On Tue, Jun 14, 2016 at 6:30 PM, Ciaran McCreesh <ciaran.mccre...@googlemail.com> wrote: > On Wed, 15 Jun 2016 00:21:45 +0200 > "Andreas K. Huettel" <dilfri...@gentoo.org> wrote: >> Am Montag, 13. Juni 2016, 09:50:15 schrieb Alexander Berntsen: >> > > I still think you're underestimating the need for centralization. >> > > What you call a "core/base" package is probably going to end up >> > > being anything listed in a dependency. That is a LOT of packages, >> > > actually - we're not just talking about libc and zlib. >> > >> > It's not a lot compared to how many we have today. >> >> Please do me a favor and emerge @system on a fresh stage >> installation, with USE=kde ... >> >> ... So, >> >> * does KDE go into the curated repos? or >> * will the useflag functionality be discontinued? > > * Your package mangler tells you you need some packages which can > be found in the ::kde repository if you have that flag enabled, and > suggests you either install repository/kde or disable that USE flag so > that it can continue. >
Ciaran can certainly correct me if I've missed anything, but the concept here is that the curated packages are distributed across many repositories. So, kde would have a repository. It would still follow QA/etc and have controlled access, so it wouldn't be like a typical overlay in the Gentoo sense. What Gentoo would currently put in a project/herd/etc would go into its own repository under this kind of model. So, comparing some of the features of this model vs what we do today: 1. Developers wouldn't have access to all the ebuilds in the curated repositories. They would only have access to the ones they contribute to. 1a. You could accept a contributor into a small project and not have to give them access to the toolchain/etc. Of course, they're still messing with curated packages so you don't want just anybody in there. 2. Exherbo at least requires peer review for all commits I believe. So, even if you're committing to your "own" overlay you're still going to need review if your overlay is a curated one. 3. Just as with Gentoo if something is curated you can generally count on it to follow QA, and if it is in a non-official overlay then it is anything go and it is probably not to rely too heavily on things like sane version numbering, deps that don't just disappear, etc. 4. If somebody really does need to make a "tree-wide" change they're going to need access to a bazillion repos or they'll need to ask everybody else to commit it for them. 4a. Conversely, people who probably shouldn't be making "tree-wide" changes won't. 5. To the extent that repos contain closely-related packages you can probably make much more effective use of git branching and so on. You would still be limited by any dependency relationships outside the repo. I think the key message here is that a distributed model isn't some kind of panacea. It doesn't mean that any random stranger can just open up a repo and start contributing packages that others can build on. Sure, they can create a repo just as somebody can create an overlay, but users will not be able to safely rely on these packages and if you build all kinds of dependency relationships this way you're building on quicksand. Likewise, many of the benefits of having a peer-review system can be had whether or not the repository is distributed. Those are really orthogonal attributes. I think there are a lot of benefits from an Exherbo-like approach, but I think early in this thread there was a sense that this would just open up the bazaar and all these contributors would come out of the woodwork. Now, what it can give you is distributed governance. Maybe the KDE team achieves good Gentoo QA. We don't know how they do it. They don't do it the way everybody else does it. But, somehow they get the job done. So, why not let the KDE team manage their own contributors who can operate in their sandbox without having to go through some Gentoo-wide developer process? I don't think this is what Exherbo actually is doing, but it theoretically is possible. However, it would depend on a KDE team that does in fact maintain good QA. The downside to distributing governance is that you may get inconsistent quality. Again, I don't think this is the Exherbo model. So, a distributed model is different, and has some pros and cons. It isn't a panacea. -- Rich -- Rich
