This is the concern with Ubuntu
|
| Author | Content |
|---|---|
| garymax Apr 16, 2008 6:45 PM EDT |
Mark Shuttleworth has bet his whole entire infrastructure on a volunteer project. And it's having issues. If Debian ever went the way of history, what would Ubuntu and Canonical do? Could Canonical develop the whole universe of packages that Debian does now? I don't think so. This has always bothered me about the Ubuntu ecosystem. It's a big business built upon a completely volunteer effort. Does anyone else see a problem with this? |
| Sander_Marechal Apr 16, 2008 10:12 PM EDT |
Not really. Ubuntu could do it themselves. The amount of packages that make up Ubuntu core is quite low. Their universe repository is purely volunteer-driven, just like Debian. Besides, Debian isn't going anywhere. Too many people are interested in it. Remember: A FOSS project doesn't die until nobody in the world cares for it anymore. Debian could run into trouble and perhaps it would need to scale back it's currently massive software repositories, but it's not going to die. |
| Steven_Rosenber Apr 16, 2008 10:37 PM EDT |
I have a pretty good feeling that Ubuntu has no shortage of people wanting to volunteer on the project. I'm in no position to know one way or the other, but it has to be easier to become a developer/maintainer in Ubuntu than it is in Debian, especially given the article on which these comments are based. I don't think either Debian or Ubuntu are in any danger of going by the wayside. There are distributions, both Linux and BSD, who do OK with far fewer developers than Debian. |
| montezuma Apr 17, 2008 3:36 AM EDT |
It sounds like the Debian issue is an effciency one not a threat to existence one. If the number of developers is suboptimal then that slows down the project but Debian is used to such problems of collegiality. If certain important packages don't make it into Unstable then MOTUs from Ubuntu would likely compensate. Doesn't sound like a huge problem to me. Beware of media hype. |
| helios Apr 17, 2008 4:05 AM EDT |
It sounds like the Debian issue is an effciency one not a threat to existence one It all comes down to their leadership structure. When you choose to run any organization on consensus instead of a chain of command, there are going to be huge bottlenecks in both efficiency and decision-making...but on the plus side, they ARE politically correct. Let's not get our values and priorities confused here. As long as the PC flag flies high, everything will be right in their world. hh |
| dinotrac Apr 17, 2008 4:17 AM EDT |
Ken -- I thought that was Starks, not Snarks!!!!!! |
| tuxchick Apr 17, 2008 7:17 AM EDT |
When the bottleneck is one guy who can't bring himself to spending a few minutes creating some new DD accounts, that's just plain pitiful. Why only one guy? Why make the new DDs wait when they've jumped through all the hoops and are waiting on one last needless technicality? This article has some actual details:
http://www.lucas-nussbaum.net/blog/Quoting: 1. Maybe the 18 waiting accounts will be created today or tomorrow. Even if that happens, it won’t solve anything. Waiting 4 months for a simple administrative task is not acceptable, and we need to fix that problem anyway. 2. Account creation is not the only problem. Some people have been unable to upload packages or to vote for the DPL election, because their PGP key expired, and nobody updated it even if they have been asking for more than 4 months. That's just stupid stuff. Several of my friends have gone through the whole process to become DDs- Nussbaum's blog barely scratches the surface of the idiocies they are subjected to. |
| helios Apr 17, 2008 2:07 PM EDT |
Dino, I think I could have made my point without dragging someone's last name into the equation in such a negative manner. That will do it for me here boys and girls. |
| Laika Apr 18, 2008 6:29 AM EDT |
Let's not forget that the careful scrutiny of potential new developers contributes to the high quality of the debian distribution. Debian developers have a great responsibility because debian has millions of users and dozens of other distros are based on debian. There's a kind of "web of trust" between the debian devs and the new developers need to earn that trust. Anyway, this current storm in a teacup seems to be over now. Nussbaum blogs that 19 new debian developers were accepted today. http://www.lucas-nussbaum.net/blog/?p=287 |
| tuxchick Apr 18, 2008 7:56 AM EDT |
I don't think it's a minor issue when the new DDs have already jumped through the many hoops, and then have to sit on their thumbs for months until their accounts are created. And don't forget the expired PGP keys. These don't have anything to do with quality developers, except perhaps chasing them to projects that aren't so enamored of artificial barriers. |
| Steven_Rosenber Apr 18, 2008 10:14 AM EDT |
I don't have much of a grasp of the hierarchy in the Debian Project (and I am reading "The Debian System," so you'd think I'd get schooled up on it a bit). But there are always those projects that run in the benevolent (or not so much) dictator mode. I'll mention OpenBSD, where Theo de Raadt has firm control ... and probably Ubuntu, which I imagine goes wherever Mark Shuttleworth wants to take it. Then there's Puppy and Damn Small Linux, both closely controlled by the few, or the one. And Slackware. Patrick Volkerding. Still, Debian is, to me, one of the greatest gifts from a group of very smart people to the rest of us. It's a remarkable achievement, and I hope it keeps going and getting better for a long, long time. Of course, I feel the same about these other distributions as well. Seems to me, if one or more of the Debian volunteers responsible for these things was either a) thumped in the head or b) replaced by such a(n) (un)benevolent dictator, it would at least move things along. Or perhaps the muckety mucks in Debian can work it out. It'll be interesting to watch, at any rate. One of the great things about Debian is the geographic diversity of its volunteers. The U.S. contingent in Debian seems to be almost miniscule. Not that there's anything wrong with that ... |
| jezuch Apr 18, 2008 2:36 PM EDT |
Quoting:I don't have much of a grasp of the hierarchy in the Debian Project As far as I understand it, there is no hierarchy in Debian - it's wonderfully flat sea of Debian Developer with some small clumps of special-interest teams. And an island of the Debian Project Leader (crowded with delegates of his/her powers). But I haven't studied the Debian Constitution, so all this might be rubbish :) |
Posting in this forum is limited to members of the group: [ForumMods, SITEADMINS, MEMBERS.]
Becoming a member of LXer is easy and free. Join Us!