Fedora Project launches Pre-Extras

[Dag Wieers]

On Sun, 19 Dec 2004, Michael Schwendt wrote:

> On Sun, 19 Dec 2004 14:59:45 +0100 (CET), Dag Wieers wrote:
> 
> > > > No no, most of the users do want a disttag and repotag. This mailinglist 
> > > > does not reflect that because very few people here are actual users.
> > > 
> > > What an irony. I bet those users are mislead by the repotag inflation and
> > > don't consider looking for alternatives. Tell users how to query vendor,
> > > distribution and signature fields, after those are used properly by
> > > all parties involved.
> > 
> > No no, read the list of advantages. None of the proposed work-arounds 
> > offer the same set of advantages.
> > 
> > https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-test-list/2004-December/msg00498.html
> 
> That list is adjusted to your specific point of view and your personal
> wishes and goals. Items in that list disregard any of the discussed
> pitfalls.
> 
> On the contrary, the people you discuss with acknowledge the benefits
> of disttags, but concentrate on avoiding pitfalls or improper use.

The only pitfall is not related with repotags themselves, but the specific 
way we want to influence the upgrade path. And even in that case it has 
been a decision based on the advantages outweighing one specific problem.

So they don't belong in that list, as the list is not specific to our 
implementation. Otherwise I would have added the advantages of our scheme 
to it too, which I didn't because then it would be unfair.


> > > > Yes, my first paragraph was wrong, for some reason I thought fedora.us 
> > > > finally decided to have disttags.
> > > 
> > > Funnily, they have had disttags since day one, because it is implemented
> > > in the buildsystem: rh80 -> rh90 -> 1 -> 2 -> 3 in right-most part of
> > > release. I'm not going into a loop with regard to discussing them.
> > 
> > Ok. But 1 and 2 is very Fedora centric and has no purpose in the larger 
> > scale of things that exist. How would one know whether 3 means FC3 or EL3?
> 
> The question is wrong. It should be:
> 
>   How do I find out whether a package is for FC3 or EL3?
> 
> The "Distribution" field would contain "Fedora Core 3" for all FC3
> packages and "Red Hat Enterprise Linux 3" for all RHEL3 packages.
> You use that field already, too. 

But then you ignore the fact that lots of people want the disttag to give 
them a recognisable identifier in the filename and package info (EVR).

1 does not give people that, because frankly, I wasn't aware of it.


> You put "Dag Apt Repository for Fedora Core 3" in there, and I hope
> you didn't forget about that.

I don't, the repotag is in addition to the Distribution field.


> A '3' in the filename is ambiguous. An 'fc3' substring in a filename
> is ambiguous, too. Adding ambiguous and non trustworthy vendor
> information in the filename doesn't make it better. '.rf' is as poorly
> chosen as '.fdr' or '.fr'. You expect that users know that .fr does
> not mean "french" and that .rf doesn't mean "redhat fedora".

Let's not fool each other. 'fc3' is much more specific and useful than 
'3' in itself.

I wasn't aware there was a disttag in fedora.us. That should have been 
your first clue !

And the absence of 'rf' will never allow people to identify packages based 
on the filename, while having the 'rf' repotag inside is useful for those 
that understand the concept, but won't harm those that don't.

I really can't understand that you are ignoring those facts. To me it's 
common sense. Maybe I understand better how users work as I help a few 
computer-illiterate users to work with Fedora and understand them the 
concepts. Without a recognisable disttag and repotag it's very hard to let 
people understand.


> Similarly, there are much better ways how to query a package for who
> made it. Vendor and Packager information and signature are
> available. Let's put them to good effect, please.

Sure, let's use those too.

But there is a real use to having it in the filename and EVR info, 
despite the fact that we're using the release tag for something it wasn't 
designed for.

--   dag wieers,  dag at wieers.com,  http://dag.wieers.com/   --
[all I want is a warm bed and a kind word and unlimited power]