thoughts on LWN "how many Fedora users are there"

[Rahul Sundaram]

Les Mikesell wrote:

> There are 2 advantages.  First, you can control what machines
> act as mirrors and thus not have to arrange anything with
> other parties to get access to the logs. 

How would a separate repository solve the problem? The repo information 
would still be distributed and we still need to coordinate with the 
mirrors to get more information.

  Second, it gives
> the individual user a way to opt out by removing that
> repository from their list. 

If we collect the update stats from the mirrors transparently and use 
other specific procedures as a opt in mechanism, we already have this 
settled.

   A side effect is that you
> would not be able to collate data on what packages users
> have installed.  Is that something you want?

The discussions here would answer you. 
https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-advisory-board/2006-October/thread.html

Rahul