Re: [lubuntu-users] State of PPC

[Fritz Hudnut]

On Sat, Jul 23, 2016 at 7:36 PM, Simon Quigley  wrote:

> I just make sure that
> they know we're listening and understand. In fact, could you link me to
> some of these forums? Maybe I should link the release announcements
> there and respond to responses on that. I could also look at some
> threads and instruct people on filing bugs and reporting issues that a
> bunch of people are having in a way we can see it.
>

@Simon:

Thanks for your reply.  Link to Ubuntu's Apple Hardware User sub-forum,
wherein all topics related to PPC would be posted or funneled by the list
mods:



BTW I do and have filed bug reports, to varying degrees of response from
devs . . . and have reported my test results on the QA; I was a member of
the QA group until I was dropped awhile back . . . .  I do read or scan
most posts on the Lu list serve and recall little or few mentions of "PPC"
related topics or requests for testing for release, until this recent
round.

But, indeed, it would be "nice" if you or some of the devs tasked with PPC
would blow through that forum and respond to various posts, possibly that
would or could get the people who are trying to get various ubuntu flavros
to run on their PPC machines enthused about testing . . . ???  Personally I
don't look to Twitter for reliable data  . . . .  As far as my post
yesterday requesting for testers, "152 views" with "0 replies" . . . .
"luigiburdo" is someone who is actively trying to get linux running on his
various PPC computers, has filed bug reports and so forth and yet seems to
have his issues unaddressed; based upon his posts on the apple user forum .
. . people are trying, but don't seem to be connecting to the people who
actually do stuff . . . .  Thanks for listening.

BW,

F
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Re: [lubuntu-users] State of PPC

[Simon Quigley]

Greetings,

I wanted to clear things up to make sure we're all on the same page.
Basically, I want to clarify what Nio and Walter have said on various
threads (if these are the points they are getting at, correct this email
if I'm wrong).

The Lubuntu team LOVES the PowerPC users. We love that you guys decide
to use Lubuntu. As Walter said, it holds a special place in his heart,
and while I haven't had the same experiences as him, i386 holds a
special place in my heart (but that's for a different day). So I'd like
to give you a little insight on how we release milestones.

We have testers, just like you (you could call them users as well) that
test the images for us. Nio tests on real hardware, I tend to test on
VMs, but I have an i386 machine I plan on using in the future, and
hardware testing is *essential* for releasing a final release of any
kind. These testers report the tests on the ISO QA Tracker[1].

We then go through the completed tests, and if there are no critical
bugs, we mark as done. We also add the bugs attached to the release
notes. It's a pretty nice system, and I really like it.

What has been happening with PPC is that people report problems on the
mailing list, say that it works, etc. but it isn't on our minds to check
the mailing list for possibly week old reports that might not be true
any more (we might have fixed bugs, emphasis on any more). So if nothing
is on the tracker for PPC, we unfortunately have to make the decision to
say, "well, because it seems like nobody tested PPC, we aren't going to
release an image." Also, sometimes that isn't even our decision. When
the global release team (for all flavors) sees that it isn't reported on
the tracker, they won't copy the ISOs to the release folder. So in a
technical way, it's not that we don't care about the mailing list, we
*literally* can't release PPC images if they aren't reported on the
tracker. I appreciate that they are tested, but please, use the latest
image (which I'm fairly confident y'all are doing, but just in case you
aren't) and report them on the tracker. If you have a problem, please
report it. I'm not going through these mailing list threads and
reporting bugs from your emails because I don't have a PowerPC machine
to confirm on (I would if I could). When we fix a bug and want to get it
into 16.04 through a verification process, nobody checks PowerPC.

And yet there are complaints when I make a statement such as:

> This is because we received *zero* testing for PowerPC in 16.04.1. If you 
> want these images in the future, make sure they are tested. :)

The reason being, nobody has taken the time to report on the tracker,
write the bugs, and go through the process to actually bring it to our
attention and allow us to release. We appreciate that the testing is
done, just please report it more officially on the tracker.

Let me make this clear, thank you for bringing up issues and talking
about PPC on the mailing lists. Just please, someone report a bug if you
have a problem.

And when the team puts out a call for testing, please test so we know it
works. And report your results on the tracker. :)

One thing that doesn't go through our mind on release day is to cite
bugs that aren't reported. That's why, if you see bugs are reported and
are on the release notes for the previous release, if you install the
image on your PPC machine, please comment on the bug and let us know
your results. Even something generic like:

"This issue still exists on the Yakkety Alpha 2 image."

helps us a lot. Also, when you write about a problem on the mailing
list, please couple it with a bug. Then, if you have a PPC machine,
confirm that bug. :)

You may be asking, "I have a PPC machine with image X (not the Xenial
image, an example release) on it, how do I confirm bugs?" Subscribe to
the Lubuntu Packages Team bugs[2](you have to be a member of the Lubuntu
Packages Team), so you can receive a notification when someone reports a
bug. Then, you can confirm it on your PPC install. It also helps if you
go through bugs and say something like:

"This bug affects the Yakkety Alpha 2 image."

Maybe even do it on bug day[3]. ;)

We love you guys. We really do. Just please follow through with getting
bugs reported and images checked. Fritz, you said that there's a
community for PPC on Lubuntu. We have Alpha 2 coming up this week and
14.04.5 coming up the week after that. Please, ask some people in the
community to give us a hand. Even if it's one tester and one machine, if
someone with a PPC machine completes the tests on the tracker, we can
release. If not, then please don't cry when we don't release the image,
because nobody followed through. And for all the people with PPC
installs, don't, after release, say, "oh wait, hey, you forgot PPC!" and
then test, expecting us to release. That's the reason we put out calls
for testing *before* the release. To get *testing* . :)

To answer Fritz's email with the information I just gave:

> OK, I 

Re: [lubuntu-users] State of PPC

[Fritz Hudnut]

On Sat, Jul 23, 2016 at 4:09 PM, Walter Lapchynski  wrote:

> >  At least as far as getting some testing on the QA for what might be the
> last hurrah for PPC and Lubuntu . . . .
>
> Well, ideally we still need testing on the Trusty/Xenial point releases,
> at minimum. Any support you can drum up there would be appreciated.
>


@wxl:

OK, I posted a request for Lubuntu PPC testers on the Apple User forum . .
. sans your quoted material . . . .  I'll see if that stirs up anything . .
. in a "formal" sense of the word.

In the meanwhile I visited the QA tracker, and the report that "zero"
testing has been done is not entirely accurate, as it looks like "erhard-f"
filed some bug reports and passed some aspect of Lubuntu . . . which in
comparison to the other options is not that much different . . . .

Looking around, the only Lubuntu Xenial QA slot that is still "testing" is
now, the "daily" other "final" and the ".1" have been "archived."  Looking
somewhere else the Lubuntu PPC options have a line strike through them . .
. so technically the only tests left to be done are the "daily" iso???

So, I'm typing this in my iBook G4, running Lu 16.04, other than the fan
blowing all of the time it has to think, it's fine--ready for primetime in
PPC-land.  My new phone company, the one that took over Verizon landline
has my DSL throttled down to less than 2 MB/sec . . . I don't have time to
play with downloading a daily, my install went well with the beta . . . for
sure I mentioned this at various junctures . . . doesn't seem like there is
any test to do for the beta . . . updated/upgraded as of today???

I vote for kicking it out and see how many people download the PPC iso . .
. it's kind of wimpy to have it be this close to release, but then, not . .
. .  Hopefully there will be some boost from the sub-forum . . . .

F
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Re: [lubuntu-users] State of PPC

[Walter Lapchynski]

On Jul 23, 2016 7:48 AM, "Fritz Hudnut"  wrote:

>  Also, with wxl's permission I could re-post his email here about the
"State of PPC" on the apple user sub-forum, and see if that will garner any
response(s)???

Yes, please. I'm not just trying to make some proclamation of how it is.
This is a community supported matter, so if the community will support
Lubuntu PPC, I'm all for carrying on like normal. I have struggled to even
bring the topic up, so if the community supports ending it, I want to hear
about that, too. No matter what, I don't feel comfortable acting on this
alone.

>  At least as far as getting some testing on the QA for what might be the
last hurrah for PPC and Lubuntu . . . .

Well, ideally we still need testing on the Trusty/Xenial point releases, at
minimum. Any support you can drum up there would be appreciated.

And as Herminio said, there is still support in the Linux community for
PPC. If this spells the end for Lubuntu PPC, at least we can say it's not
the end for Linux (or UNIX— see NetBSD, for example) PPC.
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Re: [lubuntu-users] State of PPC

[Fritz Hudnut]

On Fri, Jul 22, 2016 at 1:59 PM, Walter Lapchynski  wrote:

> My estimation of things is that Lubuntu on PPC mostly works, given a few
> caveats. All we need to do to release PPC is for all of the test cases to
> be completed successfully (regardless of whether or not there are bugs) and
> that marked on the QA tracker for the final testing of each milestone. If
> we don't have that done, Canonical will not let us release it.
>
> PPC was what brought me originally to Lubuntu, so there's a special place
> for it in my heart. Having an OS make that old hardware work was very
> refreshing and introduced me to the real power and mission of Lubuntu.
>
> However, I haven't ran PPC in a long, long time. That being said, I'm not
> of much help. We rely on the community of users to help out. When I don't
> see testing happening in the community, it makes me think that I'm not the
> only one that's neglected their PPC machines.
>


@wxl:

I also came to linux in hopes of keeping what were perfectly adequate
computers viable until they actually broke, some of which have and others
are still yet running.  One problem for my own machines is that they have
started to fall below the system requirements, either for RAM or CPU, even
for Lubuntu--which reduces the practicality of using them for work a day
computers.

However, when I installed Lu 14 LTS on several of my computers there were
"glitches" and I thought "I won't be upgrading after this" . . . but Lu 16
LTS has actually run better than 14 on both of my PPC computers.  Would I
need to upgrade them again, probably not if support is available for kernel
and browser for a few years more.

And, agreed, a team of "one" is not really a team, it shouldn't fall to wxl
to do everything he can to keep PPC going for Lubuntu.  In terms of
releasing Lu 16 for PPC I would concur that it is for all intents and
purposes, fine.  I posted here about the jaggy graphics of window dragging,
that has been around since 14.04 . . . otherwise, generally good from my
somewhat limited use of it on my iBook G4.

I'm taking time to mention again that on the Apple Hardware User forum, a
small, mostly ignored and Siberia-like sub-forum on the Ubuntu User forums
. . . there are a lot of folks in Europe now coming to the forum to get
help with there AmigaOne machines, that use the motorola processor . . .
and so there could be new enthusiasm for PPC coming to Lubuntu.

What I can do in the coming **weeks** is to try to run through some of the
QA tests on my iBook G4 for the installed Lubuntu 16.06 system.  Also, with
wxl's permission I could re-post his email here about the "State of PPC" on
the apple user sub-forum, and see if that will garner any response(s)???
At least as far as getting some testing on the QA for what might be the
last hurrah for PPC and Lubuntu . . . .

F
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Re: [lubuntu-users] State of PPC

[Narcis Garcia]

The .1 release is the most important, because it's a stabilization of
LTS ISO release.
Next point releases introduce new kernels & GUI and this can introduce
new bugs to discover.


El 22/07/16 a les 22:59, Walter Lapchynski ha escrit:
> As you can see from the page on [PPC][1], the architecture has only
> community support from Ubuntu. Lubuntu has been trying as much as we can
> to support this, but the fact of the matter is that we have no
> developers on our team that can actually help with PPC bugs. 
> 
> The best you can hope for is that kernel developers (mostly, the issue
> is with drivers) might have some interest in fixing bugs. However, with
> only community support, that's unlikely. Most of the focus on PPC has
> been on the server side of things, where graphics just don't come into play.
> 
> My estimation of things is that Lubuntu on PPC mostly works, given a few
> caveats. All we need to do to release PPC is for all of the test cases
> to be completed successfully (regardless of whether or not there are
> bugs) and that marked on the QA tracker for the final testing of each
> milestone. If we don't have that done, Canonical will not let us release it.
> 
> PPC was what brought me originally to Lubuntu, so there's a special
> place for it in my heart. Having an OS make that old hardware work was
> very refreshing and introduced me to the real power and mission of Lubuntu.
> 
> However, I haven't ran PPC in a long, long time. That being said, I'm
> not of much help. We rely on the community of users to help out. When I
> don't see testing happening in the community, it makes me think that I'm
> not the only one that's neglected their PPC machines.
> 
> The reality of the situation is that there has been much talk throughout
> the Ubuntu community over the past few years about getting rid of i386.
> If that happens, I can't imagine that Canonical keeping PPC. With that
> in mind, I think the end of PPC Lubuntu is coming regardless of what our
> feelings are.
> 
> Furthermore, the Lubuntu Team is a small one and we often lack the
> capacity to do the things that we need to do. PPC is just stretching us
> even thinner, and into an area few of us really have the experience,
> knowledge, resources, or time to deal with.
> 
> That said, I'm inclined to suggest we start the process of removing PPC.
> We managed to release an LTS, which is the only version we even bother
> with PPC on. All we would need to do is ensure that all the point
> releases for Trusty and Xenial get published. That would put us out
> until about August 2018.
> 
> I think ultimately this will be better for the team. Most importantly,
> though, I think it will be better for the PPC users that I fear we can't
> really support and who we often leave with a frustrated experience.
> 
> What do you think?
> 
> [1]: https://wiki.ubuntu.com/PowerPC 
> -- 
> @wxl | http://polka.bike
> Lubuntu Release Manager & Head of QA
> Ubuntu PPC Point of Contact
> Ubuntu Oregon LoCo Team Leader
> Ubuntu Membership Board & LoCo Council Member
> Eugene Unix & GNU/Linux User Group Co-Organizer
> 
> 

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[lubuntu-users] State of PPC

[Walter Lapchynski]

As you can see from the page on [PPC][1], the architecture has only
community support from Ubuntu. Lubuntu has been trying as much as we can to
support this, but the fact of the matter is that we have no developers on
our team that can actually help with PPC bugs.

The best you can hope for is that kernel developers (mostly, the issue is
with drivers) might have some interest in fixing bugs. However, with only
community support, that's unlikely. Most of the focus on PPC has been on
the server side of things, where graphics just don't come into play.

My estimation of things is that Lubuntu on PPC mostly works, given a few
caveats. All we need to do to release PPC is for all of the test cases to
be completed successfully (regardless of whether or not there are bugs) and
that marked on the QA tracker for the final testing of each milestone. If
we don't have that done, Canonical will not let us release it.

PPC was what brought me originally to Lubuntu, so there's a special place
for it in my heart. Having an OS make that old hardware work was very
refreshing and introduced me to the real power and mission of Lubuntu.

However, I haven't ran PPC in a long, long time. That being said, I'm not
of much help. We rely on the community of users to help out. When I don't
see testing happening in the community, it makes me think that I'm not the
only one that's neglected their PPC machines.

The reality of the situation is that there has been much talk throughout
the Ubuntu community over the past few years about getting rid of i386. If
that happens, I can't imagine that Canonical keeping PPC. With that in
mind, I think the end of PPC Lubuntu is coming regardless of what our
feelings are.

Furthermore, the Lubuntu Team is a small one and we often lack the capacity
to do the things that we need to do. PPC is just stretching us even
thinner, and into an area few of us really have the experience, knowledge,
resources, or time to deal with.

That said, I'm inclined to suggest we start the process of removing PPC. We
managed to release an LTS, which is the only version we even bother with
PPC on. All we would need to do is ensure that all the point releases for
Trusty and Xenial get published. That would put us out until about August
2018.

I think ultimately this will be better for the team. Most importantly,
though, I think it will be better for the PPC users that I fear we can't
really support and who we often leave with a frustrated experience.

What do you think?

[1]: https://wiki.ubuntu.com/PowerPC
-- 
@wxl | http://polka.bike
Lubuntu Release Manager & Head of QA
Ubuntu PPC Point of Contact
Ubuntu Oregon LoCo Team Leader
Ubuntu Membership Board & LoCo Council Member
Eugene Unix & GNU/Linux User Group Co-Organizer
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