Re: Blends integration into the Debian Installer

[Jonas Smedegaard]

Quoting Ole Streicher (2016-05-27 08:33:41)
> Jonas Smedegaard  writes:
> > Quoting Jonas Smedegaard (2016-05-24 14:45:11)
> >> Quoting Ole Streicher (2016-05-24 10:55:13)
> >> > * what are their requirements to be listed in the default installation
> >> >   image?
> >> > 
> >> > * can they live with just *one* option as a compromise?
> >> 
> >> For both debian-parl and debian-design it is a sensible compromise for 
> >> now to include only "parl-desktop" and skip region- or topic-specific 
> >> metapackages.
> >
> > Correction: It is *not* sensible to include debian-design package.
> >
> > (parl-desktop is sensible to include, when it enters testing).
> 
> So, would you take care of this inclusion? And, maybe, give a link to
> a web representation of the metapackage(s) to be included in the Blends
> homepage?

Yes, I will try, now that I have a better understanding of how the parts 
relate - thanks to the various pointers in this thread.

 - Jonas

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Re: Blends integration into the Debian Installer

[Jonas Smedegaard]

Quoting Jonas Smedegaard (2016-05-24 14:45:11)
> Quoting Ole Streicher (2016-05-24 10:55:13)
> > * what are their requirements to be listed in the default installation
> >   image?
> > 
> > * can they live with just *one* option as a compromise?
> 
> For both debian-parl and debian-design it is a sensible compromise for 
> now to include only "parl-desktop" and skip region- or topic-specific 
> metapackages.

Correction: It is *not* sensible to include debian-design package.

(parl-desktop is sensible to include, when it enters testing).

 - Jonas

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Re: Blends integration into the Debian Installer

[Ross Gammon]

Hi Ole,

Sorry for joining the party so late, and thanks so much for working on this.

On 05/25/2016 09:22 PM, Ole Streicher wrote:
> 
> If you want to have them in the Debian Installer, you should either
> provide an "-all" package for each of them containing whatever you want
> to have installed by default, or provide a patch for
> debian-blends-tasks.desc. The latter would probably have the option to
> do locale stuff -- see the main .desc file and the tasksel
> documentation.

I can't speak for the whole Debian Multimedia Team, but I will ask them
to comment on the wishlist bug to gather opinions.

My first thoughts are that it is great to get the option at install-time
to set up Debian ready for multimedia work. However, as Andreas said for
d-Med, it it is a very rare user that will want to have all tasks
installed (e.g. to do music, video, graphics, animation, broadcasting
etc.). Normally they will just want to do one or two of those things.
Also, the blend tasks contain many different tools to do the same thing
(e.g. 3 or 4 different Digital Audio Workstations (DAWs)). Normally a
user will pick just one of them to work with.

I think Ubuntu Studio have it right with a default selection of tools,
and the Ubiquity plugin that allows you at install time to choose which
of the metapackages to install, and even which packages within those
metapackages to install or not.

In addition, for serious audio work you really need to have a pretty
special configuration with Pulseaudio (for normal desktop sounds)
configured to feed through JACK (for serious audio work) to avoid
constantly switching to make different applications work. And although
most low-latency/realtime patches have been accepted into the main
kernel, most other audio focussed distros use a tuned kernel image.

I will ask how the rest of the team feel, and go from there.

Cheers,

Ross





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Re: Blends integration into the Debian Installer

[Jonas Smedegaard]

Quoting Iain R. Learmonth (2016-05-25 13:17:53)
> Please tell me which blends are missing if there are blends missing. 
> I'll add them today.

Thanks!

Due to the potentially still ongoing dispute I cannot just "tell" what 
blends are missing.

What I can tell is that for some definition of blends these exist:

  * DebianParl - https://wiki.debian.org/DebianParl
  * DebianDesign - https://wiki.debian.org/Design

Both are deployable on oldstable stable/testing/unstable Debian using 
Boxer.

Both are also deployable in simplified form (e.g. without optimized 
locale selections) using metapackages, but in that form only in 
testing/ustable for Debian Design and unstable for DebianParl.

Tell me if you need more info than that.

 - Jonas

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Re: Blends integration into the Debian Installer

[Iain R. Learmonth]

On 24/05/16 20:47, Andreas Tille wrote:
> On Tue, May 24, 2016 at 05:53:57PM +0200, Jonas Smedegaard wrote:
>>
>> I guess the reason for those blends missing at www.debian.org page is 
> 
> ... that nobody did the needed edits and commited them to the according
> repository (which is writable to any DD + Blends team members).

Please tell me which blends are missing if there are blends missing.
I'll add them today.

Thanks,
Iain.

Re: Blends integration into the Debian Installer

[Andreas Tille]

On Tue, May 24, 2016 at 05:53:57PM +0200, Jonas Smedegaard wrote:
> 
> I guess the reason for those blends missing at www.debian.org page is 

... that nobody did the needed edits and commited them to the according
repository (which is writable to any DD + Blends team members).

Kind regards

   Andreas.

-- 
http://fam-tille.de

Re: Blends integration into the Debian Installer

[Jonas Smedegaard]

Quoting Ole Streicher (2016-05-24 15:25:38)
> Jonas Smedegaard  writes:
>> Quoting Ole Streicher (2016-05-24 14:31:41)
>>> Ole Streicher  writes:
 I will open wishlist bug reports for all blends mentioned in the 
 web page to clarify if and what they want to have in a default 
 installation.
>>>
>>> Did this for almost all blends that claim to have metapackages:
>> ^^^
>>
>> I briefly skimed the bugreport for multimedia blend, and instructions 
>> there seemed to be specific to using blends-dev for generating the 
>> metapackages.
>>
>> Do the inclusion into debian-installer require blends-dev?  If not, 
>> is there any hints anywhere on generic requirements?
>
> All you basically need to to create a -all package that somehow 
> pulls all the packages you want to see in the default installation. If 
> one uses blends-dev, this can be done by using the "Install: true" 
> flag; however you are free to create the package on your own.

Sorry, I still don't understand...

Above you wrote "-all package" but in your other post in this 
thread you wrote "-all file".

If "file" was a typo, then does that mean that _any_ *.deb package in 
Debian in section "metapackages" with package name "*-all" will get 
included in the blends list in debian-installer?  I can easily do that, 
but suspect I am missing some more constraints.

If instead "package" was a typo, what is the full path of that *-all 
file, and what is the syntax of its contents?


 - Jonas

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Re: Blends integration into the Debian Installer

[Andreas Tille]

On Tue, May 24, 2016 at 03:26:27PM +0200, Jonas Smedegaard wrote:
> > Could you put this into the tasks files of the blends?
> 
> Sorry, I don't understand: Please elaborate.
> 
> NB! Above blends are built using boxer, not blends-dev - is "tasks 
> files" perhaps something specific to blends-dev?

   http://blends.debian.org/blends/ch06.html#metapackages

Jonas, I'm pretty sure you assisted my when this technique was
established back in the good old days of Extremadura strints.

Kind regards

   Andreas.

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http://fam-tille.de

Re: Blends integration into the Debian Installer

[Ole Streicher]

Jonas Smedegaard  writes:
> Quoting Ole Streicher (2016-05-24 14:31:41)
>> Ole Streicher  writes:
>>> I will open wishlist bug reports for all blends mentioned in the web 
>>> page to clarify if and what they want to have in a default 
>>> installation.
>>
>> Did this for almost all blends that claim to have metapackages:
>  ^^^
>
> I briefly skimed the bugreport for multimedia blend, and instructions 
> there seemed to be specific to using blends-dev for generating the 
> metapackages.
>
> Do the inclusion into debian-installer require blends-dev?  If not, is 
> there any hints anywhere on generic requirements?

All you basically need to to create a -all package that somehow
pulls all the packages you want to see in the default installation. If
one uses blends-dev, this can be done by using the "Install: true" flag;
however you are free to create the package on your own.

Cheers

Ole

Re: Blends integration into the Debian Installer

[Jonas Smedegaard]

Quoting Ole Streicher (2016-05-24 14:48:22)
> Jonas Smedegaard  writes:
> > Quoting Ole Streicher (2016-05-24 10:55:13)
> >> * what are their requirements to be listed in the default installation
> >>   image?
> >> 
> >> * can they live with just *one* option as a compromise?
> >
> > For both debian-parl and debian-design it is a sensible compromise for 
> > now to include only "parl-desktop" and skip region- or topic-specific 
> > metapackages.
> 
> Could you put this into the tasks files of the blends?

Sorry, I don't understand: Please elaborate.

NB! Above blends are built using boxer, not blends-dev - is "tasks 
files" perhaps something specific to blends-dev?

 - Jonas

-- 
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Re: Blends integration into the Debian Installer

[Jonas Smedegaard]

Hi Ole,

Quoting Ole Streicher (2016-05-24 14:31:41)
> Ole Streicher  writes:
>> I will open wishlist bug reports for all blends mentioned in the web 
>> page to clarify if and what they want to have in a default 
>> installation.
>
> Did this for almost all blends that claim to have metapackages:
 ^^^

I briefly skimed the bugreport for multimedia blend, and instructions 
there seemed to be specific to using blends-dev for generating the 
metapackages.

Do the inclusion into debian-installer require blends-dev?  If not, is 
there any hints anywhere on generic requirements?

Thanks for the great work on this,

 - Jonas

-- 
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Re: Blends integration into the Debian Installer

[Ole Streicher]

Jonas Smedegaard  writes:
> Quoting Ole Streicher (2016-05-24 10:55:13)
>> * what are their requirements to be listed in the default installation
>>   image?
>> 
>> * can they live with just *one* option as a compromise?
>
> For both debian-parl and debian-design it is a sensible compromise for 
> now to include only "parl-desktop" and skip region- or topic-specific 
> metapackages.

Could you put this into the tasks files of the blends?

Cheers

Ole

Re: Blends integration into the Debian Installer

[Jonas Smedegaard]

Quoting Ole Streicher (2016-05-24 10:55:13)
> * what are their requirements to be listed in the default installation
>   image?
> 
> * can they live with just *one* option as a compromise?

For both debian-parl and debian-design it is a sensible compromise for 
now to include only "parl-desktop" and skip region- or topic-specific 
metapackages.

 - Jonas

-- 
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 * Tlf.: +45 40843136  Website: http://dr.jones.dk/

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Re: Blends integration into the Debian Installer

[Andreas Tille]

On Tue, May 24, 2016 at 12:55:04PM +0100, Iain R. Learmonth wrote:
> On 24/05/16 12:52, Andreas Tille wrote:
> > Perfectly agreed.  I'd love if somebody would put a simple script into
> > the Blends framework that generates Live media from tasks dependencies.
> 
> It won't be in the blends framework, it'll be in the (currently a mess)
> blends-images package which is being reworked to work with live-wrapper.

I don't care about the name of the beast ... as long as it works.
 
> Will be working on this Wed/Thurs.

Sounds good.  Please keep us updated.

Kind regards

Andreas.

-- 
http://fam-tille.de

Re: Blends integration into the Debian Installer

[Ole Streicher]

Andreas Tille  writes:
>> That is probably the main driver here. Please note that this is now
>> "opt-in" as changed to resolve #825004.
>
> I realised this and just pushed the relevant change.

Great!

>> I will open wishlist bug reports for all blends mentioned in the web
>> page to clarify if and what they want to have in a default
>> installation.
>
> I think
>
> $ git diff HEAD^
> diff --git a/tasks/bio b/tasks/bio
> index fb086e9..9c7c6fe 100644
> --- a/tasks/bio
> +++ b/tasks/bio
> @@ -1,4 +1,5 @@
>  Task: Biology
> +Install: true

>
> will close the wishlist bug report against, Debian Med before you have
> filed it, right?

Yes, this is it :-)

I will ignore now debian-med in the bugreporting... :-)

Cheers

Ole

Re: Blends integration into the Debian Installer

[Andreas Tille]

On Tue, May 24, 2016 at 01:25:39PM +0200, Ole Streicher wrote:
> >> For Debian-Astro, I can (unsurprisingly) state that having one checkbox
> >> only is a compromise that works. What about the others?
> >
> > For Debian Med it would be a big enhancement over not beeing mentioned
> > in the installer at all. 
> 
> That is probably the main driver here. Please note that this is now
> "opt-in" as changed to resolve #825004.

I realised this and just pushed the relevant change.
 
> I will open wishlist bug reports for all blends mentioned in the web
> page to clarify if and what they want to have in a default
> installation.

I think

$ git diff HEAD^
diff --git a/tasks/bio b/tasks/bio
index fb086e9..9c7c6fe 100644
--- a/tasks/bio
+++ b/tasks/bio
@@ -1,4 +1,5 @@
 Task: Biology
+Install: true
 Description: Debian Med bioinformatics packages
  This metapackage will install Debian packages for use in molecular biology,
  structural biology and other biological sciences.
diff --git a/tasks/bio-dev b/tasks/bio-dev
index 6d88786..dab743e 100644
--- a/tasks/bio-dev
+++ b/tasks/bio-dev
@@ -1,4 +1,5 @@
 Task: Biology Development
+Install: true
 Description: Debian Med packages for development of bioinformatics applications
  This metapackage will install Debian packages which might be helpful
  for development of applications for biological research.
diff --git a/tasks/statistics b/tasks/statistics
index 5bb9d6e..e29ce61 100644
--- a/tasks/statistics
+++ b/tasks/statistics
@@ -1,4 +1,5 @@
 Task: Statistics
+Install: true
 Description: Debian Med statistics
  This metapackage will install packages which are helpful to do statistics
  with a special focus on tasks in medical care.


will close the wishlist bug report against, Debian Med before you have
filed it, right?
 
> > If we might have only a single selection option for Stretch we might
> > even go with just the Biology part.  So in the end we could cope with
> > a one option compromise to not make things more complicated than they
> > need to be.
> 
> Could you put the "Install: true" tag into the task headers of the
> debian-med package that should go into the default installation, and
> edit the debian-blends-tasks.desc in the blends package to reflect the
> selection you make?

Done.  See above.
 
Thanks a lot for working on this and even caring that others realise
the change

   Andreas. 

-- 
http://fam-tille.de

Re: Blends integration into the Debian Installer

[Iain R. Learmonth]

Hi,

On 24/05/16 12:52, Andreas Tille wrote:
> Perfectly agreed.  I'd love if somebody would put a simple script into
> the Blends framework that generates Live media from tasks dependencies.

It won't be in the blends framework, it'll be in the (currently a mess)
blends-images package which is being reworked to work with live-wrapper.

Will be working on this Wed/Thurs.

Thanks,
Iain.

Re: Blends integration into the Debian Installer

[Andreas Tille]

Hi Iain,

On Tue, May 24, 2016 at 12:19:21PM +0100, Iain R. Learmonth wrote:
> On 24/05/16 11:37, Andreas Tille wrote:
> > If
> > we might have only a single selection option for Stretch we might even
> > go with just the Biology part.  So in the end we could cope with a one
> > option compromise to not make things more complicated than they need to
> > be.
> 
> This would also sound reasonable for a live CD build. (:

Perfectly agreed.  I'd love if somebody would put a simple script into
the Blends framework that generates Live media from tasks dependencies.

Kind regards

 Andreas. 

-- 
http://fam-tille.de

Re: Blends integration into the Debian Installer

[Ole Streicher]

Andreas Tille  writes:

> Hi Ole,
>
> On Tue, May 24, 2016 at 10:55:13AM +0200, Ole Streicher wrote:
>> in the alpha-6 relase of the debian installer, blends can selected for
>> the first time directly during installation [1]. This was implemented by
>> adding a blends-dev/debian-blends-tasks.desc file on a place where the
>> "tasksel" step can find it.
>
> That's *very* good news and might realise a dream I'm dreaming of more
> than 10 years. ;-)

Let's see if we can keep a good compromise here. I was a bit surprised
about the emotions and personalities that popped up in the discussion.

>> * what are their requirements to be listed in the default installation
>>   image?
>> 
>> * can they live with just *one* option as a compromise?
>> 
>> * if not: what needs to be done to get your requirement into the
>>   installer?
>> 
>> For Debian-Astro, I can (unsurprisingly) state that having one checkbox
>> only is a compromise that works. What about the others?
>
> For Debian Med it would be a big enhancement over not beeing mentioned
> in the installer at all. 

That is probably the main driver here. Please note that this is now
"opt-in" as changed to resolve #825004.

I will open wishlist bug reports for all blends mentioned in the web
page to clarify if and what they want to have in a default
installation.

> If we might have only a single selection option for Stretch we might
> even go with just the Biology part.  So in the end we could cope with
> a one option compromise to not make things more complicated than they
> need to be.

Could you put the "Install: true" tag into the task headers of the
debian-med package that should go into the default installation, and
edit the debian-blends-tasks.desc in the blends package to reflect the
selection you make?

Best regards

Ole

Re: Blends integration into the Debian Installer

[Iain R. Learmonth]

Hi All,

On 24/05/16 09:55, Ole Streicher wrote:
> * can they live with just *one* option as a compromise?

For hamradio, having just "install the hamradio blend" is completely
acceptable and would be my preferred choice. It's worth noting that I
install *all* the tasks for a blend when I build the live CDs (currently
only built for GIS and Hamradio). If people think that some tasks should
not be installed, would the same choices be made for the Live CD? -
Please say they can be the same so that we don't have to make this more
complicated. (:

Thanks,
Iain.

Blends integration into the Debian Installer

[Ole Streicher]

Hi all,

in the alpha-6 relase of the debian installer, blends can selected for
the first time directly during installation [1]. This was implemented by
adding a blends-dev/debian-blends-tasks.desc file on a place where the
"tasksel" step can find it.

However, this causes a lot of discussion: the common complaint is that
it adds too much complexity to the "Software selection" step of the
installer [2]. My hope here is that the compromise would be to move the
blends selection onto a separate step that can be enabled by
f.e. checkbox on the first "Software selection" screen.

The other complaint is about the way the task are selected: currently,
all tasks of a blend are selected, with an opt-out possibility, and all
the blends we have on the web page are included.  The first one is
questioned [3], and changing the behauivour to opt-in will remove those
blends who do not do this step. IMO we should discuss these aspects (how
the integration is to be done, and how the selection of tasks is done)
in the two mentioned bugs.

However, there is a third aspect that came up with the discussion in [3],
and also appeared in a discussion with NeuroDebian: Some blends have the
requirement not just to install a "default" package selection but to
have a more detailed choice.

I must say that I have no idea how we ge this implemented in the current
situation (especially the discussion in [2]) -- in my opinion the
maximal compromise for the installer we can reach is to have *one*
option per blend. So this mail is to ask the blends on

* what are their requirements to be listed in the default installation
  image?

* can they live with just *one* option as a compromise?

* if not: what needs to be done to get your requirement into the
  installer?

For Debian-Astro, I can (unsurprisingly) state that having one checkbox
only is a compromise that works. What about the others?

I think we should somehow come up with an agreement on how we want to
see the blends presented in the (default) installer.

Best regards

Ole

[1] https://lists.debian.org/debian-devel-announce/2016/05/msg4.html
[2] https://bugs.debian.org/758116
[3] https://bugs.debian.org/825004