Some questions about Fedora

[Nicolas Mailhot]

Le jeudi 20 septembre 2007 à 08:42 -0400, seth vidal a écrit :

Some nitpicking :)

> On Thu, 2007-09-20 at 09:11 +0200, Lucas Nussbaum wrote:
> > Q1. Packages
> > How many "pieces of software" do you have in your distribution?
> In our development distribution:
> - 8232 compiled packages (binaries)
> - 4638 source packages 

This being for a single architecture.

> >  Do you distinguish between "source packages" and "binary packages"? (if yes,
> > give numbers for both). 
> 
> Source packages are what the binary packages are built from.
> 
> > Are there subdivisions in the set of packages (by kind of support, by "freeness")? 
> 
> No. 

Some packages may end up in derived distributions like RHEL which have
their own support organisation separate from Fedora.

Also, groups within the project can release spins composed of a subset
of the distribution packages. Obviously these groups pay more QA
attention to the subset they selected than to the rest of the
distribution.

But there is no formal separation in 1st-class and X-class packages
within Fedora.

Lastly Fedora packages only free software, but it may relax its rules
for stuff with is not software or is borderline (firmware, fonts, etc).
Relax meaning no requirement to be modifiable, or if it's modifiable,
not requirement to build from sources.

Several well-known third-party repositories specialise in stuff Fedora
refuses to carry, and may get contributions from individual Fedora
members.

> > Are all packages supported the same way, or are there different levels of 
> > support?
> 
> All packages are treated the same.
> 
> > Are some packages imported from another distribution, or are most of your 
> > packages done from scratch by your developers ?
> 
> All packages are done from scratch by our developers.

All packages are build on Fedora infrastructure and must pass Fedora
packaging guidelines. There is no requirement to redo them from scratch
and indeed most Fedora packages were originally imported from other
entities (RHL/FC, third-party RHEL/RHL/FC repositories, etc), by their
original packager or someone else.

This import is usually one-way because our strict QA process usually
forces many changes, and there's little interest in keeping a package
outside the project live once it's imported. However many Fedora Java
packages live a double life at JPackage, with frequent two-way imports
and adaptations. Another such example is OLPC which was forked from
Fedora initially, and has come back @fedora lately. Everything OLPC
packaged independently will probably be re-imported @fedora eventually.

> > Do you have different
> > "classes" of developers, or does everybody have the same access right to
> > all your packages?
> 
> Everyone has the same access to all the packages. The only exception is
> that an individual package maintainer has the right to restrict access
> to his/her packages to a specific set of developers. 

However even when access to a package is not restricted via technical
means, each package has an owner and sometimes a co-owner list, and
these people have special weight in conflicts, get auto-CCed on package
bugs, etc

-- 
Nicolas Mailhot
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