F39 Change Proposal: Retire Modularity (Self Contained)

[Aoife Moloney]

https://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Changes/RetireModularity

This document represents a proposed Change. As part of the Changes
process, proposals are publicly announced in order to receive
community feedback. This proposal will only be implemented if approved
by the Fedora Engineering Steering Committee.

== Summary ==

Fedora will discontinue building
[https://docs.fedoraproject.org/en-US/modularity/ modules] for Fedora
Linux 39 and further in the Fedora infrastructure and shipping modular
content to users. The fedora-repos-modular and
fedora-repos-rawhide-modular packages will be retired and obsoleted.
The modular repositories will no longer be composed. Once Fedora Linux
38 reaches the end of life, Fedora's [https://mbs.fedoraproject.org/
Module Build Service] will be terminated. Whether or not dnf(5) would
still support modularity from 3rd party repository is out of the scope
of this proposal.

== Owner ==

* Name: [[User:Churchyard|Miro Hrončok]]
* Name: [[User:Mcurlej|Martin Čurlej]]
* Name: [[User:Ppisar|Petr Písař]]

* Email: [e-mail], [e-mail], [e-mail]

== Detailed Description ==

=== Motivation ===

There are very few modules left in Fedora, nobody is developing
modularity anymore and there is an everlasting infrastructure problem
with building modules. Similarly to retiring a package that has no
maintainers, we are retiring Modularity from Fedora, because it has no
maintainers. The latest noticeable activity in
[https://pagure.io/modularity pagure.io/modularity] was 3+ years ago.

=== What will happen ===

# After Fedora Linux 38 branches from Rawhide, we will disable
building modules for Rawhide and future Fedora Linux 39 and later.
# We will work with Release Engineering to disable composing of
modular repositories, F39 Modular updates in Bodhi etc.
# The fedora-repos-modular and fedora-repos-rawhide-modular
subpackages of fedora-repos will be removed and obsoleted by
fedora-repos and fedora-repos-rawhide.
# Once Fedora Linux 38 reaches end of life, we will retire the Fedora
instance of [https://mbs.fedoraproject.org/ Module Build Service].

=== What might or might not happen ===

Whether or not the package manager in Fedora Linux (dnf and/or dnf5)
will support modular repositories created by 3rd parties is not
decided in this change proposal. It is up to the dnf maintainers to
make this decision and we intentionally want to make the scope of this
proposal as limited as possible.

=== For maintainers of modules ===

Please retire your modules appropriately, so users are migrated to
suitable non-modular content. If you wish to continue shipping
multiple different versions or editions of your packages, please
follow [https://docs.fedoraproject.org/en-US/packaging-guidelines/Naming/#multiple
'''Multiple packages with the same base name'''], as was
[https://docs.fedoraproject.org/en-US/modularity/policies/#_requirements_for_...
a recommendation of the policy for many years].

== Feedback ==

=== What will be offered as a replacement ===

We have been asked internally at Red Hat, what will be offered to
users of Fedora Linux if we retire modularity.
While we encourage anyone to share ideas they might have on the topic,
we intentionally offer no ''new'' alternative to modularity as part of
this change proposal. Replacing the retired modularity with something
else is intentionally out of scope of this proposal.

== Benefit to Fedora ==

Packager and Infra/Releng resources will not be wasted on Modularity.
Instead, we can focus on delivering quality content to our users
without it.

== Scope ==
* Proposal owners:
** Work with releng to disable modular builds in f39+
** Work with releng to disable composing and mirroring of modular repos for f39+
** Work with Bodhi admins to disable F39+ Modular updates
** Submit changes to fedora-repos package to remove and obsolete the
modular subpackages
** (once f38 is EOL) Work with infra to sunset MBS

* Other developers:
** Modular packagers:
*** Retire your modules
*** Ideally package the content as nonmodular

* Release engineering: [https://pagure.io/releng/issue/11480 #11480]
** Disable modular builds in f39+
** Disable composing and mirroring of modular repos for f39+

* Policies and guidelines: N/A (not needed for this Change) <!--
REQUIRED FOR SYSTEM WIDE CHANGES -->

* Trademark approval: N/A (not needed for this Change)

* Alignment with Community Initiatives:

== Upgrade/compatibility impact ==

An RPM scriptlet fedora-release might be necessary to deactivate all
Fedora-provided modular streams when upgrading to Fedora Linux 39 and
40. This will only happen if all other means of properly EOLing the
modules still block upgrades.

== How To Test ==

=== Has this landed? ===

# Check if fedora-repos-modular and fedora-repos-rawhide-modular are
missing from the repository and Obsoleted.
# Check if the modular repositories are missing from
download.fedoraproject.org and mirrormanager.

=== Does it work? ===

# Check if upgrading from Fedora Linux 37/38 to 39/40 with enabled
modular streams (from the Fedora repos) is still possible.

== User Experience ==

Users of Fedora Linux 39+ will no longer have access to the Fedora
modular repos. They can still install non-modular packages instead.

== Dependencies ==

* [[Changes/FlatpaksWithoutModules]]
* [[Changes/No_default_fedora-repos-modular]]

== Contingency Plan ==

* Contingency mechanism: Revert the changes
* Contingency deadline: Beta Freeze
* Blocks release? No

== Documentation ==

Ideally, all references to Fedora-provided modular streams should be
removed from docs.fedoraproject.org, except for
docs.fedoraproject.org/en-US/modularity which should be clearly marked
as obsolete/archived.

== Release Notes ==

Users of Fedora Linux 39+ will no longer have access to the Fedora
modular repos. They can still install non-modular packages instead.

[Fabio Valentini]

On Thu, Jun 22, 2023 at 6:31 PM Aoife Moloney  wrote:
> https://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Changes/RetireModularity
>
> This document represents a proposed Change. As part of the Changes
> process, proposals are publicly announced in order to receive
> community feedback. This proposal will only be implemented if approved
> by the Fedora Engineering Steering Committee.
>
> == Summary ==
>
> Fedora will discontinue building
> [https://docs.fedoraproject.org/en-US/modularity/ modules] for Fedora
> Linux 39 and further in the Fedora infrastructure and shipping modular
> content to users. The fedora-repos-modular and
> fedora-repos-rawhide-modular packages will be retired and obsoleted.
> The modular repositories will no longer be composed. Once Fedora Linux
> 38 reaches the end of life, Fedora's [https://mbs.fedoraproject.org/
> Module Build Service] will be terminated. Whether or not dnf(5) would
> still support modularity from 3rd party repository is out of the scope
> of this proposal.

I'm tempted to say something like "my wildest dreams are coming true" :D
Given general lack of investment in infrastructure / tooling for
creating / maintaining / building capital-M-Modules, this seems to be
the way to go.
Thank you for working on this.

Fabio

[Jaroslav Mracek]

I am just curious, who is going to provide or test upgrade path for packages originally provided by modular repositories? I am asking as DNF maintainer, because problems with upgrades are often reported to our components.