Stupid question

[Jon Ciesla]

FC3 -> RHEL4.

FC6 -> RHEL5.

Presumably, F9 -> RHEL6.

With me so far?

How is maintainership handled when RHEL is based on a Merged (WRT
Core/Extras) Fedora?  Pre-merge, Core->RHEL and is maintained by RH folk,
and Extras->EPEL, and is maintained by the community.  Post-merge, there
are lots of packages maintained or co-maintained by community folks that
are either historically Core or might be considered so in the process of
choosing packages for RHEL6.

Let's say a package was brought into Fedora and is maintained by a non-RH
person, and RH wants to put it in RHEL6.  Who maintains it?  The current
maintainer or someone in RH?  What about EPEL?  Presumably not an EPEL
candidate then?

Normally, I couldn't care less whether someone is RH or non-RH from a
maintainer perspective, I'm just curious about how the above will work. 
Probably a non-issue.

Thanks,
Jon

[Rahul Sundaram]

Jon Ciesla wrote:
> FC3 -> RHEL4.
>
> FC6 -> RHEL5.
>
> Presumably, F9 -> RHEL6.
>
> With me so far?

[Not speaking for Red Hat here. Just my understanding of the process]

The RHEL 6 time schedule isn't that strict and RHEL release schedules 
are not public information and probably won't be till close to release.
> How is maintainership handled when RHEL is based on a Merged (WRT
> Core/Extras) Fedora?  Pre-merge, Core->RHEL and is maintained by RH folk,
> and Extras->EPEL, and is maintained by the community.  Post-merge, there
> are lots of packages maintained or co-maintained by community folks that
> are either historically Core or might be considered so in the process of
> choosing packages for RHEL6.
>
> Let's say a package was brought into Fedora and is maintained by a non-RH
> person, and RH wants to put it in RHEL6.  Who maintains it?  The current
> maintainer or someone in RH?

Anything in RHEL has to be maintained by a Red Hat employee. Usually, 
the same maintainer who will maintain it for RHEL will also 
maintain/co-maintain the Fedora branch too to get continous visibility 
into the development. When Red Hat branches off from Fedora to RHEL, 
product management will find someone to own the RHEL branch regardless 
of how it is managed in Fedora.

What about EPEL?  Presumably not an EPEL
> candidate then?

If it is pulled into RHEL, it is not a EPEL candidate.

Rahul

[Jon Ciesla]

> Jon Ciesla wrote:
> > FC3 -> RHEL4.
> >
> > FC6 -> RHEL5.
> >
> > Presumably, F9 -> RHEL6.
> >
> > With me so far?
>
> [Not speaking for Red Hat here. Just my understanding of the process]
>
> The RHEL 6 time schedule isn't that strict and RHEL release schedules
> are not public information and probably won't be till close to release.

So I assumed.
> > How is maintainership handled when RHEL is based on a Merged (WRT
> > Core/Extras) Fedora?  Pre-merge, Core->RHEL and is maintained by RH
> > folk,
> > and Extras->EPEL, and is maintained by the community.  Post-merge, there
> > are lots of packages maintained or co-maintained by community folks that
> > are either historically Core or might be considered so in the process of
> > choosing packages for RHEL6.
> >
> > Let's say a package was brought into Fedora and is maintained by a
> > non-RH
> > person, and RH wants to put it in RHEL6.  Who maintains it?  The current
> > maintainer or someone in RH?
>
> Anything in RHEL has to be maintained by a Red Hat employee. Usually,
> the same maintainer who will maintain it for RHEL will also
> maintain/co-maintain the Fedora branch too to get continous visibility
> into the development. When Red Hat branches off from Fedora to RHEL,
> product management will find someone to own the RHEL branch regardless
> of how it is managed in Fedora.

So if, say, I maintain a package that goes into RHEL, I can expect a new
co-maintainer?
> What about EPEL?  Presumably not an EPEL
> > candidate then?
>
> If it is pulled into RHEL, it is not a EPEL candidate.

Perfectly logical. So if it's already in EL-4 and EL-5, we just don't
branch for EL-6.  I get it.
> Rahul

[Rahul Sundaram]

Jon Ciesla wrote:
> So if, say, I maintain a package that goes into RHEL, I can expect a new
> co-maintainer?

I don't know if there is any rule that there should be. I doubt we have 
any process to force that or past experience to count on but I expect 
any maintainer in RHEL to want to participate in the maintenance of the 
branches in Fedora too. Otherwise between a few years of jump between 
RHEL releases, they would not have much insight into the changes that go 
upstream and resulting feedback from end users which would be a critical 
thing when they get to own it for a particular RHEL release for 7 years 
or so.
> Perfectly logical. So if it's already in EL-4 and EL-5, we just don't
> branch for EL-6.  I get it.

Usually yes, sometimes packages are added/dropped in between releases 
and if someone finds those important they can continue to maintain it 
for Fedora and EPEL.

Rahul

[Stephen John Smoogen]

On Tue, Jul 15, 2008 at 6:43 AM, Jon Ciesla  wrote:
> FC3 -> RHEL4.
>
> FC6 -> RHEL5.
>
> Presumably, F9 -> RHEL6.
>
> With me so far?

It was more coincidence than planning that put the 3 release schedule
difference there. The releases have gotten shorter in time so it might
be 10 or 11 before EL-6 is split.
> How is maintainership handled when RHEL is based on a Merged (WRT
> Core/Extras) Fedora?  Pre-merge, Core->RHEL and is maintained by RH folk,
> and Extras->EPEL, and is maintained by the community.  Post-merge, there
> are lots of packages maintained or co-maintained by community folks that
> are either historically Core or might be considered so in the process of
> choosing packages for RHEL6.

Normally packages are just split off and pulled into RH's internal
VCS. What packages those are etc are not known until about release
time as the Fedora and EL release systems have to meet different
'rules'.
> Let's say a package was brought into Fedora and is maintained by a non-RH
> person, and RH wants to put it in RHEL6.  Who maintains it?  The current
> maintainer or someone in RH?  What about EPEL?  Presumably not an EPEL
> candidate then?

The package is maintained for EL by a Red Hat engineer and would not
be available in EPEL anymore. The Fedora side would be maintained by
the original person.
> Normally, I couldn't care less whether someone is RH or non-RH from a
> maintainer perspective, I'm just curious about how the above will work.
> Probably a non-issue.
>
> Thanks,
> Jon
>
> --
> novus ordo absurdum
>
> epel-devel-list mailing list
> [e-mail]
> https://www.redhat.com/mailman/listinfo/epel-devel-list

[Tom Callaway]

On Tue, 2008-07-15 at 13:30 -0600, Stephen John Smoogen wrote:
> It was more coincidence than planning that put the 3 release schedule
> difference there. The releases have gotten shorter in time so it might
> be 10 or 11 before EL-6 is split.

If I was a betting man, I would put money on this.

*cough*

~spot