On Apr 5, 2005 3:40 PM, Mike Bird mgb-fedora@yosemite.net wrote: [snip]
Why are useful Core packages being thrown into the uncoordinated obscurity of Extras before the system is ready to handle them?
And why oh why throw out popular packages to make room for Eclipse on the Core CD's?!
Oh, and Seth, is it that the Extras system can't rebuild all or that you don't want to schedule one yet?
Hey Mike, Chill a bit here... Extras is a long way from being "uncoordinated" and obscure.... The intensity of your words is offensive to the people who are working really hard to make extras a reality.
At the same time, I think we can agree that it isn't the same for a package to be in extras as in core. I'm not sure that this is entirely bad, but in some cases I think FC-core style maint would be better..
Here are some reasons that if I were a package, I might not want to be in extras:
1. Much smaller audience (lots of people do install everything in core, but not so with extras today) 2. More difficult distribution model (if someone burns me the DVD ISO redhat provides it has all of core, but none of extras) 3. 'Less reliable'source: When I get a distro from redhat, I'm getting it from people I trust.. When I get extras it's coming from a bunch of people on the internet I dont know. Now it's probably true that core doesn't have that much more redhat oversight on low profile packages, but it's a perception issue. 4. If a package is broken in core is known broken it has some potential for holding up a release. Not so for extras, so there is more incentive to fix a package. 4. Almost no build synchronization. When is a package in extras guaranteed to build on a new version of FC? ... Never. It's possible that a package will effectively drop out of core without any conscious decision. What if a user depends on that package, upgrades to FCn+1, and finds that it no longer works? This is far less likely to happen 'on accident' for packages in core. Should every user have to search for all the apps they use on the varrious discussion lists before upgrading to have a reasonable expectation that everything will work with only minimal fiddling after an upgrade?
All of these issues only matter for packages that are coming out of core.. For a package that never was in core, it is less of an issue... being in Extras is better than nothing at all.
Basically if we carry on in the direction of moving most of the non-essential stuff into extras, and don't provide release stabilizations for extras we will eventually create an environment where RHES is the only option for those who want a redhat distro with some degree of full-system stability... It's nearly useless to say that we've QAed fedora core if we reach a point where every FC user is spending a large part of their using extras packages that haven't been QAed.
At the same time, extras contains a lot of great package for even further out stuff.. software where it just isn't reasonable to have strong QA goals on it... Stuff we would never accept in core.. And thats great.
Perhaps a solution would be to define a subset of extras that belong to a set of more stable/more important. These packages follow the same revision timeline as FC, and perhaps even redhat would agree to delay the release of FC due to problems with something in this subset. Then only remove package from this subset through a process which provides for transparency and discussion, to avoid pulling the rug out from under anyone.