Team maintenance of more Apache modules?
I've been NMUing a lot of Apache modules recently to try to get them into shape for Apache 2.4. I suppose it's inevitable that NMUing stragglers for a transition means you get to see the least well-maintained packages, but I've seen quite a few cases that look roughly like this: * single maintainer, last upload several years ago * irregular handling of whether to load the module by default * haphazard cut-and-paste maintainer scripts with a variety of behaviour, sometimes even mentioning the wrong module name (dh-apache2 is helping a lot here) * non-standard file names in /etc/apache2/mods-available/, which are cumbersome to sort out after the fact (since you also have to take care to update the mods-enabled symlinks and a2enmod/a2dismod's internal state) * often still vestiges of Apache 1 packaging kicking around * a variety of other features which are widely regarded as stale, such as dpatch To me, this suggests that many of these packages would benefit from team maintenance. Of course some of libapache2-mod-* are already team-maintained because they're built from source packages that do other things - notably the various language maintenance teams for things like libapache2-mod-perl2 - but there are plenty of source packages that only build an Apache module. The contrast with the Haskell team which I joined recently (almost all team-maintained, very high degree of packaging consistency, lots of tools, amazingly low bug-to-package ratio) has been pretty striking to me, and it suggests possible improvement. I don't mean to diss the maintainers involved; it's just that there are obvious economies of scale here. The Apache 2.4 porting work has been pretty formulaic for the most part, and no doubt there'll be an Apache 2.6 in the future and we'll get to do it all over again. This isn't my normal field (although I did web server development in a previous job), and while I'd like to help out I certainly can't set up a team entirely on my own. Would module maintainers be interested in this kind of thing? Depending on what the Apache server maintainers are amenable to in terms of access control and bug mail on debian-apache@lists, we could either use the existing pkg-apache Alioth project or start a new pkg-apache-modules project. We could start with libapache2-mod-auth-plain, which is currently orphaned, but it'd be nice to have a few more. Thanks, -- Colin Watson [cjwat...@debian.org] -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to debian-devel-requ...@lists.debian.org with a subject of unsubscribe. Trouble? Contact listmas...@lists.debian.org Archive: http://lists.debian.org/20130713104339.gg27...@riva.ucam.org
Re: Team maintenance of more Apache modules?
Hi Colin, I appreciate your efforts. It was me, as a main driver of this transition to be responsible for causing you all this work. Sorry about all of this, but I'm deeply impressed on all the good work you spent to patch upstream's code. On 13.07.2013 12:43, Colin Watson wrote: To me, this suggests that many of these packages would benefit from team maintenance. [..] but there are plenty of source packages that only build an Apache module. The contrast with the Haskell team which I joined recently (almost all team-maintained, very high degree of packaging consistency, lots of tools, amazingly low bug-to-package ratio) has been pretty striking to me, and it suggests possible improvement. Any _working_ team is without doubt an improvement. However, as you pointed out yourself, many modules had no love for years which implies some lack of interest to have them maintained properly. Just having a team umbrella around does not attract more interest on these modules, and the only thing being worse than a single maintainer not caring is a whole team not caring in hope someone else will do. I don't mean to diss the maintainers involved; it's just that there are obvious economies of scale here. The Apache 2.4 porting work has been pretty formulaic for the most part, and no doubt there'll be an Apache 2.6 in the future and we'll get to do it all over again. True. That being said I hope it will be less painful for the changes we introduced with 2.4 (depending on API versions, packaging helper, consolidated maintainer script handling etc.) Depending on what the Apache server maintainers are amenable to in terms of access control and bug mail on debian-apache@lists, we could either use the existing pkg-apache Alioth project or start a new pkg-apache-modules project. We could start with libapache2-mod-auth-plain, which is currently orphaned, but it'd be nice to have a few more. As an Apache maintainer, I welcome any effort resulting in a *working* team, and I see no problem to use debian-apache@l.d.o for that purpose. I might even join that team. ;-) -- with kind regards, Arno Töll IRC: daemonkeeper on Freenode/OFTC GnuPG Key-ID: 0x9D80F36D signature.asc Description: OpenPGP digital signature
Re: Team maintenance of more Apache modules?
Am 13.07.2013 12:43, schrieb Colin Watson: we could either use the existing pkg-apache Alioth project or start a new pkg-apache-modules project. We could start with libapache2-mod-auth-plain, which is currently orphaned, but it'd be nice to have a few more. add neko to this. it was orphaned, I fixed it and properly did orphan it. Matthias -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to debian-devel-requ...@lists.debian.org with a subject of unsubscribe. Trouble? Contact listmas...@lists.debian.org Archive: http://lists.debian.org/51e167eb.6060...@debian.org
Re: Team maintenance of more Apache modules?
On Sat, July 13, 2013 12:43, Colin Watson wrote: This isn't my normal field (although I did web server development in a previous job), and while I'd like to help out I certainly can't set up a team entirely on my own. Would module maintainers be interested in this kind of thing? As a maintainer of two modules I think it's a great idea and I'd definitely join such a team. Cheers, Thijs -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to debian-devel-requ...@lists.debian.org with a subject of unsubscribe. Trouble? Contact listmas...@lists.debian.org Archive: http://lists.debian.org/80fb526c6e9b2e6b553bc3afd60a665e.squir...@aphrodite.kinkhorst.nl
Re: Team maintenance of more Apache modules?
Thijs Kinkhorst th...@debian.org writes: On Sat, July 13, 2013 12:43, Colin Watson wrote: This isn't my normal field (although I did web server development in a previous job), and while I'd like to help out I certainly can't set up a team entirely on my own. Would module maintainers be interested in this kind of thing? As a maintainer of two modules I think it's a great idea and I'd definitely join such a team. I already maintain two fairly complicated packages that don't make sense to team-maintain (the ones built from the webauth and shibboleth-sp2 source packages), but I'd be happy to join a package maintenance team and help out with others. I have a fair bit of experience with porting Apache modules and with module packaging at this point, since I've made and therefore learned from a wide variety of mistakes with webauth over the years. :) The module that I'm particularly interested in is libapache2-mod-auth-kerb whose maintainer (cc'd) hasn't had much time to work on lately. Ghe, would you be willing to have libapache2-mod-auth-kerb maintained by an Apache modules team (which you are, of course, invited to join)? -- Russ Allbery (r...@debian.org) http://www.eyrie.org/~eagle/ -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to debian-devel-requ...@lists.debian.org with a subject of unsubscribe. Trouble? Contact listmas...@lists.debian.org Archive: http://lists.debian.org/87mwpq9tb1@windlord.stanford.edu
Re: Team maintenance of more Apache modules?
On 07/14/2013 12:36 AM, Thijs Kinkhorst wrote: On Sat, July 13, 2013 12:43, Colin Watson wrote: This isn't my normal field (although I did web server development in a previous job), and while I'd like to help out I certainly can't set up a team entirely on my own. Would module maintainers be interested in this kind of thing? As a maintainer of two modules I think it's a great idea and I'd definitely join such a team. Cheers, Thijs Same over here (maintaining mod-log-sql). Teams are always best. Thomas -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to debian-devel-requ...@lists.debian.org with a subject of unsubscribe. Trouble? Contact listmas...@lists.debian.org Archive: http://lists.debian.org/51e23872.6040...@debian.org
