmagazine.com/2007/11/07/i-am-fedora-and-so-can-you/
We also have a series of interviews with some of the developers who
worked on these features, which offer interesting insights.
* http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Interviews
If you check out my blog, you can see our ongoing "lesser-known Fedora
contributors" series:
* http://spevack.livejournal.com/tag/fedora
And finally, for those of you who can't get enough and want to know what
is being planned for Fedora 9, I am here to help.
* http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Releases/9/FeatureList
----
My sincere thanks to all of our developers, users, testers, writers,
translators, and ambassadors -- in short, our Community, wherever you
happen to live or work. You are Fedora. None of this would exist
without you.
Max Spevack
Fedora Project Leader
16 years, 4 months
Fedora Unity releases updated Fedora 7 Re-Spins
by Jeroen van Meeuwen
The Fedora Unity Project is proud to announce the release of new ISO
Re-Spins (DVD and CD Sets) of Fedora 7. These Re-Spin ISOs are based on
Fedora 7 and all updates released as of October 30th, 2007. The ISO
images are available for i386 and x86_64 architectures via jigdo
starting Wednesday, November 7th, 2007. We have included CD Image sets
for those in the Fedora community that do not have DVD drives or burners
available.
Fedora Unity has taken up the Re-Spin task to provide the community with
the chance to install Fedora with recent updates already included. These
updates might otherwise comprise more than 1.91GiB of downloads for a
full install. This is a community project, for and by the community.
You can contribute to the community by joining our test process.
A full changelog of the packages that have been updated in this Re-Spin
can be reviewed on http://spins.fedoraunity.org/changelogs/20071030/
This Re-Spin will obsolete the previous Re-Spin released by Fedora
Unity, namely '20070912'.
If you are interested in helping with the testing or mirroring efforts,
please contact the Fedora Unity team. Contact information is available
at http://fedoraunity.org/ or the #fedora-unity channel on the Freenode
IRC Network (irc.freenode.net).
Go to http://spins.fedoraunity.org/ to get the bits!
To report bugs in the Re-Spins please use http://bugs.fedoraunity.org/
Kind regards,
Jeroen van Meeuwen
Fedora Unity Founder
kanarip(a)fedoraunity.org
--
Fedora is a trademark of Red Hat, Inc.
16 years, 4 months
Fedora Weekly News Issue 108
by Thomas Chung
= Fedora Weekly News Issue 108 =
Welcome to Fedora Weekly News Issue 108 for the week of October 29th.
http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/FWN/Issue108
In Announcements, we have "Fedora Core 6 End of Life"
In Planet Fedora, we have "Fedora 8 Release is on its Way Out",
"Fedora 8 Release Summary", "Upgrading from Rawhide to Final Release"
and "Codec Buddy Interview"
To join or give us your feedback, please visit
http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/NewsProject/Join.
1. Announcements
1. Fedora Core 6 End of Life
2. Planet Fedora
1. Fedora 8 Release is on its Way Out
2. Fedora 8 Release Summary
3. Upgrading from Rawhide to Final Release
4. Codec Buddy Interview
3. Marketing
1. Fedora struggles with harm reduction via CodecBuddy
2. PulseAudio by default in Fedora 8!
3. New Display Tool Coming In Fedora 9
4. Developments
1. Package EVR Problems
2. MP3 Licensing Issues
3. KDE Flamewar Warms Up Night Of Final Freeze
4. Filesystem Mounts: UUIDs or LABELs?
5. Split KDE Packages
6. IcedTea Plugin On x86_64
7. SecondLife Exposes Mesa Licensing Problem?
5. Advisory Board
1. Fedora Board Meeting
6. Fonts
1. Fedora Fonts SIG TODO List
7. Infrastructure
1. The Wiki
8. Security Week
1. IBM Plans Major Security Initiative
9. Advisories and Updates
1. Fedora 7 Security Advisories
10. Events and Meetings
1. Fedora Board Meeting Minutes 2007-10-30
2. Fedora Ambassadors Meeting 2007-MM-DD
3. Fedora Documentation Steering Committee (Log) 2007-10-28
4. Fedora Engineering Steering Committee Meeting 2007-MM-DD
5. Fedora Extra Packages for Enterprise Linux Report 2007-MM-DD
6. Fedora Infrastructure Meeting (Log) 2007-11-01
7. Fedora KDE-SIG Meeting 2007-10-30
8. Fedora Localization Meeting 2007-MM-DD
9. Fedora Marketing Meeting 2007-MM-DD
10. Fedora Packaging Committee Meeting 2007-10-30
11. Fedora Release Engineering Meeting 2007-10-29
[[Anchor(Announcements)]]
== Announcements ==
In this section, we cover announcements from Fedora Project.
https://www.redhat.com/mailman/listinfo/fedora-announce-list
Contributing Writer: ThomasChung
=== Fedora Core 6 End of Life ===
BillNottingham announces in fedora-announce-list[1],
"A reminder to users: Fedora Core 6 will reach its end of life for updates on
Friday, December 7, 2007."
"Fedora 7 will remain supported until one month past the release of Fedora 9
(as things stand, this would be roughly through the end of May, 2008)."
[1] https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-announce-list/2007-November/msg000...
[[Anchor(PlanetFedora)]]
== Planet Fedora ==
In this section, we cover a highlight of Planet Fedora - an
aggregation of blogs from world wide Fedora contributors.
http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Planet
Contributing Writers: ThomasChung
=== Fedora 8 Release is on its Way Out ===
JeremyKatz points out in his blog[1],
"As a few other people have mentioned, we finished up Fedora 8 on
Friday and it's currently on its way to the mirror masters so that the
mirrors should be able to start picking it up tomorrow (just pending
getting the export control bits into place) and we'll be releasing on
Thursday. Overall, I'm feeling pretty good about the release -- we got
some good things in and I think that a lot of the improvements should
be pretty visible to most of our users. Doesn't mean there are things
that could be better or that we could do better from a process
perspective. But for the moment, I think I'm going to try to enjoy the
fact that the release is done."
[1] http://katzj.livejournal.com/408520.html
=== Fedora 8 Release Summary ===
JonathanRoberts points out in his blog[1],
"Fedora 8 is out in 5 days now and as part of our final marketing
efforts we've been putting together a release summary. Take a look at
it, and if there's a new feature that you really like and we've
missed, add a section on it! And if there's a feature you really like
that we haven't done justice too, (please remember, we're trying to
keep it brief) expand and improve on what we've done!"
[1] http://blog.questionsplease.org/2007/11/04/release-summary/
=== Upgrading from Rawhide to Final Release ===
MaxSpevack points out in his blog[1]
"Every release cycle, there seems to be confusion about how to
transition over from Rawhide (the nightly build of Fedora) to whatever
the final release is (in this case, Fedora 8). This confusion is
understandable, because at first glance the process is a bit magical.
Let's see if I can explain it a little bit. The short answer is this:
you don't have to do anything! It will Just Work."
[1] http://spevack.livejournal.com/33314.html
=== Codec Buddy Interview ===
JonathanRoberts points out in his blog[1],
"Starting to pick up the pace a bit to make sure I get all the
interviews covered before Fedora 8's release. Any how, with that
aside, the latest interview is up: this time it's about Codec Buddy
and unlike previous interviews is with two of the primary developers
behind this feature - ThomasVanderStichele and BastienNocera; like
always it's a really great read as they discuss many different topics,
and you can even find some screenshots showing the process of enabling
MP3 playback with Codec Buddy."
[1] http://blog.questionsplease.org/2007/11/02/codec-buddy-interview/
[[Anchor(Marketing)]]
== Marketing ==
In this section, we cover Fedora Marketing Project.
http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Marketing
Contributing Writer: ThomasChung
=== Fedora struggles with harm reduction via CodecBuddy ===
RahulSundaram reports in fedora-marketing-list
"In public health, harm reduction is a practice that, rather than
trying to eradicate potentially dangerous choices like prostitution,
tries to minimize their effects. Often, the practice involves a
limited condoning of the practice, such as safe injection sites for
addicts. Harm reduction is the path that Fedora 8 has chosen on the
issue of MP3 and other non-free codecs in the form of CodecBuddy, a
Codeina-based program that tries to educate users about free software
while giving them easy legal access to codecs by linking to the
commercial Fluendo site. It's a decision about which the Fedora Board
and community leaders feel considerable ambivalence."
[1] https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-marketing-list/2007-November/msg00...
=== PulseAudio by default in Fedora 8! ===
RahulSundaram reports in fedora-marketing-list,
"PulseAudio is a next-generation sound server for GNU/Linux, creating
the possibility of enabling all sorts of "ear-candy": it's possible to
dynamically control the volume of individual applications, and
hot-plugging works great with it. Read on for more details, including
what can be expected in the future."
[1] https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-marketing-list/2007-October/msg004...
=== New Display Tool Coming In Fedora 9 ===
RahulSundaram reports in fedora-marketing-list,
"There's less than two weeks now until the release of Fedora 8, which
has been codenamed Werewolf. However, it's not too early to start
thinking about Fedora 9. One of the items that has already been
brought up for this next release cycle is a new display utility. While
there is the rather basic system-config-display utility from Red Hat,
Fedora is currently lacking a graphical tool to change or enable
display devices (such as LCDs or TVs) in real-time."
[1] https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-marketing-list/2007-October/msg004...
[[Anchor(Developments)]]
== Developments ==
In this section, we cover the problems/solutions, people/personalities, and
ups/downs of the endless discussions on Fedora Developments.
http://www.redhat.com/mailman/listinfo/fedora-devel-list
Contributing Writer: OisinFeeley
=== Package EVR Problems ===
The recent series of automated reports from the buildsystem showing
problems with the EVR[1] of packages prompted RolandMcGrath to
suggest[2] that updates pending in bodhi, but not yet pushed should be
considered by the script generating the reports in order to either
suppress the complaint or to notify release-engineering instead of the
maintainer.
[1] EVR stands for Epoch, Version, Release. See
http://www.redhat.com/archives/rpm-list/2004-August/msg00117.html
[2] https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-devel-list/2007-October/msg02810.html
This was answered by MichaelSchwendt with the suggestion that bodhi
could have an interface for anonymous users added and with a link to
the script generating the reports, to which Michael has contributed
substantially suggesting that patches were welcome. JesseKeating
added[3] that there is a command line interface for bodhi in the
works.
[3] https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-devel-list/2007-November/msg00022....
Some brief confusion occurred when DouglasWarner pointed out[4] that
if a package is sitting in updates-testing and has not been pushed
into stable then that constitutes a broken upgrade path and the
maintainer should be notified. Douglas thought that Roland was asking
for the notification to be suppressed. JesseKeating corrected[5] this
however with the information that the party responsible for the push
was release-engineering and not the maintainer and that Roland wished
the emails to no longer go to maintainers as they had already done
their part.
[4] https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-devel-list/2007-November/msg00023....
[5] https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-devel-list/2007-November/msg00032....
There were objections from TillMaas and RalfCorsepius about the
schemes for choosing the NEVR (Name, Epoch, Version, Release) of RPM
packages. These detailed arguments center around what is understood
to be the purpose of the testing, stable and development repositories.
The varied interpretations have the practical result of differing
upgrade capabilities from one repository (and distro version) to
another. There are also implications for the amount of work which
maintainers would have to do, and this was highlighted[6] by Till.
MichaelSchwendt countered[7] this with the observation that currently
the ''upgradepathcheck'' script will soon have to consider more than
one updates-testing repository and that ignoring what it reports has
historically resulted in less preparation of updates for the most
recent test release.
[6] https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-devel-list/2007-November/msg00075....
[7] https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-devel-list/2007-November/msg00080....
RalfCorsepius argued[8] that testing should be limited to specific
distros due to their unique environment and that the testing
repositories should contain experimental packages which may not end up
in ''updates''. A detailed discussion between Michael, Ralf and
KevinKofler followed[9] with Ralf apparently arguing that their vision
of using a consistent EVR scheme which allows concurrent release and
testing of packages in multiple distributions is flawed. Ralf's
assertions about Michael's vision of how EVR naming should interplay
with the different repositories were described as "ridiculous" in a
lengthy and thoughtful post[10] from Michael. In it Michael repeated
that it was necessary to test updates in all the possible distribution
environments and promised that the next report would once again
exclude F-7 updates-testing from the check. Michael also argued that
Ralf was being overly negative and unhelpful.
[8] https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-devel-list/2007-November/msg00081....
[9] https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-devel-list/2007-November/msg00092....
[10] https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-devel-list/2007-November/msg00098....
JesseKeating later joined[11] the discussion and argued that Ralf was
not considering the reality that packages in testing are frequently
promulgated into the stable release. It's a detailed and confusing
thread which does not lend itself to easy summary and ended[12] in
Jesse claiming that Ralf was mis-characterizing the situation as a
disagreement between himself and Jesse, whereas in fact it was between
Ralf and the majority of maintainers..
[11] https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-devel-list/2007-November/msg00115....
[12] https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-devel-list/2007-November/msg00120....
=== MP3 Licensing Issues ===
The issue of whether it is legal to include mp3 decoders (in the form
of ''mpg123'') and possibly add support for ''join stereo coding'' was
floated[1] by PeterLemenkov who had been reading around and noticing
that the core patent was due to expire in a month. Peter stated his
understanding of the situation to be that ''OGG Vorbis'' (erroneously
referred to simply as Ogg) may violate patents, that there were
non-commercial exceptions made , that many of the patents referred to
encoding rather than decoding and thus were not applicable and finally
that the Frauenhofer patents had expired in the EU. He wondered if
they also had expired in the USA.
[1] https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-devel-list/2007-November/msg00012....
The status of the freedom of the rights granted under the
non-commercial exceptions was foregrounded[2] by RahulSundaram who
stated that they were incompatible with the GPL. Rahul also asked for
evidence that OGG Vorbis violated patents.
[2] https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-devel-list/2007-November/msg00013....
SimoSorce felt[3] that part of Rahul's reply was not precise enough
when it cited the GPL and despite TomCallaway concurring with Rahul's
interpretation Simo disagreed that the GPL made it necessary for an
author to also supply a written non-limiting patent grant.
[3] https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-devel-list/2007-November/msg00029....
The answer to the US-centric question on expiry dates was supplied[4]
by TomCallaway with a list of the patents which mostly expire within
the next decade.
[4] https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-devel-list/2007-November/msg00028....
=== KDE Flamewar Warms Up Night Of Final Freeze ===
A mostly happy and appreciative StefanGrosse reported[1] that the KDE
''logout'' dialogue was missing the ''shutdown'' and ''hibernation''
buttons while running a system upgraded to Rawhide from Fedora 8 Test
3. There was solely an ''end session'' button which led back to the
''login'' screen where it was then possible to shutdown. SebastianVahl
suggested that it was necessary to use ''KDM'' as the login manager
and Stefan asked[2] for details on how to do this. He also remembered
that upgrading from Fedora 7 to Rawhide saw these buttons disappear,
but that they had been present even when using GDM in Fedora Core 6.
[1] https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-devel-list/2007-October/msg02616.html
[2] https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-devel-list/2007-October/msg02621.html
Sebastian answered that it was necessary to create a
''/etc/sysconfig/desktop'' containing ''DESKTOP="KDE" and
DISPLAYMANAGER=KDE'' and suggested that the question was not
appropriate to @fedora-devel. RahulSundaram thought[3] that it was
because it was odd that the Fedora DVD image was installing GDM if the
user had selected KDE. KevinKofler traced[4] this back to ''desktop
unification'' in Red Hat Linux 8.0. BillNottingham stated[5] that
''GDM'' was the default login manager in the base X group and couldn't
be removed from it. Rahul wondered[6] why GDM was not in the GNOME
package group instead of the X package group.
[3] https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-devel-list/2007-October/msg02624.html
[4] https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-devel-list/2007-October/msg02627.html
[5] https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-devel-list/2007-October/msg02640.html
[6] https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-devel-list/2007-October/msg02650.html
Later Bill argued[7] that ''xdm'' was inappropriate as a default
display manager because it was so bad and MatthiasClasen responded to
Rahul that associating a display manager with a desktop environment
was illogical anyway. Rahul was un-swayed[8] and argued for either a
neutral display manager, or else for the display manager to reflect
the chosen desktop environment.
[7] https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-devel-list/2007-October/msg02653.html
[8] https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-devel-list/2007-October/msg02652.html
The first sparks of a flamewar appeared when Bill felt that Rahul was
dismissing his argument without considering the context and Rahul
asked[9] why it would be a problem to either install XDM or the
desktop-appropriate display manager. MatthiasClasen suppled[10] the
argument that due to the security importance of a display manager it
would be necessary to do unneeded extra work if more than one were
shipped. When JesseKeating amplified this point by noting the choice
between duplicating each feature or else confusing users there was a
certain amount of irritation expressed by KDE developers KevinKofler
and VikramGoyal [11] who noted that KDE had supported some features
first and that the unpleasant logical conclusion was that KDE
integration was going to be ignored. Rahul countered[12] Matthias by
noting that KDM is already the default for the KDE spin and that as
the repositories already carry various display managers there is no
security or work advantage in avoiding its use. KevinKofler made the
same point, with the addition[13] that the KDE SIG had clearly decided
that they wanted to use KDM. ChristopherAillon shared[14] the
information that work was being done on a unified generic login
manager (by William Jon McCann) and asked that instead of internecine
Fedora fighting energy would be directed to convince upstream KDM
developers of the advantages. RexDieter promised to see what he could
do in that direction.
[9] https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-devel-list/2007-October/msg02658.html
[10] https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-devel-list/2007-October/msg02659.html
[11] https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-devel-list/2007-October/msg02697.html
[12] https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-devel-list/2007-October/msg02662.html
[13] https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-devel-list/2007-October/msg02686.html
[14] https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-devel-list/2007-October/msg02723.html
BillNottingham argued[15] that although there was a regression in
functionality it would be better to investigate the bug instead of
suggesting that long-established practice be changed on the night of
the final freeze. The thread continued[16] to get toasty when Bill
told Rahul that the change was a one line patch to make ''kdebase''
point to the correct FIFO to communicate with GDM. Rahul's insistence
that he had raised and discussed this issue in Bugzilla in the past
led to Bill accusing[16] him of pushing an agenda under the cover of a
bug which he was not interested in solving. Bill closed[17] with a
restatement of the problem and the use of GDM as a default (which can
be unchecked) during install.
[15] https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-devel-list/2007-October/msg02664.html
[16] https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-devel-list/2007-October/msg02670.html
[17] https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-devel-list/2007-October/msg02796.html
MatthiasClasen disagreed with Rahul that this change was a regression
and Rahul's disavowal of certainty about the term led
ChristopherAillon to be aware that if he was "going to play the
non-native speaker card" that it was also held by many other
participants. Christopher asked[18] Rahul to "curb the hostility and
try a different argument". Rahul wondered what he meant, and a
Christopher referenced[19] a separate strand of the thread in which
Rahul had cautioned[19] that throwing accusations around about the KDE
maintainers was counterproductive and added some links to show
evidence of how he had earlier been accused of being anti-KDE.
Christopher appeared bemused as to what this had to do with him and
pointed out that it put him on the defensive. Rahul apologized for
seeming to complain and Christopher again responded that Rahul had
made his point several times and although it was reasonable to
requested KDM as a default when KDE is selected from the Fedora DVD
there had been unrefuted technical answers from BillNottingham and
JesseKeating as to why this was not going to happen for Fedora 8.
Jesse had also suggested much earlier that the KDE release notes
should simply tell users to uncheck GDM[19a]
[18] https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-devel-list/2007-October/msg02761.html
[19] https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-devel-list/2007-October/msg02722.html
[19a] https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-devel-list/2007-October/msg02676.html
A detailed response[20] from KevinKofler outlined two possible ways in
which the problem could be solved without modifying ''anaconda'' and
one way in which anaconda could be hacked. Kevin was very clear that
KDM is the preferred display manager and will continue to be so in
KDE4.0. Later he promised[21] that KDM would only be pried from "my
cold dead hands."
[20] https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-devel-list/2007-October/msg02793.html
[21] https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-devel-list/2007-October/msg02690.html
DaveAirlie agreed with Bill that "[XDM] is a horror" although
JoachimFrieben thought[23] that it could provide a plain X environment
without the encumbrances of all the package dependencies of GNOME and
KDE and that foisting GDM on advanced users was undesirable.
ChristopherAillon thought that such advanced users could probably do
what they wanted with kickstart or re-spinning.
[22] https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-devel-list/2007-November/msg00019....
Final thoughts on the thread came from the KDE developers who
expressed[23] distrust due to the way in which KNetworkManager had
been handled. It seemed that although it is possible to use
NetworkManager via a dummy package that installs several gnome
libraries[24] it has not been possible to adapt the KNetworkManager
frontend to use the very rapidly improved NetworkManager backend.
[23] https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-devel-list/2007-November/msg00036....
[24] https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-devel-list/2007-November/msg00039....
=== Filesystem Mounts: UUIDs or LABELs? ===
An inquiry[1] from AmitakhyaPhukan about why all detected filesystems
are automatically mounted (on a rawhide machine) with desktop icons
led to a discussion of the use of PolicyKit in Fedora 9. DavidZeuthen
explained[2] that Rawhide mounts fixed drives only when root has made
some changes. Apparently there is not yet a GUI to undo help with
undoing these administrator initiated changes, but David suggested
using ''polkit-grant --delete <username>''. KevinKofler suggested[3]
that Amitakhya should check that
''usr/share/hal/fdi/policy/10osvendor/99-redhat-storage-policy-fixed-drives.fdi''
existed with the same contents as in Fedora 8.
[1] https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-devel-list/2007-November/msg00010....
[2] https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-devel-list/2007-November/msg00052....
[3] https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-devel-list/2007-November/msg00037....
RoddClarkson had also seen some filesystems (which hadn't been visible
in Fedora 7) show up in the disk mounter applet for Rawhide. David
explained[4] that these were from previous OSes and are now shown in
Fedora 8. He agreed that the text shown in the UI might be a little
misleading due to the labels chosen, and also wondered why the
anaconda team had chosen to use LABELs over UUIDs.
[4] https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-devel-list/2007-November/msg00128....
David followed up by apologizing for his rant and providing[5]
bugzilla entries where these issues could be discussed.
[5] https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-devel-list/2007-November/msg00129....
=== Split KDE Packages ===
"Axel" wondered[1] whether it would be possible to split KDE packages
into multiple smaller sub packages. The reasoning behind this is that
KDE install currently pull in many unwanted programs leading to an
unnecessarily bloated system. Axel acknowledged that Fedora was
primarily a "GNOME based distribution" but preferred to use KDE.
[1] https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-devel-list/2007-November/msg00000....
The official position of the KDE SIG was regretfully conveyed[2] by
KevinKofler. The issue has been discussed in the SIG's IRC meetings
and the consensus has been that the maintenance burden would be too
high. A compromise position which sees the splitting out of less used
components into "-extras" sub packages has been adopted. This allows
the production of a LiveCD. Kevin also replied that if the same
programs appear in more than one place in the KDE menus then this a
bug and it would be appreciated if those finding them would search
Bugzilla before opening a new bug.
[2] https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-devel-list/2007-November/msg00001....
=== IcedTea Plugin On x86_64 ===
A non-functioning IcedTea java plugin for Firefox led MarkeBidewell to
wonder[1] if the problem was because the plugin directory was named
"amd64" while he was using an Intel system. RexDieter confirmed the
problem and provided a solution which was symlinking the IcedTea
plugin to the Firefox plugins subdirectory[2].
[1] https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-devel-list/2007-October/msg02774.html
[2] https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-devel-list/2007-October/msg02779.html
MarkBidewell and JefSpaleta agreed[3] that the problem was probably an
incorrect search path for Mozilla. BillNottingham suggested[4] running
''mozilla-plugin-config -i -f'' as root.
[3] https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-devel-list/2007-October/msg02788.html
[4] https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-devel-list/2007-October/msg02798.html
=== SecondLife Exposes Mesa Licensing Problem? ===
A bunch of OpenGL headers had attention drawn to their licensing
because due to a bug opened against SecondLife. CallumLerwick grepped
through several and found[1] that they were using "SGI Free Software
License B" which seemed to be explicitly not acceptable in Fedora.
HansdeGoede agreed[2] with Callum and said that they had been allowed
as an exception due to their essential nature, but that since talks
with SGI were stagnating it would be good to start working on removing
and replacing the troublesome pieces.
[1] https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-devel-list/2007-October/msg02706.html
[2] https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-devel-list/2007-October/msg02709.html
Callum later added[3] that the problem seemed to have been fixed in
the version of Mesa which was included in Fedora 8, but TomCallaway
was unsure about the validity of the relicensing and asked[4]
AdamJackson for information.
[3] https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-devel-list/2007-October/msg02713.html
[4] https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-devel-list/2007-October/msg02732.html
HansdeGoede (as could be expected of someone maintaining so many game
packages) had done some research and found[5] that ownership of the
OpenGL standard had been transferred to "The Khronos Group" and appear
to have been committed legitimately. Hans and Tom were in agreement
that the problem was bigger than this and remained unsolved however.
[5] https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-devel-list/2007-October/msg02735.html
[6] https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-devel-list/2007-October/msg02736.html
[[Anchor(AdvisoryBoard)]]
== Advisory Board ==
In this section, we cover discussion in Fedora Advisory Board.
https://www.redhat.com/mailman/listinfo/fedora-advisory-board
Contributing Writer: MichaelLarabel
=== Fedora Board Meeting ===
With Fedora 8 coming out in just a few days, this past week's Fedora
Board Meeting[1] was about the Fedora 8 Blocker List[2]. Among the
outstanding issues affected NetworkManager, LiveCD/USB testing,
Python/Turkish, and dmraid. The final day to have the Fedora 8 tree
completed was Friday, and fortunately everything was completed in
time. Find out more in the fedora-advisory-board message[3].
[1] http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Board/Meetings/2007-10-30
[2] https://bugzilla.redhat.com/showdependencytree.cgi?id=235703&hide_resolved=1
[3] https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-advisory-board/2007-October/msg000...
[[Anchor(Fonts)]]
== Fonts ==
In this section, we cover discussion in Fedora Fonts.
https://www.redhat.com/mailman/listinfo/fedora-fonts-list
Contributing Writer: MichaelLarabel
=== Fedora Fonts SIG TODO List ===
If you've been wanting to help out with the Fedora Fonts, but are
unsure of what you would like to work on, NicolasMailhot has created a
TODO list[1] for this special interest group, The Fonts TODO List[2]
lists one-time tasks as well as recurring tasks along with those that
have been completed. If you've been wanting to help out or are curious
where the Fedora Fonts SIG stands today, check out the list.
[1] https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-fonts-list/2007-November/msg00045....
[2] http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/SIGs/Fonts/Todo
[[Anchor(Infrastructure)]]
== Infrastructure ==
In this section, we cover the Fedora Infrastructure Project.
http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Infrastructure
Contributing Writer: JasonMatthewTaylor
=== The Wiki ===
There was more discussion this week[1][2] about what to do about the
wiki, whether to move to a new software or keep the existing and patch
it as needed. The jury is still out, we will see what happens after F8
is released.
[1] https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-infrastructure-list/2007-October/m...
[2] https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-infrastructure-list/2007-November/...
[[Anchor(SecurityWeek)]]
== Security Week ==
In this section, we highlight the security stories from the week in Fedora.
Contributing Writer: JoshBressers
=== IBM Plans Major Security Initiative ===
http://ap.google.com/article/ALeqM5iSFxylj-4ojpf44zNT6k01yBY5RgD8SKHH781
IBM announced last week that they plan to spend 1.5 billion ( with a
big B ) dollars on security research in 2008. Information Security is
becoming a very serious business. I suspect the biggest issue now is
going to be finding employees to fill these positions.
[[Anchor(AdvisoriesUpdates)]]
== Advisories and Updates ==
In this section, we cover Security Advisories and Package Updates from
fedora-package-announce.
https://www.redhat.com/mailman/listinfo/fedora-package-announce
Contributing Writer: ThomasChung
=== Fedora 7 Security Advisories ===
* tar-1.15.1-28.fc7 -
https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-package-announce/2007-October/msg0...
* subversion-1.4.4-1.fc7 -
https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-package-announce/2007-October/msg0...
* python-2.5-14.fc7 -
https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-package-announce/2007-October/msg0...
* ruby-1.8.6.111-1.fc7 -
https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-package-announce/2007-October/msg0...
* openvrml-0.16.6-3.fc7 -
https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-package-announce/2007-October/msg0...
* galeon-2.0.3-12.fc7 -
https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-package-announce/2007-October/msg0...
* Miro-0.9.8.1-4.fc7 -
https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-package-announce/2007-October/msg0...
* chmsee-1.0.0-1.25.fc7 -
https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-package-announce/2007-October/msg0...
* xen-3.1.0-8.fc7 -
https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-package-announce/2007-November/msg...
* nagios-plugins-1.4.8-9.fc7 -
https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-package-announce/2007-November/msg...
* pidgin-2.2.2-1.fc7 -
https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-package-announce/2007-November/msg...
* cups-1.2.12-6.fc7 -
https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-package-announce/2007-November/msg...
* xscreensaver-5.03-14.fc7 -
https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-package-announce/2007-November/msg...
* liferea-1.2.23-4.fc7 -
https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-package-announce/2007-November/msg...
* flac-1.2.1-1.fc7 -
https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-package-announce/2007-November/msg...
* phpMyAdmin-2.11.2-1.fc7 -
https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-package-announce/2007-November/msg...
[[Anchor(EventsMeetings)]]
== Events and Meetings ==
In this section, we cover event reports and meeting summaries from
various projects.
Contributing Writer: ThomasChung
=== Fedora Board Meeting Minutes 2007-10-30 ===
* https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-advisory-board/2007-October/msg000...
=== Fedora Ambassadors Meeting 2007-MM-DD ===
* No Report
=== Fedora Documentation Steering Committee (Log) 2007-10-28 ===
* https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-docs-list/2007-October/msg00168.html
=== Fedora Engineering Steering Committee Meeting 2007-MM-DD ===
* No Report
=== Fedora Extra Packages for Enterprise Linux Report 2007-MM-DD ===
* No Report
=== Fedora Infrastructure Meeting (Log) 2007-11-01 ===
* https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-infrastructure-list/2007-November/...
=== Fedora KDE-SIG Meeting 2007-10-30 ===
* https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-devel-list/2007-October/msg02615.html
=== Fedora Localization Meeting 2007-MM-DD ===
* No Report
=== Fedora Marketing Meeting 2007-MM-DD ===
* No Report
=== Fedora Packaging Committee Meeting 2007-10-30 ===
* https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-devel-list/2007-October/msg02797.html
=== Fedora Release Engineering Meeting 2007-10-29 ===
* http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/ReleaseEngineering/Meetings/2007-oct-29
--
Thomas Chung
http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/ThomasChung
16 years, 4 months
Fedora Core 6 End of Life
by Bill Nottingham
A reminder to users: Fedora Core 6 will reach its end of life for updates on
Friday, December 7, 2007.
Fedora 7 will remain supported until one month past the release of Fedora 9
(as things stand, this would be roughly through the end of May, 2008).
- The Fedora Board
16 years, 5 months