>> Checking sunet.se now. (12:45 Moscow time,
>> Sep.28, 16:45 on my Linux clock, for some
>> reson :-) Launch is very close... KDE2 - far
>> away...
>>
>> no kdelibs, base, etc. on sunet.se
>> onle kdegames-1.94...
>> Most files are marked Sep.22 latest...
>
> What's the use of a mirror if the reflection it
> provides is distorted?
>
> Maybe it's time to dig through the (rather
> large) list of mirrors and weed out the ones
> that are not "up to standard". I use the the
> sunsite.uio.no mirror, although this week it's
> been unreachable. I find that other mirrors
> often have issues:
> - file permisions that change (often the exec
> bit is stripped);
> - old;
> - incomplete.
>
> For distributing the stable distribution I
> agree that a large list of mirrors is needed.
> The content on these mirrors doesn't change
> that much (security updates) and only a large
> event takes a lot of BW (release of a new
> product).
>
> Maybe it's possible to put up some quality
> criteria to which a mirror must conform if it
> wants to carry the cooker distro? A larger
> list of primary mirrors might also help.
I think Mandrake has hit some more growing pains
(actually, I think they've been facing them for
a while now).
As Mandrake is a small Linux company (but a
hugely successful distro), they don't have the
money for multiple/redundant high-speed
connections for distribution purposes, and
therefore depend on the kindness of mirrors to
pick up the workload. I see *nothing* wrong with
this, I think it is a perfect example of
businesses, schools, individual users, and ISPs
working with, and for, the Linux community.
--
I think Mandrake's current problem is with
co-ordination of the mirrors. I outline a number
of possible changes below:
(1.)
There appears to be no standard when it comes to
mirroring hierarchy. Now, I know that each
mirror does things a little different, but there
needs to be some type of basic Mandrake base
hierarchy that should be followed. There's a
number of separate Mandrake trees that need to be
considered, and some organizational thought put
into them. Below is something that is very
similar to what already exists, and what some
mirrors already do, but not all, and it should
therefore be made a rule. The number of versions
that a mirror actuallly mirrors is up to them, I
just listed a few versions to make this e-mail
longer than it needed to be:
Mandrake/
- current/ -> 7.1/
- 6.1/
- i386/
- alpha/
- sparc/
- ISO/
- 7.0/
- i386
- alpha/
- sparc/
- ISO/
- 7.1/
- i386
- alpha/
- sparc/
- ISO/
Mandrake-devel/
- 7.2 beta/
- i386
- alpha/
- sparc/
- ISO/
- Cooker
Mandrake-updates/
- current/ -> 7.1/
- 6.1/
- i386
- alpha/
- sparc/
- 7.0/
- i386
- alpha/
- sparc/
- 7.1/
- i386
- alpha/
- sparc/
(Most mirrors could/would/should/may create an
upper-level Mandrake directory to house all these
trees.)
I've left of Mandrake-crypto, as I feel it's
going to disappear soon, am I correct? If not,
it should follow the same tree structure as
Mandrake-updates.
Notice how all of the above flow exactly the same
(what a concept, flow!)? Easy to follow, easy to
mirror. From site to site, this hierarchy (1)
makes sense, and (2) makes it easy to tell where
things are going to be. This makes writing
rsync scripts a lot easier, too.
(2.)
Next, a minimum refresh (rsync) time needs to be
implemented and enforced. Daily,
every-other-day, whatever. Something needs to be
set in stone so that we aren't faced with mirrors
who are way behind on the times. Being an
official Mandrake mirror is a privilage, not a
right. If you're offering Mandrake some space
and bandwidth for a mirror, you have the
responsibility of making sure its not being
wasted on out-of-date content. This kinda goes
with the item below.
(3.)
Lastly, a mirror co-ordinator needs to be
appointed, and given the time to do his job, and
do it right. I must say that Mandrake made an
excellent move when they appointed Vincent Danen
the security guy. IMHO, Mandrake has gone from
last to first in security response. Can they do
the same for distribution/mirroring?
This person needs to be in constant contact with
all the mirrors, notified of planned outages at
the mirrors, and needs to be in charge of keeping
the mirror list up to date.
A change also needs to be made to this list, to
reflect a lot more information. For example, Red
Hat's mirror list shows which mirrors provide
which architectures. What's even better is a
list that shows both which architectures are
available, as well as which mirrors offer ISO
images. Something like this (imagine it's in
HTML)(Warning, bad ASCII art follows):
___________________________________________________________________________
|Primary| Site |ISO|Alpha|Intel|Sparc|Devel|
___________________________________________________________________________
Sweden
______
| X | X | ftp.sunet.se | X | X | X | X | X |
ftp://ftp.sunet.se/pub/Linix/distributions/mandrake/
rsync://ftp.sunet.se/mandrake/
rsync://ftp.sunet.se/mandrake-devel/
Norway
______
| X | sunsite.uio.no | X | X | X | X | X |
ftp://sunsite.uio.no/pub/unix/Linux/Mandrake/
rsync://sunsite.uio.no/Mandrake/
rsync://sunsite.uio.no/Mandrake-devel/
United States
_____________
| | ftp.tux.org | X | | X | | |
ftp://ftp.tux.org/pub/linux/mandrake/
| | rpmfind.net | | | X | | X |
ftp://rpmfind.net/linux/Mandrake/
Would I volunteer for this job? Not now, I'm
sorry. I can't afford to sacrifice some of my
remaining free time for something I get no
monetary reimbursement for (even though knowing I
helped out my favorite Linux distro would be
enough reimbursement for me, my fiancee would
kill me). Would I do this job part/full time and
get paid for it? Sure, my fiancee won't kill me
for giving her more spending money. Drop me a
line.
--
Now, I'm not going to try and tell Mandrake or
its mirrors how to run their business/do their
job. I am just trying to propose a fix to the
problem that has plagued Mandrake for far too
long.
If someone believes all of these things are being
done, I'm sorry to say they're not. If it's your
job, this is an e-mail to you informing you that
the process currently in place isn't working
properly. This is in no way a flame, if nothing
else, it's a formal notification (bug report?)
from a Mandrake user to you.
Don Head [[EMAIL PROTECTED]]
Linux Mentor, LCA, Network+ [1 314 692-1942]
Wave Technologies, Inc. [1 800 826-4640 x1942]
[AIM - Don Wave][ICQ - 18804935][Yahoo - Don_Wave]
