toolchain rock-up

[Karsten Wade]

We've been talking about rocking up our toolchain by integrating
Publican[1].  We need to set up some tests to be able to confirm if the
tool does what we need, technically, socially, and communally.

Please add yours to the list below, then we can throw it in a wiki page
to start working against.

= Technical =

* Does it fulfill all the current tool's capabilities?
  - These need to be defined and listed as specific tests
* Is it built on sound technology with a future?
* ...

= Social =

* Is there an active upstream?
* Is upstream responsive to Fedora Docs?
* Is the upstream work in the open?
* Can anyone (theoretically) join the upstream work?
* Is there a role Fedora Docs should take in the upstream?
* ...

= Communal =

* Is there a Fedora packager?
* Is it maintained for EPEL as well?
* Do other parts of Fedora want to use this tool?
* Is there value-add from Fedora Docs to make it worth promoting the
integrated set (Fedora Docs + Publican)?
* Does Fedora Docs want to create and maintain a "Content Producer
Spin"?
* ...

-- 
Karsten Wade, Sr. Developer Community Mgr.
Dev Fu : http://developer.redhatmagazine.com
Fedora : http://quaid.fedorapeople.org
gpg key : AD0E0C41

[Jeff Fearn]

Hi, here is some feedback for people to chew on before the meeting.

Hopefully it will minimize time spent on points that are already know, get people to think
of some other questions to ask, and help people gather relevant information where
required.

Karsten 'quaid' Wade wrote:
>  We've been talking about rocking up our toolchain by integrating
>  Publican[1].  We need to set up some tests to be able to confirm if the
>  tool does what we need, technically, socially, and communally.
>  
>  Please add yours to the list below, then we can throw it in a wiki page
>  to start working against.
>  
>  = Technical =
>  
>  * Does it fulfill all the current tool's capabilities?
>    - These need to be defined and listed as specific tests 
You need to know which of those capabilities are must haves and which are niceties.

>  * Is it built on sound technology with a future? 
The current system is tightly bound to CVS ... please, let CVS die quietly, it has earned
its rest.

Publican uses standard Linux technologies and FOP. If anyone makes a better PDF generator
than FOP it will get assessed by the publican team _immediately_!!111!

>  * ...
>  
>  = Social =
>  
>  * Is there an active upstream? 
Bugs against Publican have already being lodged and fixed in the Fedora Bugzilla.

>  * Is upstream responsive to Fedora Docs? 
See above.

>  * Is the upstream work in the open? 
Publican development is hosted on fedorahosted.org.

>  * Can anyone (theoretically) join the upstream work? 
Theoretically anyone with a FAS account can join the Publican team.

>  * Is there a role Fedora Docs should take in the upstream? 
What role does Fedora docs take in other upstream packages?


>  * ...
>  
>  = Communal =
>  
>  * Is there a Fedora packager? 
There is no packager for the current system.

Since publican is packaged in Fedora (8, 9 & devel) this question would seem to have
an answer.

>  * Is it maintained for EPEL as well? 
You mean packaged. The current system is not packaged for EPEL.

Publican has been built in plague for EPEL 4 & 5, the packages are waiting to be
pushed to the repos.

>  * Do other parts of Fedora want to use this tool? 
Which other parts of Fedora use the current tool?

Several Fedora projects, e.g. Fedora Directory Server & Fedora IPA etc, either already
use publican or are having their documentation migrated to publican.

>  * Is there value-add from Fedora Docs to make it worth promoting the
>  integrated set (Fedora Docs + Publican)?
>
>  * Does Fedora Docs want to create and maintain a "Content Producer
>  Spin"? 
Cheers, Jeff.

-- 
Jeff Fearn <jfearn(a)redhat.com&gt;
Software Engineer
Engineering Operations
Red Hat, Inc

[Karsten Wade]

On Wed, 2008-05-21 at 17:29 +1000, Jeff Fearn wrote:
>  Hi, here is some feedback for people to chew on before the meeting.
>  
>  Hopefully it will minimize time spent on points that are already know,
>  get people to think of some other questions to ask, and help people
>  gather relevant information where required. 
Thanks.

>  Karsten 'quaid' Wade wrote:
>  > We've been talking about rocking up our toolchain by integrating
>  > Publican[1].  We need to set up some tests to be able to confirm if
>  the
>  > tool does what we need, technically, socially, and communally.
>  > 
>  > Please add yours to the list below, then we can throw it in a wiki
>  page
>  > to start working against.
>  > 
>  > = Technical =
>  > 
>  > * Does it fulfill all the current tool's capabilities?
>  >   - These need to be defined and listed as specific tests
>  
>  You need to know which of those capabilities are must haves and which
>  are niceties. 
I'll be surprised if we've baked any niceties in; it's a fairly sparse
toolchain.

The 'docs-common' tools mainly build output from input XML.  However,
there are a few bits that are Fedora-specific, such as how we generate
an RPM and SRPM for the release builds, desktop files, etc.  In many
cases, I expect we'll just call Publican's make instead.

>  > * Is it built on sound technology with a future?
>  
>  The current system is tightly bound to CVS ... please, let CVS die
>  quietly, it has earned its rest. 
There are separate issues here.  We cannot separate the need to maintain
packages such as fedora-release-notes in CVS.  However, last week we
agreed to stop pushing new books in to CVS and to let them form
one-project-per-book on fedorahosted.org.  Once we give the toolchain
it's own fh.o project space, we can retire most of our CVS usage. 

>  Publican uses standard Linux technologies and FOP. If anyone makes a
>  better PDF generator than FOP it will get assessed by the publican
>  team _immediately_!!111! 
+1 ... you know you don't have to convince me here. :)

Anyway, yes, that is a good answer to that checklist item.

>  > * ...
>  > 
>  > = Social =
>  > 
>  > * Is there an active upstream?
>  
>  Bugs against Publican have already being lodged and fixed in the
>  Fedora Bugzilla.
>  
>  > * Is upstream responsive to Fedora Docs?
>  
>  See above. 
+1 on both from what I've seen so far.

>  > * Is the upstream work in the open?
>  
>  Publican development is hosted on fedorahosted.org.
>  
>  > * Can anyone (theoretically) join the upstream work?
>  
>  Theoretically anyone with a FAS account can join the Publican team.
>  
>  > * Is there a role Fedora Docs should take in the upstream?
>  
>  What role does Fedora docs take in other upstream packages? 
* We contributed the original patch to xmlto to support FOP
* We've been highly active with the Fedora Java folks to get FOP
packaged and supported in Fedora
* Worked with MoinMoin on Google Summer of Code dev project
* Other small bugfixes, iirc
...

Like other parts of Fedora, we see the value in remaining active with
the upstream, no matter the outcome.

>  > * ...
>  > 
>  > = Communal =
>  > 
>  > * Is there a Fedora packager?
>  
>  There is no packager for the current system.
>  
>  Since publican is packaged in Fedora (8, 9 & devel) this question
>  would seem to have an answer.
>  
>  > * Is it maintained for EPEL as well?
>  
>  You mean packaged. The current system is not packaged for EPEL. 
"Maintain a package," yes.

>  Publican has been built in plague for EPEL 4 & 5, the packages
> are
>  waiting to be pushed to the repos. 
Sweet.

>  > * Do other parts of Fedora want to use this tool?
>  
>  Which other parts of Fedora use the current tool?
>  
>  Several Fedora projects, e.g. Fedora Directory Server & Fedora IPA
>  etc, either already use publican or are having their documentation
>  migrated to publican. 
That's good news, thanks.

- Karsten
-- 
Karsten Wade, Sr. Developer Community Mgr.
Dev Fu : http://developer.redhatmagazine.com
Fedora : http://quaid.fedorapeople.org
gpg key : AD0E0C41