gmane.linux.debian.user.news

Debian Weekly News - November 28th, 2006

---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Debian Weekly News
http://www.debian.org/News/weekly/2006/41/
Debian Weekly News - November 28th, 2006
---------------------------------------------------------------------------

Welcome to this year's 41st issue of DWN, the newsletter for the
Debian community. Due to unfortunate [1]circumstances the weekly
newsletter stopped being released weekly and will only be
[2]finalised when enough people have contributed. Thanks to Sebastian
Feltel for nearly writing this issue alone. Bill Allombert [3]began
to evaluate package set upgrades from [4]sarge to [5]etch to find
out how smooth the upgrade goes.

 1. http://www.dunc-tank.org/
 2. http://www.infodrom.org/~joey/log/?200610250942
 3. http://lists.debian.org/debian-release/2006/11/msg00337.html
 4. http://www.debian.org/releases/sarge/
 5. http://www.debian.org/releases/etch/

GNOME 2.14 in Etch. Jordi Mallach [6]announced that the [7]Debian
GNOME team has decided to ship [8]GNOME 2.14 with the upcoming
[9]etch release. Due to several problems with the latest version 2.16
they prefer the stabilised and well tested version 2.14 to be shipped
with etch rather than an relative new GNOME 2.16 for which backports
shall be provided.

 6. http://oskuro.net/blog/freesoftware/gnome-2.16-etch-2006-10-06-21-45
 7. http://alioth.debian.org/projects/pkg-gnome
 8. http://www.gnome.org/

(Continue reading)

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Drew Parsons | 29 Nov 03:13

Re: Debian Weekly News - November 28th, 2006

On Tue, 2006-11-28 at 21:05 +0100, Martin Schulze wrote:
> ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
> ...Due to unfortunate [1]circumstances the weekly
> newsletter stopped being released weekly
> 
>  1. http://www.dunc-tank.org/

Give it a rest alright, won't you?  Geez...

Drew

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MJ Ray | 29 Nov 11:14

Re: Debian Weekly News - November 28th, 2006

Drew Parsons <dparsons <at> debian.org> wrote:
> On Tue, 2006-11-28 at 21:05 +0100, Martin Schulze wrote:
> > ...Due to unfortunate [1]circumstances the weekly
> > newsletter stopped being released weekly
> > 
> >  1. http://www.dunc-tank.org/
>
> Give it a rest alright, won't you?  Geez...

Give it a rest yourself.  It is fairly important for the introduction
of Debian Weekly News to explain why it is no longer Weekly.

Regards,
--

-- 
MJR/slef
My Opinion Only: see http://people.debian.org/~mjr/
Please follow http://www.uk.debian.org/MailingLists/#codeofconduct

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Baz | 29 Nov 20:54

Re: Debian Weekly News - November 28th, 2006

Perhaps you prefer to see Debian releases late than to see the Weekly News published every week plus a day or two?

On 11/29/06, MJ Ray <mjr <at> phonecoop.coop> wrote:

Drew Parsons <dparsons <at> debian.org> wrote:
> On Tue, 2006-11-28 at 21:05 +0100, Martin Schulze wrote:
> > ...Due to unfortunate [1]circumstances the weekly
> > newsletter stopped being released weekly
> >
> >  1. http://www.dunc-tank.org/
>
> Give it a rest alright, won't you?  Geez...

Give it a rest yourself.  It is fairly important for the introduction
of Debian Weekly News to explain why it is no longer Weekly.

Regards,
--
MJR/slef
My Opinion Only: see http://people.debian.org/~mjr/
Please follow http://www.uk.debian.org/MailingLists/#codeofconduct

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Martin Wuertele | 29 Nov 22:06

Re: Debian Weekly News - November 28th, 2006

* Baz <bazciscor <at> gmail.com> [2006-11-29 20:55]:

> Perhaps you prefer to see Debian releases late than to see the Weekly News
> published every week plus a day or two?

Now that is quite an unsubstantiated imputation.

Martin
--

-- 
http://martin.wuertele.net/ -- Debian -- OFTC -- SPI -- maxx <at> debian.org
<youam> ich kann gar nicht so viel tun, wie ich nicht lassen kann

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Baz | 29 Nov 22:45

Re: Debian Weekly News - November 28th, 2006

It was a question, not an imputation, unsubstantiated or otherwise...

On 11/29/06, Martin Wuertele <maxx <at> debian.org> wrote:

* Baz <bazciscor <at> gmail.com> [2006-11-29 20:55]:

> Perhaps you prefer to see Debian releases late than to see the Weekly News
> published every week plus a day or two?

Now that is quite an unsubstantiated imputation.

Martin
--
http://martin.wuertele.net/ -- Debian -- OFTC -- SPI -- maxx <at> debian.org
<youam> ich kann gar nicht so viel tun, wie ich nicht lassen kann

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MJ Ray | 30 Nov 10:55

Re: Debian Weekly News - November 28th, 2006

Baz <bazciscor <at> gmail.com> wrote:
> Perhaps you prefer to see Debian releases late than to see the Weekly News
> published every week plus a day or two?

I like to see debian release when it is ready and I don't care when
the Weekly News appears.

Perhaps you prefer to sell Debian leadership for money, any money,
rather than to build consensus among Debian developers on how to
support it equitably?

Regards,
--

-- 
MJR/slef
My Opinion Only: see http://people.debian.org/~mjr/
Please follow http://www.uk.debian.org/MailingLists/#codeofconduct

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Baz | 1 Dec 07:16

Re: Debian Weekly News - November 28th, 2006

I prefer to see "etch" released in a timely manner - I prefer to see the DWN released weekly in the same excellent degree. An organization such as The Debian Project can certainly do both. Anthony Towns et al, have come up with something (anything) to try and solve a major problem. Do I acknowledge that money may have a corrupting influence? Yes I do. Do I believe it has corrupted the process in question?

The question is - what can be done to reconcile the conflicting concerns?

On 11/30/06, MJ Ray < mjr <at> phonecoop.coop> wrote:

Baz < bazciscor <at> gmail.com> wrote:
> Perhaps you prefer to see Debian releases late than to see the Weekly News
> published every week plus a day or two?

I like to see debian release when it is ready and I don't care when
the Weekly News appears.

Perhaps you prefer to sell Debian leadership for money, any money,
rather than to build consensus among Debian developers on how to
support it equitably?

Regards,
--
MJR/slef
My Opinion Only: see http://people.debian.org/~mjr/
Please follow http://www.uk.debian.org/MailingLists/#codeofconduct

--
To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to debian-project-REQUEST <at> lists.debian.org
with a subject of "unsubscribe". Trouble? Contact listmaster <at> lists.debian.org

--
"...heart and soul....one will burn."
- Joy Division

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Russ Allbery | 1 Dec 22:00

Re: Debian Weekly News - November 28th, 2006

Baz <bazciscor <at> gmail.com> writes:

> I prefer to see "etch" released in a timely manner - I prefer to see the
> DWN released weekly in the same excellent degree.  An organization such
> as The Debian Project can certainly do both.  Anthony Towns et al, have
> come up with something (anything) to try and solve a major problem.  Do
> I acknowledge that money may have a corrupting influence?  Yes I do.  Do
> I believe it has corrupted the process in question?

> The question is - what can be done to reconcile the conflicting
> concerns?

The best thing that can be done to reconcile the conflicting concerns
right now, as far as I'm concerned, would be for all of us to stop telling
other people what to do.  That applies across the board: stop telling
other people how to spend their money, stop telling other people how to
structure their time, stop involving ourselves in the personal decisions
of other developers unless invited to do so, stop looking behind every
action for a whiff of conspiracy, stop psychoanalyzing each other, stop
criticizing each other for our emotions, stop reacting when other people
do.

Just stop.

Let everyone work on Debian in their own fashion, in their own way, and
take their contributions at face value and move on.  Some people will stop
working for whatever reason, including anger at what other people have
chosen to do with their money or how other people have chosen to accept
money.  Some people will increase their effort.  All of us are *very*
different, are coming from extremely different cultures and sets of
concerns, and have very different personal arrangements of work/life
balance, employment, funding, and work structure.  We need to give each
other space to be ourselves while working on Debian and not try to force
Debian Developers into any particular model.  There are too many of us for
that.

This doesn't solve all of the problems, and I'm not saying that the
concerns raised can be dismissed as simply as just letting them go, but it
would give us a cooling off period and some space to focus on the work
rather than on the politics, and I for one would really appreciate that
right now.

--

-- 
Russ Allbery (rra <at> debian.org)               <http://www.eyrie.org/~eagle/>

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Bill Allombert | 5 Dec 22:08

Re: Debian Weekly News - November 28th, 2006

On Fri, Dec 01, 2006 at 01:00:46PM -0800, Russ Allbery wrote:
> Baz <bazciscor <at> gmail.com> writes:
> 
> > I prefer to see "etch" released in a timely manner - I prefer to see the
> > DWN released weekly in the same excellent degree.  An organization such
> > as The Debian Project can certainly do both.  Anthony Towns et al, have
> > come up with something (anything) to try and solve a major problem.  Do
> > I acknowledge that money may have a corrupting influence?  Yes I do.  Do
> > I believe it has corrupted the process in question?
> 
> > The question is - what can be done to reconcile the conflicting
> > concerns?
> 
> The best thing that can be done to reconcile the conflicting concerns
> right now, as far as I'm concerned, would be for all of us to stop telling
> other people what to do.  

This would start by rescinding the Vancouver proposal, and generally
not conflating executive and legislative power.

Cheers,
--

-- 
Bill. <ballombe <at> debian.org>

Imagine a small pink swirl here.

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Steve McIntyre | 6 Dec 01:12

Re: Debian Weekly News - November 28th, 2006

On Tue, Dec 05, 2006 at 09:08:54PM +0000, Bill Allombert wrote:
>On Fri, Dec 01, 2006 at 01:00:46PM -0800, Russ Allbery wrote:
>> 
>> The best thing that can be done to reconcile the conflicting concerns
>> right now, as far as I'm concerned, would be for all of us to stop telling
>> other people what to do.  
>
>This would start by rescinding the Vancouver proposal, and generally
>not conflating executive and legislative power.

What on earth are you babbling about?

--

-- 
Steve McIntyre, Cambridge, UK.                                steve <at> einval.com
"I can't ever sleep on planes ... call it irrational if you like, but I'm
 afraid I'll miss my stop" -- Vivek Dasmohapatra

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Stephen Gran | 6 Dec 01:21

Re: Debian Weekly News - November 28th, 2006

This one time, at band camp, Steve McIntyre said:
> On Tue, Dec 05, 2006 at 09:08:54PM +0000, Bill Allombert wrote:
> >On Fri, Dec 01, 2006 at 01:00:46PM -0800, Russ Allbery wrote:
> >> 
> >> The best thing that can be done to reconcile the conflicting
> >> concerns right now, as far as I'm concerned, would be for all of us
> >> to stop telling other people what to do.  
> >
> >This would start by rescinding the Vancouver proposal, and generally
> >not conflating executive and legislative power.
> 
> What on earth are you babbling about?

Bill's apparently under the impression that Debian has either a
legislative or an executive branch that exists and wields some power,
and this idea has apparently made him grumpy.  It's good for all of us
that this idea doesn't actually exist.

Take care,
--

-- 
 -----------------------------------------------------------------
|   ,''`.                                            Stephen Gran |
|  : :' :                                        sgran <at> debian.org |
|  `. `'                        Debian user, admin, and developer |
|    `-                                     http://www.debian.org |
 -----------------------------------------------------------------

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MJ Ray | 6 Dec 10:26

Re: Debian Weekly News - November 28th, 2006

Stephen Gran <sgran <at> debian.org> wrote:
> Bill's apparently under the impression that Debian has either a
> legislative or an executive branch that exists and wields some power,
> and this idea has apparently made him grumpy.  It's good for all of us
> that this idea doesn't actually exist.

In a way, it does, whether or not you agree with it: DPL+most
delegates are the executive, DDs are the legislative, secretary+some
cttes are the authority, but that is a view not agreed by all and I've
seen it debated on-list since at least 2002.  Another way of viewing
debian's governance is a democracy / guild / do-ocracy split (which I
think appears in Biella Coleman's dissertation).

It seems unhelpful to simply deny those views, as it's usually pretty
clear what is meant.  In the other world-view above, Bill Allombert
seems unhappy with the guild deciding things previously done byq the
democracy.  Has that got better or worse since Vancouver?  Did
Vancouver mark a structural change?  I've not seen many good studies
and surveys of debian recently, after a gaggle around 2004, some of
which are linked from http://people.debian.org/~mjr/surveys.html

Anyone feel like answering the point instead of abusing the viewer?

Hope that explains,
--

-- 
MJR/slef
My Opinion Only: see http://people.debian.org/~mjr/
Please follow http://www.uk.debian.org/MailingLists/#codeofconduct

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Hubert Chan | 6 Dec 22:27

Re: Debian Weekly News - November 28th, 2006

On Wed, 6 Dec 2006 16:46:37 +0000, Stephen Gran <sgran <at> debian.org> said:

> It has been jokingly said that the DPL could be replaced with a
> mailbot that just replies "That sounds like a good idea.  Why don't
> you try it?"

That sounds like a good idea.  Why don't you try it?

;)

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Margarita Manterola | 6 Dec 17:56

Re: Debian Weekly News - November 28th, 2006

On 12/6/06, Stephen Gran <sgran <at> debian.org> wrote:

> > DDs are the legislative
> That doesn't make sense, either.  The legislature is a subset of the
> population, elected to act on behalf of the population.  DDs are the
> population.

Uhm, that seems a bit DD-centric to me.  Debian is not only about DDs,
you know. There are *users* who are not DDs.  So, the population would
be all the people that use Debian, be it DDs or not.

So, in that sense, the DDs might be legislative, in the sense that we
make the rules, and the users have to live with them, and some times
we take into account the users' wishes and change this or that
according to them.

We don't legislate much, though, so I think that calling it the
"legislative" power is a bit of a stretch.

--

-- 
Besos,
Marga

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Gunnar Wolf | 7 Dec 19:00

Re: Debian Weekly News - November 28th, 2006

Ok, I'll bite. Although I do feel this discussion as senseless, as
there is no parallel between Debian and a real-world government. Or at
least, I have not yet been visited by the Judicial branch or the
Secret Services (Ouch! No, stop that, please! THERE IS NO CABAL!)

Margarita Manterola dijo [Wed, Dec 06, 2006 at 01:56:40PM -0300]:
> >> DDs are the legislative
> >That doesn't make sense, either.  The legislature is a subset of the
> >population, elected to act on behalf of the population.  DDs are the
> >population.
> 
> Uhm, that seems a bit DD-centric to me.  Debian is not only about DDs,
> you know. There are *users* who are not DDs.  So, the population would
> be all the people that use Debian, be it DDs or not.
> 
> So, in that sense, the DDs might be legislative, in the sense that we
> make the rules, and the users have to live with them, and some times
> we take into account the users' wishes and change this or that
> according to them.
> 
> We don't legislate much, though, so I think that calling it the
> "legislative" power is a bit of a stretch.

If you want to look at who legislates, take a look at who participates
in the etching and patching of the Policy, and who drives the
discussions about modifications to our foundation documents
(Constitution, DFSG, SC). If you want to stretch it a bit, include the
discussions on -vote previous to a GR. _That_'s tha closest to
legislative we have. 

The DDs were, however, never elected by the "citizens" (users), so I
can only position Debian as a social structure as a XVIII-century
regime. It is extremely unlikely for a regular citizen to become a
voting member. They consume the goods of our oh-so-very-hard work, but
don't really have a say on our doings. Well, we'd better listen to
them, if we want to keep our heads in close proximity. Don't forget we
have at least a DD (hi, Evan!) that actually _uses_ the French
Revolutionaire Calendar!

Greetings,

--

-- 
Gunnar Wolf - gwolf <at> gwolf.org - (+52-55)5623-0154 / 1451-2244
PGP key 1024D/8BB527AF 2001-10-23
Fingerprint: 0C79 D2D1 2C4E 9CE4 5973  F800 D80E F35A 8BB5 27AF

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Marc 'HE' Brockschmidt | 7 Dec 13:06

Re: Debian Weekly News - November 28th, 2006

Anthony Towns <aj <at> azure.humbug.org.au> writes:
> On Wed, Dec 06, 2006 at 04:46:37PM +0000, Stephen Gran wrote:
>> It has been jokingly said that the DPL
>> could be replaced with a mailbot that just replies "That sounds like a
>> good idea.  Why don't you try it?"
> Wow, that sounds like a good idea!

Why don't we try it?

Marc
--

-- 
Fachbegriffe der Informatik - Einfach erklärt
24: Future Computer Whiz Kids Energy Mobilizer
       Kühlschrank mit Cola und Kartoffelchips drin. (Peter Berlich)

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Andreas Tille | 7 Dec 13:33

Re: Debian Weekly News - November 28th, 2006

On Thu, 7 Dec 2006, Marc 'HE' Brockschmidt wrote:

> Anthony Towns <aj <at> azure.humbug.org.au> writes:
>> On Wed, Dec 06, 2006 at 04:46:37PM +0000, Stephen Gran wrote:
>>> It has been jokingly said that the DPL
>>> could be replaced with a mailbot that just replies "That sounds like a
>>> good idea.  Why don't you try it?"
>> Wow, that sounds like a good idea!
>
> Why don't we try it?

I think the problem is recursive.

Kind regards

        Andreas.

--

-- 
http://fam-tille.de

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Tobias Wolter | 7 Dec 14:58

Re: Debian Weekly News - November 28th, 2006

On 2006-12-07T13:06:17+0100 (Thursday), Marc 'HE' Brockschmidt wrote:
> Anthony Towns <aj <at> azure.humbug.org.au> writes:
> > On Wed, Dec 06, 2006 at 04:46:37PM +0000, Stephen Gran wrote:
> >> It has been jokingly said that the DPL
> >> could be replaced with a mailbot that just replies "That sounds like a
> >> good idea.  Why don't you try it?"
> > Wow, that sounds like a good idea!
> Why don't we try it?

Because you're cheaper than a mailbot.

-towo
--

-- 
I don't like calling it UTF-16. It should be WTF-8.

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Bill Allombert | 8 Dec 21:20

Re: Debian Weekly News - November 28th, 2006

On Wed, Dec 06, 2006 at 12:21:59AM +0000, Stephen Gran wrote:
> This one time, at band camp, Steve McIntyre said:
> > On Tue, Dec 05, 2006 at 09:08:54PM +0000, Bill Allombert wrote:
> > >On Fri, Dec 01, 2006 at 01:00:46PM -0800, Russ Allbery wrote:
> > >> 
> > >> The best thing that can be done to reconcile the conflicting
> > >> concerns right now, as far as I'm concerned, would be for all of us
> > >> to stop telling other people what to do.  
> > >
> > >This would start by rescinding the Vancouver proposal, and generally
> > >not conflating executive and legislative power.
> > 
> > What on earth are you babbling about?
>  
> Bill's apparently under the impression that Debian has either a
> legislative or an executive branch that exists and wields some power,
> and this idea has apparently made him grumpy.  It's good for all of us
> that this idea doesn't actually exist.

I wrote power, not people.  In every society, power belong to three
kind: executive, legislative and judicial. Debian is no exception.
There is no much point using Condorcet vote system if we are going to
ignore Montesquieu.

Executive power is the power to do stuff, legislative power is the power
to write rules how stuff are done and judicial power the power to force
rules to be followed. 

For example developers have executive power over their packages, but the
Debian Policy group has legislative power to set up policies that
packages should follow and the technical commity has judicial power to
ensure the policy are followed.

If we follow the Debian constitution (section 2):

The executive power is split belong:
1. The Project Leader;
2. Delegates appointed by the Project Leader for specific tasks;
3. The individual Developer working on a particular task,
(like maintaining a package)

The legislative power is held by:
1. The Developers, by way of General Resolution 
2. The Developers, by way of Debian policy update process.
 (6.1(1), 6.3(5), Policy Process 3.)

The judicial power is held by:
1. The Project Secretary.
 (7.1(3) Adjudicates any disputes about interpretation of the
constitution. )
2. The Technical Committee;
 (6.1(4) Overrule a Developer (requires a 3:1 majority).

Cheers,
--

-- 
Bill. <ballombe <at> debian.org>

Imagine a large blue swirl here.

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Ian Jackson | 11 Dec 12:33

Re: Debian Weekly News - November 28th, 2006

Bill Allombert writes ("Re: Debian Weekly News - November 28th, 2006"):
> For example developers have executive power over their packages, but the
> Debian Policy group has legislative power to set up policies that
> packages should follow and the technical commity has judicial power to
> ensure the policy are followed.

This is a completely wrong understanding.  In your example, the TC is
able to determine the content of policy as well as to ask for
particular fixes to packages, and if the TC thinks that policy is
wrong or inapplicable or whatever it will decide what it thinks is
best.

Debian does not have the separation of powers you describe.

Ian.

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Hans-Georg Bork | 30 Nov 00:02

Re: Debian Weekly News - November 28th, 2006

On Wed, 2006-11-29 at 10:14 +0000, MJ Ray wrote:
> [...] It is fairly important for the introduction
> of Debian Weekly News to explain why it is no longer Weekly.

To get that, just check out the link under [2] in the latest issue of
DWN (released Tue, 28 Nov 2006 21:05:03 +0100 (CET))

Regards
	-- hgb

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MJ Ray | 30 Nov 10:50

Re: Debian Weekly News - November 28th, 2006

Hans-Georg Bork <hgb <at> hgbhome.net> wrote:
> On Wed, 2006-11-29 at 10:14 +0000, MJ Ray wrote:
> > [...] It is fairly important for the introduction
> > of Debian Weekly News to explain why it is no longer Weekly.
>
> To get that, just check out the link under [2] in the latest issue of
> DWN (released Tue, 28 Nov 2006 21:05:03 +0100 (CET))

I'm not sure which was [2] in the version you read, but that sounds
like firing up a web browser and visiting another site, rather than a
short explanation *in* the introduction.  Joey funded a lot of DWN
work, so has quite some control, and few complained about it until he
was demotivated by money.  So, each edition's leader includes passing
mentions of why the Weekly isn't weekly any more.

As news reporting, it would be fair for DWN to point out all negative
effects of dunc-tank - which are going to last long after the end of
their funding - and I think Joey has been quite restrained, given his
strong views on it.  Personally, I'd like to see DWN point out more
things that have fallen off due to Dunc-Tank, ready for the
evaluation.  Dunc-tank's supporters have steadfastly refused to tell
how they think we can measure whether or not the so-called experiment
has been successful.  I expect much hand-waving in the coming months
and I hope that the debian media will help scrutinise the DPL on this.

Do people have a problem with how funding can be used to control the
project from half-outside the community at the minute? If so, take it
up with debian-release and dunc-tank...

Regards,
--

-- 
MJR/slef
My Opinion Only: see http://people.debian.org/~mjr/
Please follow http://www.uk.debian.org/MailingLists/#codeofconduct