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Re: [gNewSense-users] Re: KFV back end / Code Review Programs


From: Karl Goetz
Subject: Re: [gNewSense-users] Re: KFV back end / Code Review Programs
Date: Sat, 12 Jul 2008 11:11:37 +0930

On Fri, 2008-07-11 at 07:07 +0200, Sam Geeraerts wrote:
> Danny Clark wrote:
> > Bake Timmons wrote:
> >> Danny Clark <address@hidden> writes:
> >>
> >>> (Q1) Is a version control program not used just because no one has had
> >>> time to implement it, or are there arguments against it?
> >> Lack of time has been my impression of the problem.  The wiki tables
> >> have been a quick and easy solution, but just a first step.  I agree
> >> with your comments and am eager to help adapt KFV Mode to a better
> >> back end.  I would be surprised if git were not the most efficient
> >> back end.
> > 
> > Git is efficient, but also a real pain in the ass to work with
> > (extremely nonobvious behavior - and this is coming to me from top
> > percentile programmers (former OLPC colleagues), not newbies), and it is
> > not (yet) well integrated with a bunch of other tools.
> > 
> > As I recall this is partly because Linus wanted git to be more of a core
> > library that others wrote front ends to, but I think he has since
> > changed course, and is trying to make git easier to use. I'm not sure
> > what the current state of that is, as I haven't touched git in >6 months.
> > 
> 
> If we're going to use version control, it might be worth looking at 
> Bazaar. If we're going to use similar tools as Ubuntu, we might as well 
> use the same ones. It makes cooperation between the two distros easier 
> (and Mark and Jono have expressed even more interest in that since the 
> downfall of Gobuntu) and make it easier for Ubuntu contributors to work 
> on gNewSense.

This is a good point.

> 
> >> Moreover, I hope that this new back end could be adapted for *all*
> >> freedom verification work, including what gNewSense started to do for
> >> packages (PFV).  One difference between KFV and PFV is that PFV
> >> typically involved looking not at a file of source code but at a file
> >> of license text that covered a whole package.
> > 
> > Or even a step beyond that, to freedom verification work even for
> > non-gNS projects, and then have the gNS-specific stuff be separated out
> > (there really shouldn't be that much packaging code that's separate from
> > the pristine sources).
> > 
> > This seems like it's abstractable to "we need to maintain a database of
> > information about a set of files that changes over time, and have nice
> > front ends to maintaining that information". I have to think that there
> > are - or really should be - nice Free Software products / sites covering
> > that problem space. Fossology - http://fossology.org/ - was recently
> > pointed out to me, but I haven't had a chance to look at it in depth yet.
> > 
> > I have a few related memos circulating around the FSF offices about
> > this, so soon I should have rms etc. opinions.
> > 
> > Also re: PFV, I just had a talk with Deb (IRC freedeb), maintainer of
> > directory.fsf.org, and it turns out that there are plenty of cases where
> > you need to look at every file with packages as well, or at least use
> > some simple (grep/keyword) heuristics to scan through the files. She has
> > some nice (but internally-focussed) write-ups on how she does that that
> > may make it to the resources section of the FSF website in the fullness
> > of time.
> > 
> 
> I don't really know how FOSSology works or what it does exactly, but it 
> sounds like something that we can use. Too bad their live demo is not up.


Seems that it didnt get recorded at LCA which is a pity.
kk

-- 
Karl Goetz <address@hidden>

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