Warren' rejection of cooperation with other repos

[R P Herrold]

On Sat, 8 Nov 2003, Michael Schwendt wrote:

> I find it very unfortunate to see that a lot of work is
> still duplicated.  If someone asked me whether I could
> explain why there are still several independent repo
> maintainers who do their own rather closed thing, I would
> admit that I don't know.

A polite answer to that someone might be:  Open Source
encourages freedom, experimentation and diversity -- Several
independendent packagers is the sign of a healthy Open Source
ecosystem.

A less 'politically correct' might mention fact that
'independent repo maintainers' are stubborn and independent,
see little reason to change, and cannot be _forced_ to change.

/me?  I don't find it unfortunate at all that things have not
settled down.  Looking beyond the initial Fedora project, lots
of interesting and practical work on RPM, SRPM mediated
package building, cvs checkout building, and build environment
has emerged in the last year.  seth vidal's yum development,
Michael Redinger's rhel-rebuild, Greg Kurtzer cAos, several of
the independents' approaches, and the much awaited RH
unveiling of an echo of the Beehive (being item 3 of the RH
fedora annmouncement outline) all have or will help push the
art of RPM based package management.

Developers who are not working _just_ for monetary
compensation have have some other motivation to do research,
and implement testing harnesses to advance.  We would not have
seen such fast progress without diversity and stubborn 
independence.

------------

> "Crusade" is the wrong term, IMO. Fedora.us started as a vision. A vision
> to serve the Red Hat Community with add-on packages from a single
> repository which would make it easy for users to find additional software.

Well, this is a less happy topic for me.  The history is what
the history is, although we each bring our own
interpretations.  Let's look through the record, and then
decide.  The initial Fedora proposal which was at:
	http://videl.ics.hawaii.edu/~warren/fedora.html
has gone dark; a copy is here: 
	http://www.owlriver.com/projects/packaging/fedora-manifesto-1.txt
but it did not 'start' as a 'single repository' proposal.  It
arose in the clear success of FreshRPMs (indeed, was proposed
there), and followed other independent packaging efforts of
'add-ons'.

and later as to the 'crusade' aspect: 
	http://www.owlriver.com/projects/packaging/valediction.txt
 
[07:47:32] _warren- thomasvs: I understand the risk very well, 
	and I can only say that if Fedora has RH 
	updated packages as the result of extensive regression testing 
	that is something I would personally be 
	comfortable using.  If you don't feel comfortable using it, 
	then please don't use it.

The former IRC archive linked at:  
	http://www.fedora.us/index-main.html 
has gone dark, but the 'crusade' aspect arose from several
such statements on IRC and in the mailing list, which were
noted as dominance, control and process problems at that time 
(as well as now).

http://videl.ics.hawaii.edu/pipermail/fedora-devel/2003-February/000243.html
http://videl.ics.hawaii.edu/pipermail/fedora-devel/2003-February/000244.html

(herrold responding to a post)

On Fri, 21 Feb 2003, Warren Togami wrote:

> I hope that people do not see me as trying a "hostile takeover" of 
> FreshRPMS.  I have great respect for Matthias and his good work with his 
> excellent packages.  I am only pointing out these issues of co-existence.

[... ] But you have to expect criticism when you propose a
massive independent packager repository fork. There are not
that many of us, and after reflection, you have to know it
would leave a bad taste.  The 'issue' of "co-existence" only
arises because of overlap.  No overlap -- no issue. 
... 
As to the 'hostile takeover' matter, I certainly try to keep
perspective that we are only packaging software -- and that a
person who blindly relies on others, and automated maintenance
without understanding the issues is going to get wedged, from
time to time.
[...] 
... so there are simply issues, benign and malicious, which
Fedora cannot solve.  Accept it, get over it, and move on.  
I'm gonna' keep packaging my way for my use in my repository;  
until and unless the Fedora process gets documented, open, and
running, I'm not gonna sign any Fedora packages. 
[...] 

Anyway, back to [warren's] post, how else can one casually 
read the comments at 03:34:52 and 03:34:55, other than as a 
'there can be only one' Highlander ending... <grin>.  If you 
want essentially perfect, but exceedingly stale, you should
probably package only for Debian stable. <double grin>

[... The IRC transcript section:]
[03:34:52] <Warren> freshrpms and fedora cannot co-exist
[03:34:55] <Warren> in the long run

----------------------------------- quote ends

And to me, there was simply no other answer for my rhetorical
'how else can one casually read the comments' question,
because the 'single archive' and 'crusade' aspect of what his
vision of Fedora was clear, regardless of stated benign
intent.  My solution: be stubborn and independent.

-- Russ Herrold
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