Re: discontinuing source ISOs?

[Michael Hudson-Doyle]

On Wed, 31 Jan 2024 at 13:33, Steve Langasek 
wrote:

> On Wed, Jan 31, 2024 at 01:04:21PM +1300, Michael Hudson-Doyle wrote:
> > So do we think this reached any kind of consensus? Can I start deleting
> > code related to source ISOs?
>
> After basically a month with no genuine requirements / use cases
> identified,
> yes.
>

OK!

https://code.launchpad.net/~mwhudson/ubuntu-cdimage/+git/ubuntu-cdimage-1/+merge/459681
https://code.launchpad.net/~mwhudson/debian-cd/+git/ubuntu/+merge/459682

Cheers,
mwh


> > On Fri, 5 Jan 2024 at 00:27, Lukasz Zemczak <
> lukasz.zemc...@canonical.com>
> > wrote:
> >
> > > Hey Michael!
> > >
> > > I basically +1 what Steve said. To add a bit more to this, the current
> > > source-iso machinery doesn't take snaps into consideration, so the
> > > resulting isos weren't fully compliant anyway - especially after we
> > > adopted so many snaps on our images.
> > > The source iso codebase was in general unmaintained. I remember Laney
> > > once tried refactoring it to key on amd64 but that actually broke
> > > things even more, so we decided not to touch it if not needed.
> > >
> > > I think archive snapshotting is a much better solution in overall, or
> > > at least pointing people to the manifest + lists files as a means of
> > > source retrieval. Maybe even offer a tool that would consume a
> > > manifest + list file to download all the sources if needed.
> > >
> > > I feel like it's the right way to go. I'm not really knowledgeable
> > > about the licensing compliance bits here of course, but I'm sure we
> > > can achieve that in a better way than having to provide 6+ isos with
> > > source content, which in my opinion nowadays wasn't very useful
> > > anyway.
> > >
> > > Cheers,
> > >
> > > On Thu, 4 Jan 2024 at 05:55, Steve Langasek  >
> > > wrote:
> > > >
> > > > On Thu, Jan 04, 2024 at 04:41:43PM +1300, Michael Hudson-Doyle wrote:
> > > > > Hello release team,
> > > >
> > > > > In the course of recent refactorings of ubuntu-cdimage / debian-cd
> we
> > > > > somehow broke the building of source ISOs. I doubt this is anything
> > > very
> > > > > deep and can surely be fixed but there is another option: stop
> building
> > > > > source ISOs.
> > > >
> > > > > AFAIU the point of a source ISO is GPL-compliance: if you are
> hosting
> > > an
> > > > > ISO made out of GPL-licensed components you should really also
> host the
> > > > > source of those components. However, we put source ISOs on cdimage
> > > (e.g.
> > > > > https://cdimage.ubuntu.com/source/20231011.1/source/) not
> releases, so
> > > > > everyone (?) who mirrors the ubuntu ISOs for us does not mirror the
> > > source
> > > > > ISOs.
> > > >
> > > > > As our mirror operators have been working this way for
> approximately 20
> > > > > years without issue, perhaps it's time to stop making source ISOs
> and
> > > > > delete even more code from debian-cd and ubuntu-cdimage.
> > > >
> > > > > WDYAT?
> > > >
> > > > As you know, I'm a fan of this.
> > > >
> > > > In principle, source images are useful for ensuring the distributors
> of
> > > our
> > > > install images are complying with the terms of the GPL.  But this is
> only
> > > > true if they are *actually distributed together*, or if the source
> image
> > > is
> > > > somehow useful for a distributor to rely on for the "written offer"
> > > option
> > > > under the GPL.
> > > >
> > > > As you point out, the image files are not being distributed together.
> > > > Mirrors of releases.ubuntu.com don't get these source ISOs; and
> where
> > > > community flavors are running their own mirrors, AFAIK they aren't
> > > including
> > > > the source ISOs.  So if they're not being distributed together, the
> ISOs
> > > are
> > > > no better than pointing at the apt archive for source (possibly with
> an
> > > > appropriate index - which we do as a matter of course archive as
> part of
> > > > point releases, so that it is possible to correctly reconstruct the
> list
> > > of
> > > > required source packages + versions for point release images as
> well, not
> > > > just GA images).
> > > >
> > > > And we ourselves long ago stopped distributing physical CDs, and I'm
> not
> > > > aware of anyone else doing so - and if someone does, I think it's
> > > unlikely
> > > > that they are also distributing
> > > > https://cdimage.ubuntu.com/releases/mantic/release/source/ on 6
> DVDs!
> > > This
> > > > just isn't a useful structuring of corresponding-source-for-image
> > > anymore,
> > > > because we try to include the source for all flavors, and there are
> a lot
> > > > more flavors than there were when source ISOs started being built;
> yet
> > > we've
> > > > had zero bug reports from anyone asking to make these source ISOs
> more
> > > > useful.
> > > >
> > > > And as far as OEM preinstalled systems are concerned, well - those
> > > systems
> > > > use customized install media, so the "mainline" Ubuntu source ISOs
> don't
> > > > satisfy the "corresponding source" requireme

Re: discontinuing source ISOs?

[Steve Langasek]

On Wed, Jan 31, 2024 at 01:04:21PM +1300, Michael Hudson-Doyle wrote:
> So do we think this reached any kind of consensus? Can I start deleting
> code related to source ISOs?

After basically a month with no genuine requirements / use cases identified,
yes.

> On Fri, 5 Jan 2024 at 00:27, Lukasz Zemczak 
> wrote:
> 
> > Hey Michael!
> >
> > I basically +1 what Steve said. To add a bit more to this, the current
> > source-iso machinery doesn't take snaps into consideration, so the
> > resulting isos weren't fully compliant anyway - especially after we
> > adopted so many snaps on our images.
> > The source iso codebase was in general unmaintained. I remember Laney
> > once tried refactoring it to key on amd64 but that actually broke
> > things even more, so we decided not to touch it if not needed.
> >
> > I think archive snapshotting is a much better solution in overall, or
> > at least pointing people to the manifest + lists files as a means of
> > source retrieval. Maybe even offer a tool that would consume a
> > manifest + list file to download all the sources if needed.
> >
> > I feel like it's the right way to go. I'm not really knowledgeable
> > about the licensing compliance bits here of course, but I'm sure we
> > can achieve that in a better way than having to provide 6+ isos with
> > source content, which in my opinion nowadays wasn't very useful
> > anyway.
> >
> > Cheers,
> >
> > On Thu, 4 Jan 2024 at 05:55, Steve Langasek 
> > wrote:
> > >
> > > On Thu, Jan 04, 2024 at 04:41:43PM +1300, Michael Hudson-Doyle wrote:
> > > > Hello release team,
> > >
> > > > In the course of recent refactorings of ubuntu-cdimage / debian-cd we
> > > > somehow broke the building of source ISOs. I doubt this is anything
> > very
> > > > deep and can surely be fixed but there is another option: stop building
> > > > source ISOs.
> > >
> > > > AFAIU the point of a source ISO is GPL-compliance: if you are hosting
> > an
> > > > ISO made out of GPL-licensed components you should really also host the
> > > > source of those components. However, we put source ISOs on cdimage
> > (e.g.
> > > > https://cdimage.ubuntu.com/source/20231011.1/source/) not releases, so
> > > > everyone (?) who mirrors the ubuntu ISOs for us does not mirror the
> > source
> > > > ISOs.
> > >
> > > > As our mirror operators have been working this way for approximately 20
> > > > years without issue, perhaps it's time to stop making source ISOs and
> > > > delete even more code from debian-cd and ubuntu-cdimage.
> > >
> > > > WDYAT?
> > >
> > > As you know, I'm a fan of this.
> > >
> > > In principle, source images are useful for ensuring the distributors of
> > our
> > > install images are complying with the terms of the GPL.  But this is only
> > > true if they are *actually distributed together*, or if the source image
> > is
> > > somehow useful for a distributor to rely on for the "written offer"
> > option
> > > under the GPL.
> > >
> > > As you point out, the image files are not being distributed together.
> > > Mirrors of releases.ubuntu.com don't get these source ISOs; and where
> > > community flavors are running their own mirrors, AFAIK they aren't
> > including
> > > the source ISOs.  So if they're not being distributed together, the ISOs
> > are
> > > no better than pointing at the apt archive for source (possibly with an
> > > appropriate index - which we do as a matter of course archive as part of
> > > point releases, so that it is possible to correctly reconstruct the list
> > of
> > > required source packages + versions for point release images as well, not
> > > just GA images).
> > >
> > > And we ourselves long ago stopped distributing physical CDs, and I'm not
> > > aware of anyone else doing so - and if someone does, I think it's
> > unlikely
> > > that they are also distributing
> > > https://cdimage.ubuntu.com/releases/mantic/release/source/ on 6 DVDs!
> > This
> > > just isn't a useful structuring of corresponding-source-for-image
> > anymore,
> > > because we try to include the source for all flavors, and there are a lot
> > > more flavors than there were when source ISOs started being built; yet
> > we've
> > > had zero bug reports from anyone asking to make these source ISOs more
> > > useful.
> > >
> > > And as far as OEM preinstalled systems are concerned, well - those
> > systems
> > > use customized install media, so the "mainline" Ubuntu source ISOs don't
> > > satisfy the "corresponding source" requirement there either.
> > >
> > > So I think in practice, the source ISOs are not useful in their current
> > > state, haven't been for a long time, and therefore we should stop
> > producing
> > > them.
> > >
> > >
> > > And as to whether there are costs in maintaining these: we basically only
> > > build source ISOs once or twice every release cycle, so the machinery to
> > do
> > > so is very much the opposite of well-oiled.  After the 23.10.1 respin of
> > the
> > > Ubuntu Desktop images, I found that the source ISO

Re: discontinuing source ISOs?

[Dimitri John Ledkov]

Please proceed deleting it.

Our online & cold storage are covering all possible requirements needed.

On Wed, 31 Jan 2024 at 00:05, Michael Hudson-Doyle
 wrote:
>
> So do we think this reached any kind of consensus? Can I start deleting code 
> related to source ISOs?
>
> Cheers,
> mwh
>
> On Fri, 5 Jan 2024 at 00:27, Lukasz Zemczak  
> wrote:
>>
>> Hey Michael!
>>
>> I basically +1 what Steve said. To add a bit more to this, the current
>> source-iso machinery doesn't take snaps into consideration, so the
>> resulting isos weren't fully compliant anyway - especially after we
>> adopted so many snaps on our images.
>> The source iso codebase was in general unmaintained. I remember Laney
>> once tried refactoring it to key on amd64 but that actually broke
>> things even more, so we decided not to touch it if not needed.
>>
>> I think archive snapshotting is a much better solution in overall, or
>> at least pointing people to the manifest + lists files as a means of
>> source retrieval. Maybe even offer a tool that would consume a
>> manifest + list file to download all the sources if needed.
>>
>> I feel like it's the right way to go. I'm not really knowledgeable
>> about the licensing compliance bits here of course, but I'm sure we
>> can achieve that in a better way than having to provide 6+ isos with
>> source content, which in my opinion nowadays wasn't very useful
>> anyway.
>>
>> Cheers,
>>
>> On Thu, 4 Jan 2024 at 05:55, Steve Langasek  
>> wrote:
>> >
>> > On Thu, Jan 04, 2024 at 04:41:43PM +1300, Michael Hudson-Doyle wrote:
>> > > Hello release team,
>> >
>> > > In the course of recent refactorings of ubuntu-cdimage / debian-cd we
>> > > somehow broke the building of source ISOs. I doubt this is anything very
>> > > deep and can surely be fixed but there is another option: stop building
>> > > source ISOs.
>> >
>> > > AFAIU the point of a source ISO is GPL-compliance: if you are hosting an
>> > > ISO made out of GPL-licensed components you should really also host the
>> > > source of those components. However, we put source ISOs on cdimage (e.g.
>> > > https://cdimage.ubuntu.com/source/20231011.1/source/) not releases, so
>> > > everyone (?) who mirrors the ubuntu ISOs for us does not mirror the 
>> > > source
>> > > ISOs.
>> >
>> > > As our mirror operators have been working this way for approximately 20
>> > > years without issue, perhaps it's time to stop making source ISOs and
>> > > delete even more code from debian-cd and ubuntu-cdimage.
>> >
>> > > WDYAT?
>> >
>> > As you know, I'm a fan of this.
>> >
>> > In principle, source images are useful for ensuring the distributors of our
>> > install images are complying with the terms of the GPL.  But this is only
>> > true if they are *actually distributed together*, or if the source image is
>> > somehow useful for a distributor to rely on for the "written offer" option
>> > under the GPL.
>> >
>> > As you point out, the image files are not being distributed together.
>> > Mirrors of releases.ubuntu.com don't get these source ISOs; and where
>> > community flavors are running their own mirrors, AFAIK they aren't 
>> > including
>> > the source ISOs.  So if they're not being distributed together, the ISOs 
>> > are
>> > no better than pointing at the apt archive for source (possibly with an
>> > appropriate index - which we do as a matter of course archive as part of
>> > point releases, so that it is possible to correctly reconstruct the list of
>> > required source packages + versions for point release images as well, not
>> > just GA images).
>> >
>> > And we ourselves long ago stopped distributing physical CDs, and I'm not
>> > aware of anyone else doing so - and if someone does, I think it's unlikely
>> > that they are also distributing
>> > https://cdimage.ubuntu.com/releases/mantic/release/source/ on 6 DVDs!  This
>> > just isn't a useful structuring of corresponding-source-for-image anymore,
>> > because we try to include the source for all flavors, and there are a lot
>> > more flavors than there were when source ISOs started being built; yet 
>> > we've
>> > had zero bug reports from anyone asking to make these source ISOs more
>> > useful.
>> >
>> > And as far as OEM preinstalled systems are concerned, well - those systems
>> > use customized install media, so the "mainline" Ubuntu source ISOs don't
>> > satisfy the "corresponding source" requirement there either.
>> >
>> > So I think in practice, the source ISOs are not useful in their current
>> > state, haven't been for a long time, and therefore we should stop producing
>> > them.
>> >
>> >
>> > And as to whether there are costs in maintaining these: we basically only
>> > build source ISOs once or twice every release cycle, so the machinery to do
>> > so is very much the opposite of well-oiled.  After the 23.10.1 respin of 
>> > the
>> > Ubuntu Desktop images, I found that the source ISOs appeared to have become
>> > un-published, and I found it incredibly difficult to even work 

Re: discontinuing source ISOs?

[Michael Hudson-Doyle]

So do we think this reached any kind of consensus? Can I start deleting
code related to source ISOs?

Cheers,
mwh

On Fri, 5 Jan 2024 at 00:27, Lukasz Zemczak 
wrote:

> Hey Michael!
>
> I basically +1 what Steve said. To add a bit more to this, the current
> source-iso machinery doesn't take snaps into consideration, so the
> resulting isos weren't fully compliant anyway - especially after we
> adopted so many snaps on our images.
> The source iso codebase was in general unmaintained. I remember Laney
> once tried refactoring it to key on amd64 but that actually broke
> things even more, so we decided not to touch it if not needed.
>
> I think archive snapshotting is a much better solution in overall, or
> at least pointing people to the manifest + lists files as a means of
> source retrieval. Maybe even offer a tool that would consume a
> manifest + list file to download all the sources if needed.
>
> I feel like it's the right way to go. I'm not really knowledgeable
> about the licensing compliance bits here of course, but I'm sure we
> can achieve that in a better way than having to provide 6+ isos with
> source content, which in my opinion nowadays wasn't very useful
> anyway.
>
> Cheers,
>
> On Thu, 4 Jan 2024 at 05:55, Steve Langasek 
> wrote:
> >
> > On Thu, Jan 04, 2024 at 04:41:43PM +1300, Michael Hudson-Doyle wrote:
> > > Hello release team,
> >
> > > In the course of recent refactorings of ubuntu-cdimage / debian-cd we
> > > somehow broke the building of source ISOs. I doubt this is anything
> very
> > > deep and can surely be fixed but there is another option: stop building
> > > source ISOs.
> >
> > > AFAIU the point of a source ISO is GPL-compliance: if you are hosting
> an
> > > ISO made out of GPL-licensed components you should really also host the
> > > source of those components. However, we put source ISOs on cdimage
> (e.g.
> > > https://cdimage.ubuntu.com/source/20231011.1/source/) not releases, so
> > > everyone (?) who mirrors the ubuntu ISOs for us does not mirror the
> source
> > > ISOs.
> >
> > > As our mirror operators have been working this way for approximately 20
> > > years without issue, perhaps it's time to stop making source ISOs and
> > > delete even more code from debian-cd and ubuntu-cdimage.
> >
> > > WDYAT?
> >
> > As you know, I'm a fan of this.
> >
> > In principle, source images are useful for ensuring the distributors of
> our
> > install images are complying with the terms of the GPL.  But this is only
> > true if they are *actually distributed together*, or if the source image
> is
> > somehow useful for a distributor to rely on for the "written offer"
> option
> > under the GPL.
> >
> > As you point out, the image files are not being distributed together.
> > Mirrors of releases.ubuntu.com don't get these source ISOs; and where
> > community flavors are running their own mirrors, AFAIK they aren't
> including
> > the source ISOs.  So if they're not being distributed together, the ISOs
> are
> > no better than pointing at the apt archive for source (possibly with an
> > appropriate index - which we do as a matter of course archive as part of
> > point releases, so that it is possible to correctly reconstruct the list
> of
> > required source packages + versions for point release images as well, not
> > just GA images).
> >
> > And we ourselves long ago stopped distributing physical CDs, and I'm not
> > aware of anyone else doing so - and if someone does, I think it's
> unlikely
> > that they are also distributing
> > https://cdimage.ubuntu.com/releases/mantic/release/source/ on 6 DVDs!
> This
> > just isn't a useful structuring of corresponding-source-for-image
> anymore,
> > because we try to include the source for all flavors, and there are a lot
> > more flavors than there were when source ISOs started being built; yet
> we've
> > had zero bug reports from anyone asking to make these source ISOs more
> > useful.
> >
> > And as far as OEM preinstalled systems are concerned, well - those
> systems
> > use customized install media, so the "mainline" Ubuntu source ISOs don't
> > satisfy the "corresponding source" requirement there either.
> >
> > So I think in practice, the source ISOs are not useful in their current
> > state, haven't been for a long time, and therefore we should stop
> producing
> > them.
> >
> >
> > And as to whether there are costs in maintaining these: we basically only
> > build source ISOs once or twice every release cycle, so the machinery to
> do
> > so is very much the opposite of well-oiled.  After the 23.10.1 respin of
> the
> > Ubuntu Desktop images, I found that the source ISOs appeared to have
> become
> > un-published, and I found it incredibly difficult to even work out the
> > correct invocation of the commands that would allow me to re-publish the
> > existing ISOs.  debian-cd didn't even enter into it, I was just trying to
> > drive ubuntu-cdimage to re-publish the previously built images...
> >
> > Dropping the source ISO bu

Re: discontinuing source ISOs?

[Erich Eickmeyer]

On Thu, Jan 4 2024 at 09:30:05 -08:00:00, Steve Langasek 
 wrote:

On Thu, Jan 04, 2024 at 08:28:28AM -0800, Erich Eickmeyer wrote:

 On 1/4/2024 8:21 AM, Steve Langasek wrote:
 > > With my flavor lead hat on, as far as I know, there's not a 
single

 > > official community flavor that is running their own mirror,
 > 


 If you investigate those mirrors, those are *not* run by the 
individual

 flavor. In fact, they seem to be pointing mostly at whole mirrors of
 cdimage.ubuntu.com, and in most cases, those providers are also 
mirroring
 releases.ubuntu.com. So, sadly, those are not mirrors done *by* the 
flavor,

 which means that argument is invalid.


The very first mirror in the list is
, 
which is a
xubuntu-specific mirror and not a full mirror of cdimage.u.c.  So 
they are

distributing the Xubuntu ISOs without distributing the source ISOs.

They ALSO happen to be providing a full mirror of the Ubuntu archive 
at
 so in effect are 
meeting

the GPL source distribution requirements without the source ISOs.

The second mirror in the list,
, is
similar.

So is the third, .

And to the best of my knowledge, we do not maintain any official list 
of
cdimage.u.c mirrors in Launchpad, unlike the mirrors for 
releases.u.c; so

this is de facto a per-flavor mirror list regardless.

So yes, there are existing per-flavor mirrors that are distributing 
binary
ISOs; they are not mirroring the source ISOs; and no one is 
complaining.

The ones I've checked also happen to have an Ubuntu archive mirror
alongside, so are effectively meeting the GPL source distribution
requirements without the source ISOs (whether by design or accident, I
cannot say).


I believe you're missing my entire point. These mirrors may or may not 
be set-up by the flavors themselves, and the providers could just be 
fans of the flavors. You can't make assumptions that the flavors 
themselves are providing them. Xubuntu, in particular, has a very wide 
fanbase.


I would like to point out though that one of those linked mirrors on 
https://xubuntu.org/downloads also provides 
https://mirror.us.leaseweb.net/ubuntu-cdimage/ubuntustudio/releases/23.10/release/, 
which I certainly didn't set-up and I highly doubt any of my 
predecessors did either. However, per the GPL, I can't stop them, and I 
have no reason to. Albiet that's a mirror of all of cdimage.ubuntu.com, 
and the same company mirrors both releases.ubuntu.com and 
archive.ubuntu.com, therefore, as you mentioned, meeting the 
requirements of the GPL by haiving the sources.


And de-facto per-flavor mirror list of cdimage.u.c or not, especially 
if the flavors themselves didn't coordinate it, you can't put that on 
the flavors as they don't maintain them. However, I would put that list 
on xubuntu.org squarely on Xubuntu for maintaining, but fact of the 
matter is they just might happen to know where to find mirrored images, 
nothing more. However, I cannot speak for Xubuntu, so I'll admit I'm 
making an assumption here, but Xubuntu does not speak for the other 
flavors in this case.


That said, I'm not interested in bikeshedding this any further. My 
entire point was that when there's a decision involved where it affects 
flavors, flavors MUST have a say.


--
Erich Eickmeyer
Project Leader - Ubuntu Studio
Technical Lead - Edubuntu

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Re: discontinuing source ISOs?

[Steve Langasek]

On Thu, Jan 04, 2024 at 08:28:28AM -0800, Erich Eickmeyer wrote:
> On 1/4/2024 8:21 AM, Steve Langasek wrote:
> > > With my flavor lead hat on, as far as I know, there's not a single
> > > official community flavor that is running their own mirror,
> > https://xubuntu.org/download/

> If you investigate those mirrors, those are *not* run by the individual
> flavor. In fact, they seem to be pointing mostly at whole mirrors of
> cdimage.ubuntu.com, and in most cases, those providers are also mirroring
> releases.ubuntu.com. So, sadly, those are not mirrors done *by* the flavor,
> which means that argument is invalid.

The very first mirror in the list is
https://mirror.aarnet.edu.au/pub/xubuntu/releases/22.04/release/, which is a
xubuntu-specific mirror and not a full mirror of cdimage.u.c.  So they are
distributing the Xubuntu ISOs without distributing the source ISOs.

They ALSO happen to be providing a full mirror of the Ubuntu archive at
https://mirror.aarnet.edu.au/pub/ubuntu/archive/ so in effect are meeting
the GPL source distribution requirements without the source ISOs.

The second mirror in the list,
http://mirror.internode.on.net/pub/ubuntu/xubuntu/22.04/release/, is
similar.

So is the third, http://ubuntu.ipacct.com/xubuntu/22.04/release/.

And to the best of my knowledge, we do not maintain any official list of
cdimage.u.c mirrors in Launchpad, unlike the mirrors for releases.u.c; so
this is de facto a per-flavor mirror list regardless.

So yes, there are existing per-flavor mirrors that are distributing binary
ISOs; they are not mirroring the source ISOs; and no one is complaining. 
The ones I've checked also happen to have an Ubuntu archive mirror
alongside, so are effectively meeting the GPL source distribution
requirements without the source ISOs (whether by design or accident, I
cannot say).

-- 
Steve Langasek   Give me a lever long enough and a Free OS
Debian Developer   to set it on, and I can move the world.
Ubuntu Developer   https://www.debian.org/
slanga...@ubuntu.com vor...@debian.org


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Re: discontinuing source ISOs?

[Steve Langasek]

On Thu, Jan 04, 2024 at 04:36:54PM +, Dimitri John Ledkov wrote:

> I thought these are generated as a point in time snapshot; because we
> otherwise had no other point in time snapshots available. And hence we
> archived these with binary isos to old-releases.ubuntu.com especially
> after things are removed from launchpad and primary mirrors. And then
> old-releases.ubuntu.com actually has co-located binaries and sources,
> with matching things.

No, we don't publish them to old-releases.ubuntu.com either, because the
policy is that old-releases.u.c only gets artifacts that were previously on
releases.u.c, not cdimage.u.c.  Images that are expired off of cdimage.u.c
do get archived by IS into "cold storage", so in theory if we needed to for
license compliance it would be possible to retrieve such an image but er we
have AFAIK also never tested the restore from backup path for those.

Which also highlights that in 20 years we've never had a request for it.  So
again, what value are they actually providing.

Furthermore, for all non-LTS releases, we continue to distribute the apt
archive from https://old-releases.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/ which has the Sources
from the release pocket, so no "point in time snapshot" is needed; and for
the point releases, the release team does take a point-in-time snapshot of
-updates, and this is also offline, but again we've never had anyone
actually ask us to give them a copy of this so the fact that it's offline
isn't terribly important.

> Given we now have https://snapshot.ubuntu.com/ service, will that
> continue to be running for releases that transition to EOL? and or
> migrate to old-releases? Because, imho https://snapshot.ubuntu.com is
> a much better interface to access matching binaries and sources, at
> any point in time, for any release today, and in the past and in the
> future.

We have not asked the Launchpad team for a committment to this.  I agree
that snapshot.u.c. is a better interface overall and likely a more efficient
way to meet this requirement, and we can have that conversation with them
about ensuring it works for EOL releases.  But also, the current point
release snapshotting process by the release team ensures we have the
information necessary to produce the corresponding source if ever required,
so that's not urgent either.

-- 
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Debian Developer   to set it on, and I can move the world.
Ubuntu Developer   https://www.debian.org/
slanga...@ubuntu.com vor...@debian.org


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Re: discontinuing source ISOs?

[Dimitri John Ledkov]

On Thu, 4 Jan 2024 at 03:42, Michael Hudson-Doyle
 wrote:
>
> Hello release team,
>
> In the course of recent refactorings of ubuntu-cdimage / debian-cd we somehow 
> broke the building of source ISOs. I doubt this is anything very deep and can 
> surely be fixed but there is another option: stop building source ISOs.
>
> AFAIU the point of a source ISO is GPL-compliance: if you are hosting an ISO 
> made out of GPL-licensed components you should really also host the source of 
> those components. However, we put source ISOs on cdimage (e.g. 
> https://cdimage.ubuntu.com/source/20231011.1/source/) not releases, so 
> everyone (?) who mirrors the ubuntu ISOs for us does not mirror the source 
> ISOs.
>
> As our mirror operators have been working this way for approximately 20 years 
> without issue, perhaps it's time to stop making source ISOs and delete even 
> more code from debian-cd and ubuntu-cdimage.
>
> WDYAT?

I thought these are generated as a point in time snapshot; because we
otherwise had no other point in time snapshots available. And hence we
archived these with binary isos to old-releases.ubuntu.com especially
after things are removed from launchpad and primary mirrors. And then
old-releases.ubuntu.com actually has co-located binaries and sources,
with matching things.

Given we now have https://snapshot.ubuntu.com/ service, will that
continue to be running for releases that transition to EOL? and or
migrate to old-releases? Because, imho https://snapshot.ubuntu.com is
a much better interface to access matching binaries and sources, at
any point in time, for any release today, and in the past and in the
future.

-- 
Dimitri

Sent from Ubuntu Pro
https://ubuntu.com/pro

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Re: discontinuing source ISOs?

[Erich Eickmeyer]

On 1/4/2024 8:21 AM, Steve Langasek wrote:

With my flavor lead hat on, as far as I know, there's not a single official
community flavor that is running their own mirror,

https://xubuntu.org/download/


If you investigate those mirrors, those are *not* run by the individual 
flavor. In fact, they seem to be pointing mostly at whole mirrors of 
cdimage.ubuntu.com, and in most cases, those providers are also 
mirroring releases.ubuntu.com. So, sadly, those are not mirrors done 
*by* the flavor, which means that argument is invalid.


While historically flavors may have done their own mirroring, that is no 
longer apparently the case anymore.
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Re: discontinuing source ISOs?

[Steve Langasek]

On Thu, Jan 04, 2024 at 07:46:25AM -0800, Erich Eickmeyer wrote:
> Not release team, and I don't mean to hijack the thread, but...

> On 1/3/2024 8:55 PM, Steve Langasek wrote:
> > As you point out, the image files are not being distributed together.
> > Mirrors of releases.ubuntu.com don't get these source ISOs; and where
> > community flavors are running their own mirrors, AFAIK they aren't including
> > the source ISOs.

> With my flavor lead hat on, as far as I know, there's not a single official
> community flavor that is running their own mirror,

https://xubuntu.org/download/

-- 
Steve Langasek   Give me a lever long enough and a Free OS
Debian Developer   to set it on, and I can move the world.
Ubuntu Developer   https://www.debian.org/
slanga...@ubuntu.com vor...@debian.org


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Re: discontinuing source ISOs?

[Erich Eickmeyer]

Hi all!

Not release team, and I don't mean to hijack the thread, but...

On 1/3/2024 8:55 PM, Steve Langasek wrote:

As you point out, the image files are not being distributed together.
Mirrors of releases.ubuntu.com don't get these source ISOs; and where
community flavors are running their own mirrors, AFAIK they aren't including
the source ISOs.


With my flavor lead hat on, as far as I know, there's not a single 
official community flavor that is running their own mirror, and since 
our images are in cdimage.ubuntu.com, releases.ubuntu.com would be 
irrelevant anyhow. Every single one of our websites is pointing to our 
various pages or directly linked to the ISOs on cdimage.u.c or which, as 
I understand it, is not our own mirror. There are mirrors of cdimage.u.c 
out there, but those are not run by any official community flavor to my 
knowledge, and I would be extremely surprised if any were. I can say 
that they aren't run by Ubuntu Studio or Edubuntu. :)


However, yes, your assessment of not including the source ISOs, to my 
knowledge, is correct. That said, if there are source ISOs out there for 
the flavors, then I think the flavors should also have some say in this 
as this makes each one of the official flavors stakeholders. That said, 
I preemptively have no problem with discontinuance on behalf of Ubuntu 
Studio or Edubuntu, if they even exist.


--
Erich Eickmeyer
Project Leader - Ubuntu Studio
Technical Lead - Edubuntu
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Re: discontinuing source ISOs?

[Lukasz Zemczak]

Hey Michael!

I basically +1 what Steve said. To add a bit more to this, the current
source-iso machinery doesn't take snaps into consideration, so the
resulting isos weren't fully compliant anyway - especially after we
adopted so many snaps on our images.
The source iso codebase was in general unmaintained. I remember Laney
once tried refactoring it to key on amd64 but that actually broke
things even more, so we decided not to touch it if not needed.

I think archive snapshotting is a much better solution in overall, or
at least pointing people to the manifest + lists files as a means of
source retrieval. Maybe even offer a tool that would consume a
manifest + list file to download all the sources if needed.

I feel like it's the right way to go. I'm not really knowledgeable
about the licensing compliance bits here of course, but I'm sure we
can achieve that in a better way than having to provide 6+ isos with
source content, which in my opinion nowadays wasn't very useful
anyway.

Cheers,

On Thu, 4 Jan 2024 at 05:55, Steve Langasek  wrote:
>
> On Thu, Jan 04, 2024 at 04:41:43PM +1300, Michael Hudson-Doyle wrote:
> > Hello release team,
>
> > In the course of recent refactorings of ubuntu-cdimage / debian-cd we
> > somehow broke the building of source ISOs. I doubt this is anything very
> > deep and can surely be fixed but there is another option: stop building
> > source ISOs.
>
> > AFAIU the point of a source ISO is GPL-compliance: if you are hosting an
> > ISO made out of GPL-licensed components you should really also host the
> > source of those components. However, we put source ISOs on cdimage (e.g.
> > https://cdimage.ubuntu.com/source/20231011.1/source/) not releases, so
> > everyone (?) who mirrors the ubuntu ISOs for us does not mirror the source
> > ISOs.
>
> > As our mirror operators have been working this way for approximately 20
> > years without issue, perhaps it's time to stop making source ISOs and
> > delete even more code from debian-cd and ubuntu-cdimage.
>
> > WDYAT?
>
> As you know, I'm a fan of this.
>
> In principle, source images are useful for ensuring the distributors of our
> install images are complying with the terms of the GPL.  But this is only
> true if they are *actually distributed together*, or if the source image is
> somehow useful for a distributor to rely on for the "written offer" option
> under the GPL.
>
> As you point out, the image files are not being distributed together.
> Mirrors of releases.ubuntu.com don't get these source ISOs; and where
> community flavors are running their own mirrors, AFAIK they aren't including
> the source ISOs.  So if they're not being distributed together, the ISOs are
> no better than pointing at the apt archive for source (possibly with an
> appropriate index - which we do as a matter of course archive as part of
> point releases, so that it is possible to correctly reconstruct the list of
> required source packages + versions for point release images as well, not
> just GA images).
>
> And we ourselves long ago stopped distributing physical CDs, and I'm not
> aware of anyone else doing so - and if someone does, I think it's unlikely
> that they are also distributing
> https://cdimage.ubuntu.com/releases/mantic/release/source/ on 6 DVDs!  This
> just isn't a useful structuring of corresponding-source-for-image anymore,
> because we try to include the source for all flavors, and there are a lot
> more flavors than there were when source ISOs started being built; yet we've
> had zero bug reports from anyone asking to make these source ISOs more
> useful.
>
> And as far as OEM preinstalled systems are concerned, well - those systems
> use customized install media, so the "mainline" Ubuntu source ISOs don't
> satisfy the "corresponding source" requirement there either.
>
> So I think in practice, the source ISOs are not useful in their current
> state, haven't been for a long time, and therefore we should stop producing
> them.
>
>
> And as to whether there are costs in maintaining these: we basically only
> build source ISOs once or twice every release cycle, so the machinery to do
> so is very much the opposite of well-oiled.  After the 23.10.1 respin of the
> Ubuntu Desktop images, I found that the source ISOs appeared to have become
> un-published, and I found it incredibly difficult to even work out the
> correct invocation of the commands that would allow me to re-publish the
> existing ISOs.  debian-cd didn't even enter into it, I was just trying to
> drive ubuntu-cdimage to re-publish the previously built images...
>
> Dropping the source ISO builds from the release process (and not having to
> continue supporting them in the code) would be very nice.
>
> --
> Steve Langasek   Give me a lever long enough and a Free OS
> Debian Developer   to set it on, and I can move the world.
> Ubuntu Developer   https://www.debian.org/
> slanga...@ubuntu.com   

Re: discontinuing source ISOs?

[Steve Langasek]

On Thu, Jan 04, 2024 at 04:41:43PM +1300, Michael Hudson-Doyle wrote:
> Hello release team,

> In the course of recent refactorings of ubuntu-cdimage / debian-cd we
> somehow broke the building of source ISOs. I doubt this is anything very
> deep and can surely be fixed but there is another option: stop building
> source ISOs.

> AFAIU the point of a source ISO is GPL-compliance: if you are hosting an
> ISO made out of GPL-licensed components you should really also host the
> source of those components. However, we put source ISOs on cdimage (e.g.
> https://cdimage.ubuntu.com/source/20231011.1/source/) not releases, so
> everyone (?) who mirrors the ubuntu ISOs for us does not mirror the source
> ISOs.

> As our mirror operators have been working this way for approximately 20
> years without issue, perhaps it's time to stop making source ISOs and
> delete even more code from debian-cd and ubuntu-cdimage.

> WDYAT?

As you know, I'm a fan of this.

In principle, source images are useful for ensuring the distributors of our
install images are complying with the terms of the GPL.  But this is only
true if they are *actually distributed together*, or if the source image is
somehow useful for a distributor to rely on for the "written offer" option
under the GPL.

As you point out, the image files are not being distributed together.
Mirrors of releases.ubuntu.com don't get these source ISOs; and where
community flavors are running their own mirrors, AFAIK they aren't including
the source ISOs.  So if they're not being distributed together, the ISOs are
no better than pointing at the apt archive for source (possibly with an
appropriate index - which we do as a matter of course archive as part of
point releases, so that it is possible to correctly reconstruct the list of
required source packages + versions for point release images as well, not
just GA images).

And we ourselves long ago stopped distributing physical CDs, and I'm not
aware of anyone else doing so - and if someone does, I think it's unlikely
that they are also distributing
https://cdimage.ubuntu.com/releases/mantic/release/source/ on 6 DVDs!  This
just isn't a useful structuring of corresponding-source-for-image anymore,
because we try to include the source for all flavors, and there are a lot
more flavors than there were when source ISOs started being built; yet we've
had zero bug reports from anyone asking to make these source ISOs more
useful.

And as far as OEM preinstalled systems are concerned, well - those systems
use customized install media, so the "mainline" Ubuntu source ISOs don't
satisfy the "corresponding source" requirement there either.

So I think in practice, the source ISOs are not useful in their current
state, haven't been for a long time, and therefore we should stop producing
them.


And as to whether there are costs in maintaining these: we basically only
build source ISOs once or twice every release cycle, so the machinery to do
so is very much the opposite of well-oiled.  After the 23.10.1 respin of the
Ubuntu Desktop images, I found that the source ISOs appeared to have become
un-published, and I found it incredibly difficult to even work out the
correct invocation of the commands that would allow me to re-publish the
existing ISOs.  debian-cd didn't even enter into it, I was just trying to
drive ubuntu-cdimage to re-publish the previously built images...

Dropping the source ISO builds from the release process (and not having to
continue supporting them in the code) would be very nice.

-- 
Steve Langasek   Give me a lever long enough and a Free OS
Debian Developer   to set it on, and I can move the world.
Ubuntu Developer   https://www.debian.org/
slanga...@ubuntu.com vor...@debian.org


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