Hello everyone,
The latest release of Canonical Ubuntu 26.04 LTS (Resolute
Raccoon) is an opportunity to give a short overview of the current
state of Back In Time and what is coming next.
Current Status
==============
- Latest release: 1.6.1
- Available in latest Debian GNU/Linux (stable, "Trixie", 13)
- Available in latest Ubuntu 26.04 LTS (universe repository)
- EncFS:
- Deprecated and effectively disabled
- Existing profiles still accessible
- Will be removed completely in the next release
Next Release
============
- Planned as 2.0.0 [7]
- New mount subsystem (rewritten from scratch) to provide maintainable
gocryptfs support [14]
- Removal of EncFS [8]
- Fixes for rsync change detection and permission handling; may
slip to another version if not sufficient in time [10]
- My goal is to release this as soon as possible to introduce breaking
changes most far long before a new Debian release, to give Back In
Time the time to evolve and stabilize.
Other big ToDo's and Long-Term Ideas for later Releases
=======================================================
- New configuration management code [11]
- Configuration file in TOML format [12]
- Internal refactoring across multiple layers, improving
maintainability, testability and test coverage
- Several GUI improvements
- Integrate "Snapshots dialog" features into main window and
remove the dialog itself
- Improve "Manage profiles" dialog
- etc
Project and infrastructure topics
=================================
- Migration to Python build system (PEP 517/621) [13]
- Moving from Microsoft GitHub to Codeberg.org
- Debian maintenance situation remains unresolved. Practically its
status is "orphaned" (Debian meaning for "not maintained").
- Lost contact to former upstream maintainer Germar despite multiple
attempts
- Handling of low-quality ("AI slop") contributions remains an issue
- Code reviews are missing. In most cases there is no second pair of
eyes when merge my code.
- There is also a lack of manual tests.
Additional Notes
================
Thank you
---------
I need to express my gratitude to Fabio Fantoni and Danel Echeverry
stepping in for the original "Debian maintainer" Jonathan Wiltshier
("jwm") and packaging Back In Time for Debian. Also a big Thank You
goes to Skia about approving an Ubuntu Freeze Exception and upload
the latest BIT version to Ubuntu's universe repository [4], after we
missed their Freeze deadline.
Contribution quality and AI slop
--------------------------------
This is one of my very personal tasks in this project. It is an ongoing
topic with no easy solution.
As maintainer I grow suspicious to every unknown account (first-time
contributor) not saying "Hello", having to much bling bling icons on
their profile page or coming from one of the countries producing
millions of AI-using-college-students.
I am watching myself and don't like what I see. I want to assume the
best efforts in all contributors from the very first beginning, no
matter their account age, skill level, or culture. But "AI" and the
marketing behind it poisoned that social contract.
But fact is, that not a small amount of the first time contributions are
"AI slop" and/or of extreme low quality. The tool is not the problem but
contributors not taking the responsibility for "their" code.
That contributions would require significant review effort just to
decided if it is AI or not. And this is even before starting the review
itself. Because I am not willing to invest sucht efforts and to keep
maintenance sustainable, I tend to close such PR's early. I also report
that accounts to Microsoft's abuse team. But I am only a human being,
not perfect also sometimes not in the perfect mood. So it comes that
sometimes I false-close and miss the best efforts of a first-time
contributor.
Improving this process without discouraging legitimate contributors is
an open task.
Other projects I am involved with and occupied by
-------------------------------------------------
I need to be careful to stay focused and not lose myself in too many
things at the same time. Currently, besides Back In Time, I am working
on several other projects:
- I reactivated my old RSS reader project "Feedybus" [1]
- My "Hyperorg" project need some attention because someone wants to
package it for Debian [2].
- Because ongoing resource issues on the side of Debian Maintainers, I
created a helper tool for them, named "spdx2debian", to ease their
burden with managing copyright and license information [3].
Thank you for reading that far. I am always interested in your feedback.
A second opinion or a second pair of eyes is also a valuable
contribution.
Best wishes,
Christian Buhtz
[1] https://codeberg.org/buhtz/Feedybus
[2] https://codeberg.org/buhtz/hyperorg
[3] https://codeberg.org/buhtz/spdx2debian
[4] https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/backintime/+bug/2142983
[5] https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/backintime
[6] https://launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/backintime
[7] https://github.com/bit-team/backintime/milestone/36
[8] https://github.com/bit-team/backintime/issues/1734
[10] https://github.com/bit-team/backintime/issues/2388
[11] https://github.com/bit-team/backintime/pull/1850
[12] https://github.com/bit-team/backintime/issues/1984
[13] https://github.com/bit-team/backintime/issues/1575
[14] https://github.com/bit-team/backintime/pull/2449
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