Andreas Røsdal <[email protected]> writes: > Hello Gard, > > I suggest that a web browser with a significantly smaller source code > base is easier to maintain. A larger source code size is more > difficult to understand, change, slower to compile and more difficult > to maintain.
All else being equal, I would agree.
> Today, Nordstjernen has about 0.46 million lines of code including its
> JavaScript engine (0.30 million without it) in a 0.011 GB tarball,
> against about 38.1 million in a 0.81 GB tarball for Firefox and 160.0
> million in a 4.39 GB tarball for Chromium, depending on how one
> counts, but the main argument about source code size is clear.
Sure. But it doesn't really answer my question: How was a team of 1-4
people able to review ~2.6M lines of code entering into Nordstjernen's
repository over the course of ~4 months? I undertand that "only" ~0.4M
lines remain, but my question is about the processes involved. Will
there be churn of 20M more lines ("half a Firefox") between two Debian
releases?
I agree that less code is a good thing for maintenance and
reviewability, but it's not the only thing that matters. I'll be blunt:
I worry that the processes upstream are unacceptable. I fear that huge
chunks of Nordstjernen's code comes straight from an LLM without human
review whatsoever. I do not believe that this is a foundation for a
healthy Debian package. I'd love to be shown wrong.
As just one example: What would happen if someone discovered a security
issue (or legal issue, or RC bug, or whatever) in a version of
Nordstjernen (hypothetically) shipped in Debian? This question is not
rhetorical, it would be beneficial to hear a concrete answer.
Moreover (orthoginally to the previous question): Do you believe that a
Debian maintainer for Nordstjernen can meaningfully modify and work with
upstream's source code without employing the same non-DFSG services that
you yourself have used for the majority of your work in "creating" the
software?
> Please see "Lehman's laws of software evolution", which is about software
> evolution and software decay:
> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lehman%27s_laws_of_software_evolution
Forgive me, but could you spoonfeed me the point here?
> Nordstjernen was implemented initially using Claude, in the "AI-era",
> while Firefox and Chrome has been implemented over a very long time,
> and accumulated software bloat, decay and is more complex to maintain,
> in my opinion.
Could you elaborate a bit on why you have come to hold this opinion, and
why Debian maintaners should share it?
Best,
Gard
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