[02:08] <kraut> moin
[02:33] <freeflying> @schedule shanghai
[02:33] <ubotu> Schedule for Asia/Shanghai: 25 Sep 23:00: Server Team meeting | 26 Sep 00:00: Kernel Team | 26 Sep 03:00: Technical Board | 27 Sep 04:00: Edubuntu | 27 Sep 20:00: Desktop Team Development | 27 Sep 23:00: Community Council meeting
[02:39] <RobV> @schedule dublin
[02:39] <ubotu> Schedule for Europe/Dublin: 25 Sep 16:00: Server Team meeting | 25 Sep 17:00: Kernel Team | 25 Sep 20:00: Technical Board | 26 Sep 21:00: Edubuntu | 27 Sep 13:00: Desktop Team Development | 27 Sep 16:00: Community Council meeting
[04:42] <dendrobates> @schedule new york
[04:42] <ubotu> Schedule for America/New_York: 25 Sep 11:00: Server Team meeting | 25 Sep 12:00: Kernel Team | 25 Sep 15:00: Technical Board | 26 Sep 16:00: Edubuntu | 27 Sep 08:00: Desktop Team Development | 27 Sep 11:00: Community Council meeting
[04:57] <nealmcb> someone is coming over to work on my house this morning - I may get pulled away suddenly....
[04:58] <soren> nealmcb: morning? It's 5 in the afternoon!
[04:59] <nealmcb> :-)
[05:00] <nealmcb> https://wiki.ubuntu.com/ServerTeam/Meeting
[05:00] <soren> @now
[05:00] <dendrobates> hey everyone.
[05:00] <sommer> hey all
[05:01] <soren> o/
[05:03] <freeflying> start?
[05:03] <nealmcb> soon we'll see what time the meeting log bot thinks it is.... ntp says 9:03:25
[05:03] <soren> ...if it works at all :)
[05:04] <dendrobates> ok lets go.
[05:04] <dendrobates> Who is here?
[05:05] <dendrobates> Is this anyones first server meeting?
[05:06] <dendrobates> hi dthacker freeflying.  Welcome.
[05:06] <dendrobates> The first topic is: Present and discuss ServerTeam/HardyIdeaPool page
[05:07] <nealmcb> https://wiki.ubuntu.com/ServerTeam/HardyIdeaPool
[05:07] <dendrobates> It is time to start gathering ideas for the next release.
[05:07] <dendrobates> I encourage everyone to think about what they would like done in Ubuntu Server
[05:08] <freeflying> dendrobates: how about groupware-server now
[05:08] <dendrobates> and add it to the page nealmcb so kindly posted.
[05:08] <nealmcb> :-)
[05:09] <nealmcb> I added a number of See Also links there, and also a link to every existing spec that is subscribed to by at least three server team members, or two members and the team itself.  That should make it easy to grab some existing specs that you might want to spruce up and nominate for Hardy and put in in one of the categories higher up on the page.
[05:09] <dendrobates> We will use the ideas on this page to plan the UDS discussions.
[05:09] <nealmcb> and also remind us of specs that need to be marked as done, obsolete or superceded
[05:10] <mathiaz> nealmcb: did you compute the list of subscribed blueprints by hand ?
[05:10] <dendrobates> Any questions about the Ideapool wiki?
[05:10] <nealmcb> mathiaz: I munged the html page, and asked the launchpad folks for some xml or text output options :-(
[05:11] <dendrobates> freeflying: add your ideas to the wiki, I think that is a good idea.
[05:11] <nealmcb> I also tried drawing a graph with graphwiz, but it doesn't help much....
[05:11] <mathiaz> I'm thinking about sending a email to ubuntu-server to present the IdeaPool wiki page.
[05:11] <mathiaz> And ask people to add their ideas there.
[05:12] <ogra> mathiaz, you revived it ? yay
[05:12] <nealmcb> mathiaz: I talked about it in my mail last night
[05:12] <ogra> s/revived/reanimated/
[05:12] <dendrobates> mathiaz: that is a good idea, it reaches a lot more people.
[05:12] <mathiaz> ogra: it has already existed ?
[05:12] <ogra> mathiaz, yep, dholbach created it two years ago
[05:13] <mathiaz> ogra: I haven't seen anything specific for the ServerTeam.
[05:13] <ogra> and it quickly became a mess
[05:13] <ogra> since nobody looked after it and people just added and added stuff
[05:13] <mathiaz> ogra: you're refering to IdeaPool, the big wiki page.
[05:13] <ogra> yeah
[05:13] <mathiaz> ogra: yeah - I've seen it to. Let's hope it won't end up in the same state.
[05:14] <nijaba> we are focusing on server ideas here, and only for Hardy
[05:14] <ogra> ah, youre plannng a subpage somewhere ? ...
[05:14] <dendrobates> mathiaz: I'll post to the mailing list asking for input.
[05:14] <mathiaz> We're just focusing on ideas for Hardy.
[05:14] <nijaba> so it is time bombed
[05:14] <mathiaz> dendrobates: ok.
[05:14] <ogra> nijaba, as long as someone looks after it all is fine i think :)
[05:14] <nijaba> ogra: we'll make ure we do
[05:14] <mathiaz> dendrobates: I think you should mention that people can reply to the mail also, and you could collect idea for the wiki pages.
[05:15] <dendrobates> good idea.
[05:15] <nijaba> s/ure/sure/
[05:15] <dthacker> Is there a list of new specs implemented for Gutsy, I could use that to do some housecleaning.
[05:15] <nealmcb> wow - https://wiki.ubuntu.com/IdeaPool sure is a mess :-)  I like the idea in HardyIdeaPool of just one line per idea, with links to blueprints
[05:15] <mathiaz> It may start a big thread, but someone has to track all the ideas and organise them somehow.
[05:15] <dendrobates> next topic
[05:15] <dendrobates> previous Action items.
[05:16] <mathiaz> dthacker: https://blueprints.launchpad.net/ubuntu/gutsy
[05:16] <dendrobates> mathiaz: since I was not attending, can you  go through the open items?
[05:17] <mathiaz> https://wiki.ubuntu.com/MeetingLogs/Server/20070911
[05:17] <mathiaz> we've setup the TeamReporting infrastructure. And there is a section about the ServerTeam in the monthly report.
[05:17] <nealmcb> thanks
[05:18] <mathiaz> we currently take the minutes of the ServerTeam meeting and add them to the report.
[05:18] <dendrobates> mathiaz: did you get community help?
[05:18] <mathiaz> dendrobates: yes. from dantalizing.
[05:18] <dendrobates> great!
[05:19] <mathiaz> we aggreed that he'll update the team report page according to the minutes I sent from the serverteam meeting.
[05:19] <dendrobates> nealmcb: I believe I saw your spec tracking email go out.
[05:19] <nealmcb> yup
[05:19] <nealmcb> I also added a section to the roadmap
[05:20] <mathiaz> nealmcb: great ! Thanks.
[05:20] <dendrobates> soren: can you update us on the tasksel tasks?
[05:20] <soren> dendrobates: Sure.
[05:20] <nealmcb> https://wiki.ubuntu.com/ServerTeam/Roadmap#blueprint
[05:20] <soren> I haven't actually looked at the dailies or the beta ISO's, but I believe the new tasks should be rolled into them.
[05:20] <dendrobates> soren: they are.
[05:21] <soren> \o/
[05:21] <soren> They're not completely locked down, but now they're there, and ready for testing.
[05:21] <soren> If we can agree on changes, that's fine, I think.
[05:22] <dendrobates> speaking of testing, we need to add a test to isotracker for each new task.
[05:22] <dendrobates> unless that has been done already.
[05:22] <mathiaz> we also need to specify the testcases.
[05:22] <ogra> dendrobates, heno and stgraber usually do that if you tell them the version
[05:23] <dendrobates> I think we will have to provide the testing instructions, though.
[05:23] <mathiaz> dendrobates: yop.
[05:23] <mathiaz> dendrobates: do you have admin rights on isotesting ?
[05:23] <dendrobates> I some admin rights, but no knowledge.
[05:24] <jdstrand> I can verify that I already have a list of things to do from heno for amd64 server ISO testing
[05:24] <mathiaz> dendrobates: you may be able to add new testcases then, with a link to the wiki page describing the test.
[05:24] <dendrobates> I will contact heno and make sure.
[05:24] <jdstrand> s/I can verify that//
[05:24] <dendrobates> ok, jdstrand you can do it.
[05:25] <dendrobates> soren's email about an official MTA generated some discussion.
[05:25] <jdstrand> dendrobates: I am not sure what I just signed up for.  I was trying to say that heno already contacted me about doing ISO testing
[05:26] <dendrobates> soren: would you cae to summarize.
[05:26] <soren> Yes. I've yet to sent the e-mail to debian-devel, but it's in the works.
[05:26] <soren> Sure.
[05:26] <dendrobates> jdstrand: I'll take care of it.
[05:26] <mathiaz> jdstrand: did you create an account on isotesting ?
[05:26] <jdstrand> mathiaz: yes
[05:27] <mathiaz> jdstrand: so you've been subscribed to a series of testcases.
[05:27] <soren> We agreed that settling on a default mta is a good idea and also that it should be postfix. We probably will not change packages to *only* change that, but if we're changing a package (and hence carrying a delta to Debian) we'll do it. Also, we'll try to convince Debian to do the same.
[05:27] <soren> Technically, it'll be done by adding a meta package called something like default-mail-transport-agent, which will be prepended each time something depends on m-t-a.
[05:27] <jdstrand> mathiaz: I got an email from heno asking me to do so.  heno and I talked on IRC about what I could do.  We agreed, then got an email this morning
[05:28] <soren> default-mail-transport-agent will then in Ubuntu depend on postfix. Debian might choose exim4.
[05:29] <dendrobates> great and mdz seemed happy that you were addressing this issue.
[05:29] <nealmcb> sounds like a good, flexible solution
[05:30] <freeflying> soren: it should depends on postfix | exim4, but not only on postfix
[05:30] <soren> freeflying: Yes. Only postfix.
[05:30] <soren> freeflying: A package that needs an m-t-a will depend on:
[05:30] <soren> Depends: default-mail-transport-agent |  mail-transport-agent
[05:31] <soren> Each of postfix, exim4, msmtp-mta, sendmail, qmail, etc... will "Provides: mail-tranport-agent"
[05:31] <soren> default-mail-transport-agent will depend on postfix.
[05:31] <Mithrandir> well, they already do the latter.
[05:31] <Mithrandir> except without the typo
[05:31] <soren> That makes any m-t-a fulfill the dependency, but postfix be the preferred one.
[05:31] <soren> Mithrandir: :p
[05:31] <soren> Mithrandir: Right.
[05:31] <dendrobates> soren: what gives you the feeling that Debian might choose exim4?
[05:32] <soren> dendrobates: That at laeast used to be the default mta in debian.
[05:32] <Mithrandir> they've historically preferred exim, but there's a fairly large contigent of postfix lovers there too
[05:32] <soren> Mithrandir: They don't install an mta by default anymore?
[05:33] <Mithrandir> soren: I can't remember; I tend to explicitly install exim myself.
[05:33] <soren> Yeah. I like exim, too :)
[05:33] <Mithrandir> (well, exim4, not exim)
[05:34] <freeflying> soren: in sid, they will not install exim defaultly
[05:34] <dendrobates> well I think it is settled, we will default to postfix, and soren will broach the subject with Debian.
[05:34] <dendrobates> that is the last of the action items.
[05:35] <dendrobates> next is the roadmap. https://wiki.ubuntu.com/ServerTeam/Roadmap
[05:35] <lamont> soren: I'm happy to help you with uploading the default-mail-transport-agent package, if you need
[05:35] <dendrobates> I noticed mathiaz has triaged about 15 million samba bugs.
[05:36] <soren> lamont: In Debian, you mean?
[05:36] <lamont> yes
[05:36] <soren> lamont: Cool.
[05:36] <lamont> 'twould be funny for me to own an exim-depending package for a while...
[05:36] <nealmcb> mathiaz: only launchpad has you beat :-(  but they fixed that I guess :-)
[05:37] <mathiaz> nealmcb: yeah. The auto-expiring feature has been disabled I think.
[05:38] <dendrobates> mathiaz: anything you want to say about triaging corner?
[05:38] <mathiaz> not really.
[05:38] <mathiaz> just that we still need to have a look at the bugs.
[05:39] <dendrobates> I think packaging is done as well.
[05:39] <mathiaz> when I've received the expiring mails I was surprised  and thought that we even had a look at the bugs to see whether they're valid or not.
[05:39] <mathiaz> that means we still need to go through the bugs and see which are relevant.
[05:40] <dendrobates> Testing: we need as much testing of the beta as possible.
[05:40] <mathiaz> especially on server-type hardware.
[05:40] <dendrobates> I encourage everyone to signup at https://iso.qa.stgraber.org/qatracker/
[05:41] <dendrobates> and do as many tests as possible.  We especially need sparc testers.
[05:41] <pschulz01> dendrobates: Is there a sparc release?
[05:41] <mathiaz> if anyone has access to server hardware (from dell, ibm, hp, etc...) could you please test the server iso ?
[05:41] <dendrobates> yes
[05:42] <dendrobates> mathiaz: can you post to the mailing list asking for testers?
[05:42] <mathiaz> dendrobates: I was wondering when I should do that ?
[05:42] <mathiaz> dendrobates: for the pre-beta or once beta has been announced ?
[05:43] <dendrobates> I was thinking of that as well.  we should get heno's opinion.
[05:43] <dendrobates> documentation:
[05:44] <dendrobates> any updates?
[05:44] <pschulz01> dendrobates: Yes!
[05:44] <dendrobates> pschulz01: go ahead.
[05:44] <pschulz01> dendrobates: I only started this evening, while waiting..  but..
[05:44] <pschulz01> https://wiki.ubuntu.com/PaulSchulz/UbuntuServerDocumentationReview
[05:45] <sommer> I added some of the sections I worked on to the ServerTeam Roadmap Documentor section
[05:45] <mathiaz> pschulz01: so these are the notes about the current server guide ?
[05:45] <dendrobates> sommer: thanks.
[05:45] <pschulz01> sommer: You made a good start.,..
[05:45] <mathiaz> pschulz01: isn't it too late to make such changes ?
[05:46] <nijaba> pschulz01: could we add  section in the guide on how to set up thin clients ?
[05:46] <pschulz01> mathiaz: Yes. I'm sucking down the documentation svn as we speak..
[05:46] <mathiaz> pschulz01: I think there is a Freeze for the documentation as of now.
[05:46] <pschulz01> mathiaz: Oh well..
[05:46] <mathiaz> nijaba: I think it would be a good idea, but too late for gutsy.
[05:46] <pschulz01> mathiaz: I'll have patches.
[05:46] <sommer> One of my Hardy ideas to update the Server section before the freeze.
[05:47] <nijaba> mathiaz: for hardy, then
[05:47] <mathiaz> nijaba: yes.
[05:47] <dendrobates> but not community documentation, right.
[05:47] <nijaba> mathiaz: cause we are mentioning it on he server cd jacket
[05:47] <mathiaz> sommer: yes. You can add a documentation section in the HardyIdeaPool
[05:47] <nealmcb> I threw a bit of text in the wiki for some of the missing ubotu factoids, but some more links to relevant documentation pages would also be good. Then need to get them into the database.   And I keep watching for missing topics.
[05:48] <dendrobates> nijaba: in my opinion it is mentioned too much. on the web page as well.
[05:48] <mathiaz> dendrobates: by community you mean the wiki at help.ubuntu.com/community %
[05:48] <pschulz01> mathiaz: One of my other ideas is here.. https://wiki.ubuntu.com/PaulSchulz/UbuntuServerDocumentation
[05:48] <pschulz01> mathiaz: 'micro-manuals'
[05:48] <sommer> mathiaz: will do
[05:48] <dendrobates> mathiaz: yes we can add docs there, right.
[05:48] <dendrobates> that might be all we can do for Gutsy.
[05:48] <mathiaz> pschulz01: I suggest you add your ideas to the HardyIdeaPool and then create a blueprint.
[05:48] <pschulz01> mathiaz: Ok.
[05:48] <mathiaz> dendrobates: yes. community wiki is not frozen.
[05:49] <dendrobates> so if we are missing import docs, add them there.
[05:49] <mathiaz> dendrobates: the server guide is frozen so that translator can work on it.
[05:49] <dendrobates> important.
[05:50] <dendrobates>  ok can we move to development?
[05:50] <dendrobates> mathiaz: AppArmor update?
[05:51] <mathiaz> we're back on track. the kernel module has been updated.
[05:51] <keescook> \o/
[05:51] <mathiaz> we've started to see bug reports about profiles, so people are using it.
[05:52] <mathiaz> I'm quite happy with the current state. keescook ?
[05:52] <keescook> yeah, it's looking good.  the delay in getting the new kernel module set us back, but I think we're in good shape now.
[05:52] <keescook> I too have some abstraction tweaks for post-beta.
[05:53] <mathiaz> we won't ship a profile for dhclient3
[05:53] <mathiaz> but cupsys will have one
[05:53] <nealmcb> is there a way for folks to share profiles and stuff like that?  (knows little about apparmor...)
[05:53] <dendrobates> I am happy to announce the libpam-ldap and libnss-ldap have been accepted into main and are in the seed.
[05:53] <keescook> has pitti looked at cupsys web UI issues?
[05:53] <mathiaz> nealmcb: yes. upstream has a repository
[05:54] <keescook> mathiaz: is there docs on how to use the shared repo?  I'd like to submit a few of mine
[05:54] <mathiaz> keescook: I don't think so. He was busy playing RM
[05:54] <keescook> okay
[05:54] <mathiaz> keescook: not that I know of. I think their dns is not setup correctly.
[05:54] <nealmcb> dendrobates: cool - thanks
[05:55] <mathiaz> keescook: hum.. it is: http://apparmor.opensuse.org/
[05:55] <dendrobates> so ldap-client-config and auth-client-config are in Gutsy.
[05:55] <dendrobates> it has been a long time coming in my opinion.
[05:56] <nealmcb> this is a good time for folks to update the blueprints related to these successes....
[05:56] <dendrobates> we have already discussed hardy planning, so the last few minutes are open.
[05:57] <dendrobates> anyone have anything?
[05:57] <mathiaz> do we need meetings more often ?
[05:57] <pschulz01> mathiaz: Have added 'micro-manual' to HardyIdeaPool.
[05:57] <mathiaz> or is every two weeks enough ?
[05:57] <dendrobates> good question, with Hardy coming up, maybe
[05:58] <sommer> I have a quick documentor section question, would it be better to create a page like pschulz01 did and link it from the RoadMap page?
[05:58] <dendrobates> lets continue like this, every two weeks, until there is a need.  perhaps after
[05:58] <dendrobates> uds
[05:59] <nealmcb> uds is in just one month...
[05:59] <dendrobates> any other opinions?
[05:59] <soren> We alternate this slot with the kernel team.
[05:59] <pschulz01> sommer: I just did that as I didn't want to step on anyones toes.
[06:00] <nealmcb> ajmitch has expressed interest in a different time slot from time to time
[06:00] <soren> We'd need another timeslot every other week.
[06:00] <sommer> pschulz01: I think it makes great sense, less clutter on the RoadMap page.
[06:00] <dendrobates> we would have to choose a different time, perhaps earlier, for our European friends.
[06:00] <mathiaz> yes. That would help folks in asia.
[06:01] <nealmcb> what would  0100 UTC be like?  on alternate weeks??
[06:01] <mathiaz> dendrobates: you'd do it earlier ? I don't think it would help aussie
[06:01] <soren> That's 3 AM here.
[06:02] <soren> Of course you could have a meeting without me.
[06:02] <dendrobates> we should take this up on the mailing list.
[06:03] <dendrobates> there might be other who could not attend at this time that have a preference.
[06:03] <mathiaz> dendrobates: I aggree.
[06:04] <dendrobates> any volunteers to start te conversation on the mailing list?
[06:04] <nealmcb> does launchpad have a way to plot folks' timezones?
[06:04] <dendrobates> ok nijaba, go ahead.
[06:05] <dendrobates> we are out of time folks.  Good meeting.
[06:05] <nealmcb> thanks folks
[06:05] <mathiaz> nealmcb: nope. But keescook has a good website that does that.
[06:06] <keescook> timeanddate.com!
[06:06] <keescook> the "Meeting Planner" on there is great.
[06:06] <mathiaz> thanks.
[06:06] <nealmcb> mathiaz: yeah.  I'm mostly looking for something that will take an existing team with known timezones and help people guess about good time
[06:06] <mathiaz> so next meeting in two weeks, same place, same time.
[06:07] <mathiaz> nealmcb: that would be great. You should file a bug about it.
[06:08] <pschulz01> mathiaz: Blueprint is here -> https://blueprints.edge.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+spec/micro-manuals
[06:09] <dendrobates> bye everyone
[06:09] <mathiaz> pschulz01: seems great. But you should try to follow the SpecSpec template in the wiki page.
[06:09] <sommer> thanks all...later on
[06:09] <pschulz01> mathiaz: URL?
[06:09] <pschulz01> mathiaz: Just SpecSpec?
[06:10] <mathiaz> pschulz01: https://wiki.ubuntu.com/FeatureSpecifications
[06:10] <mathiaz> pschulz01: explains the whole process.
[06:10] <pschulz01> mathiaz: Ta.
[06:10] <mathiaz> pschulz01: np.
[06:11] <mathiaz> Thanks all
[06:14] <nealmcb> rats - the foaf/xml output from launchpad doesn't include the timezone...  https://edge.launchpad.net/~nealmcb/+rdf
[07:17] <soren> @Schedule Copenhagen
[07:17] <ubotu> Schedule for Europe/Copenhagen: 25 Sep 18:00: Kernel Team | 25 Sep 21:00: Technical Board | 26 Sep 22:00: Edubuntu | 27 Sep 14:00: Desktop Team Development | 27 Sep 17:00: Community Council meeting | 02 Oct 18:00: Kernel Team
[07:18] <nealmcb> @schedule denver
[07:18] <ubotu> Schedule for America/Denver: 25 Sep 10:00: Kernel Team | 25 Sep 13:00: Technical Board | 26 Sep 14:00: Edubuntu | 27 Sep 06:00: Desktop Team Development | 27 Sep 09:00: Community Council meeting | 02 Oct 10:00: Kernel Team
[07:27] <allee> @Schedule Berlin
[07:27] <ubotu> Schedule for Europe/Berlin: 25 Sep 18:00: Kernel Team | 25 Sep 21:00: Technical Board | 26 Sep 22:00: Edubuntu | 27 Sep 14:00: Desktop Team Development | 27 Sep 17:00: Community Council meeting | 02 Oct 18:00: Kernel Team
[07:28] <ScottK> @Schedule New York
[07:28] <ubotu> Schedule for America/New_York: 25 Sep 12:00: Kernel Team | 25 Sep 15:00: Technical Board | 26 Sep 16:00: Edubuntu | 27 Sep 08:00: Desktop Team Development | 27 Sep 11:00: Community Council meeting | 02 Oct 12:00: Kernel Team
[07:28] <siretart> allee: I didn't register the meeting with the fridge team
[07:29] <siretart> but AFAIS, there are no collisions with other meetings anyway
[07:31] <allee> siretart: yep, one hour for fai
[07:33] <siretart> allee: hm. if we need longer, we can still move to #fai/oftc
[07:44] <siretart> allee: I've setup an agenda: https://wiki.ubuntu.com/FAITeamAgenda
[07:56] <siretart> \sh_away: around?
[07:59] <siretart> hey lazyb0y, hi torkel
[08:00] <torkel> hi
[08:00] <siretart> I think we can start?
[08:00] <siretart> \sh doesn't seem to be around
[08:00] <siretart> alvinc wanted to come, has anyone heared from him?
[08:00] <siretart> I've setup a MeetingAgenda here: https://wiki.ubuntu.com/FAITeamAgenda
[08:01] <siretart> if someone wants to add something, now would be a good time to speak up :)
[08:01] <siretart> #startmeeting
[08:02] <siretart> anyone around besides me?
[08:02] <lazyb0y> I'm here :)
[08:02] <torkel> me too :-)
[08:02] <siretart> well, MootBot doesn't seem to listen for me, but let's use the syntax anyway: https://wiki.ubuntu.com/ScribesTeam/MootBot
[08:03] <siretart> since that will make writing minutes a bit easier
[08:03] <siretart> [TOPIC]  Introduction
[08:03] <siretart> since most of us don't know each other too well, I've though we could start with a small introduction of ourselves
[08:03] <siretart> to see who is in the team and why
[08:04] <siretart> I start:
[08:04] <siretart> My name is Reinhard Tartler, both ubuntu and debian developer.
[08:04] <siretart> I've been following fai in ubuntu since a couple of release cycles (since dapper I think)
[08:04] <siretart> I work at the university of erlangen, where I admin a small student lab
[08:04] <siretart> torkel: you're next :)
[08:05] <torkel> my name is Bjrn Torkelsson
[08:05] <torkel> I'm working at High Performance Computing Center North (HPC2N), Ume Universty
[08:06] <torkel> I have been using FAI for about 5-6 year. First with Debian and we swithed to Ubuntu around breezy
[08:07] <torkel> we are currently using FAI to install three clusters and a bunch of servers
[08:07] <torkel> in total 500 machines
[08:07] <siretart> impressive
[08:07] <torkel> that's about it. How's next?
[08:07] <siretart> allee?
[08:07] <lazyb0y> I take it :)
[08:07] <allee> my name is Achim Bohnet.  I'm working as a sysadmin at MPI fuer extraterrestrische Physik at Garching, Germany.  In my free time I try to help with Kubuntu and  debians  kde-extras-team
[08:07] <lazyb0y> (soory :)
[08:07] <lazyb0y> please go on
[08:08] <allee> I use fai since dapper, and slowly convert the mixuters of linux here at the insitute to fai.
[08:08] <lazyb0y> allee: mixuters?
[08:08] <allee> currently are  60 desktop and 10 laptop system installe with fai.  2 to 3 times more is possible with the time
[08:09] <allee> mixture
[08:09] <allee> 2 clusters with 50 nodes are also waiting to fai installed instead of preseeding.  but never break a running system
[08:10] <siretart> lazyb0y: okay, now its your turn :)
[08:10] <lazyb0y> Ok, my name is Henning Sprang
[08:10] <lazyb0y> I work as "IT architect" at silpion in Hamburg
[08:11] <lazyb0y> which turns out to be mainly software development in java, as well as writing a book about xen
[08:11] <lazyb0y> FAI happens mostly in my spare time at home, where I install 3 laptops, 2 servers, and currently 3 Xen VM's with FAI
[08:12] <lazyb0y> Oh, my company sponsored working on red hat installs with FAI - but it nevcer truned a real project yet, but helped finding some bugs
[08:12] <lazyb0y> and, one of these machines is Ubuntu (Dapper, too lazy to convert)
[08:13] <lazyb0y> I used to publish some FAI howtos and even a branch with some helpful stuff toi install uUbuntu and others with FAI
[08:13] <lazyb0y> but never really used FAI _on_ Ubuntu, actually
[08:14] <lazyb0y> U guess thats' it :)
[08:14] <siretart> ok
[08:14] <siretart> lets move on with the next topic
[08:15] <siretart> [TOPIC]  status quo a: housekeeping (what has happened now)
[08:15] <Mrfai> hello all
[08:15] <siretart> hi Mrfai
[08:15] <siretart> what has happened so far:
[08:15] <siretart> I've backported the latest fai 3.2.1 release from debian to ubuntu.
[08:15] <siretart> Backporting here means, that I've recompiled it for various earlier releases including gutsy.
[08:15] <siretart> It works for me fine, with a dapper server installing feisty clients.
[08:15] <siretart> I've started to work in a local bzr branch, which I've created from the svn fai using bzr-svn
[08:15] <siretart> however, after the latest bzr-svn upgrade, merging between my working branches broke,
[08:15] <siretart> and I lost my nerve with it
[08:15] <siretart> oh, what I did change is: fai is non-native in ubuntu,
[08:15] <siretart> this means all my modifications are available in the diff.gz
[08:15] <siretart> all my work is now available as source package in the team PPA
[08:15] <siretart> e.g.: http://ppa.launchpad.net/fai/ubuntu/pool/main/f/fai/fai_3.2.1-0ubuntu1~ppa1~feisty1.diff.gz
[08:16] <siretart> so Mrfai can easily see what is going on in ubuntu ;)
[08:16] <siretart> any questions so far?
[08:17] <lazyb0y> I think it's good to make FAI non-native to see the diffs...
[08:17] <siretart> okay
[08:17] <siretart> A few words of the team I've registered in launchpad:
[08:17] <siretart> the fai team has 2 objectives:
[08:17] <siretart> a) hosting the team PPA (the archive)
[08:17] <siretart> b) being notified of bugs filed against fai in ubutu
[08:17] <allee> I've tried to far to get used to bzr and fai team
[08:17] <siretart> and of course to get the team a bit visible :)
[08:18] <siretart> allee: I've requested the fai svn to be imported to bzr via launchpad: https://code.edge.launchpad.net/~vcs-imports/fai/trunk
[08:18] <siretart> did you notice?
[08:18] <allee> I've some branches now lying a round with siretart chanages and some patches I've made or got from l
[08:18] <siretart> (btw, do the 'edge' urls work for you?
[08:18] <allee> siretart: my branches are based your svn import to launchpad
[08:19] <siretart> cool. feel free to publish them!
[08:19] <allee> will do
[08:19] <siretart> so it seems indeed to make sense to use bzr for us?
[08:19] <Mrfai> will changes to the original fai svn treen automatically be pushed into your bzr system?
[08:19] <lazyb0y> I have to get into BZR, to be of some use in this team, I think
[08:19] <siretart> I mean, we can still easily submit them to Mrfai, since they are based on the svn import
[08:20] <lazyb0y> (and setup some UBuntu test instances to try them)
[08:20] <allee> Mrfai: they are sync very hour(s?)
[08:20] <siretart> Mrfai: yes, https://code.edge.launchpad.net/~vcs-imports/fai/trunk is updated automatically by launchpad
[08:20] <Mrfai> ok
[08:20] <siretart> Mrfai: the only problem I've noticed is that the $Id$ tags are not expanded
[08:20] <siretart> they are with RCS and svn
[08:20] <allee> Mrfai: my plan (and did) is to send you or debian bts the patches that I add
[08:20] <siretart> I think they since a few times a day, but I'm not sure
[08:21] <siretart> s/since/sync/
[08:21] <siretart> torkel: have you already experience with bzr?
[08:21] <torkel> no
[08:22] <siretart> torkel: well, on the one hand, bzr is rather easy to learn. on the other hand, if you have a patch to contribute, I think if you send it in per email, someone else can apply it quite easily
[08:23] <siretart> is this okay for you?
[08:23] <torkel> guess I can learn bzr. I have meant to take a look at it for a while :-)
[08:23] <siretart> great! :)
[08:24] <allee> about gusty status(as mentioned in #fai):  at least for me make-fai-nfsroot's nfsroot does not boot my test machine. .cfg is downloaded via tftp then I get a boot: prompt
[08:24] <siretart> Mrfai: all branches published to launchpad have a online sourcecode browser
[08:24] <torkel> however I prefer if we also really try to push patches back to Mrfai as soon as possible
[08:24] <siretart> Mrfai: and since we can easily diff against the official svn trunk, merging our patches back to you should really be easy
[08:24] <siretart> Mrfai: do you see any problems with that?
[08:25] <siretart> torkel: I fully agree!
[08:25] <allee> fwiw: my doc patch I sent to Mrfai was a bzr diff :)
[08:25] <lazyb0y> you only need to make sure to track somewhere which pacthes were already applied by Mrfai
[08:25] <Mrfai> no. The fai_3.2.1-0ubuntu1~ppa1~feisty1.diff.gz seems to be really small so I can include some changes into upstream.
[08:26] <Mrfai> But I will never apply all changes to the svn trunk, since some are really ubuntu specific
[08:26] <torkel> preferably there should be no difference, but that might be really hard to achive
[08:27] <siretart> torkel: yes, perhaps we can tweak debian/rules to detect if it is built in debian or ubuntu
[08:27] <siretart> torkel: and have a file debian/NFSROOT.ubuntu besinde debian/NFSROOT
[08:27] <lazyb0y> yes, if possible patches should be kept as small as possibel
[08:27] <torkel> or using "runtime" tests
[08:27] <siretart> this way Mrfai could merge them more easy
[08:27] <torkel> why not NFSROOT.<dist>?
[08:27] <lazyb0y> maybe we should review them from time to time to see if somebody has an idea how to incorporate them that somebody else didn't have yet
[08:28] <siretart> lazyb0y: btw, there is a 'bzr-rebase' plugin, so that you can rebase your branch on a newer svn revision
[08:28] <Mrfai> FSNROOT and NFSROOT.ubuntu might be an option, but those two file are mostly identical, so it's not the best idea to keep two versions of it
[08:28] <siretart> lazyb0y: this way, you can generate diffs against the latest svn-trunk
[08:28] <Mrfai> what about a class UBUNTU inside etc/fai/NFSROOT?
[08:29] <lazyb0y> siretart: and it automatically detects which patches don't neefd to be applied anymore? (cool, then!)
[08:29] <siretart> Mrfai: well, kernels are handled differently, and we need to remove upstart in favor of sysvinit. that's the only difference currently
[08:29] <siretart> lazyb0y: it doesn't "detect", but what it does acheives basically the same
[08:29] <lazyb0y> Mrfai: if we start doing Dist-specific stuff, we should not use only a distribution name
[08:29] <allee> I've current trunk (lp svn import), trunk-fixes (patches I plan for upsteam), gusty (what should go into gusty) and gusty-fixes (my work tree)
[08:29] <lazyb0y> better: a variable called DISTRIBUTION, with the vakue of the dist name in it
[08:29] <lazyb0y> or, so you can better see that this class is about a distribution: DIST_UBUNTU
[08:30] <siretart> Mrfai: if UBUNTU was a hardcoded built-in class, sure!
[08:30] <siretart> lazyb0y: I think we need both: built-in classes: DEBIAN, LENNY, UBUNTU, GUTSY and HARDY (set when appropriate)
[08:30] <lazyb0y> I use it here in my setups, and because there are differences between versions, I end up having DIST_DEBIAN, DIST_UBUNT, DIST_DEBIAN_ETCH, ...
[08:30] <torkel> what if you want to install Feisty, Gutsty, ...
[08:31] <Mrfai> Mmm, it seems that new classes for each distri and release causes more diffs than keepeing the old system of diff between debian and ubuntu
[08:31] <lazyb0y> siretart: ok, if these classes are needed, I think my naming scheme is a little better
[08:32] <lazyb0y> BTW, whar are we about to achieve? :)
[08:32] <allee> IMHO we should first the  fai   in ubuntu to the same state as in debian, before we should think about installing debian and *ubuntu hosts from same fai server
[08:32] <siretart> given ubuntu's 6 month cycle, I think multidistribution sites are more usual in ubuntu than in debian
[08:32] <siretart> I agree to allee
[08:32] <torkel> me too
[08:32] <siretart> let's therefore move on with the next topic, okay?
[08:32] <allee> k
[08:32] <siretart> [TOPIC]  current problems with fai in ubuntu
[08:32] <torkel> though we will install muliple versions of Ubuntu soon...
[08:33] <siretart> so far I'm aware of the following problems
[08:33] <siretart> fai-cd is totally broken: the cd won't boot
[08:33] <siretart> I haven't looked at it yet, but it feels like a live-initramfs problem to me
[08:33] <siretart> has anyone more input on it?
[08:33] <siretart> or does anyone plan to look at that more closely soon?
[08:33] <allee> gusty pxe boot is broken too (I assume)
[08:34] <allee> fai-cd is low prio for me
[08:34] <torkel> live-initramfs seems to be broken when trying to install dapper
[08:34] <Mrfai> Is there a fai-cd iso image for ubuntu, that I may test?
[08:34] <torkel> allee: what's the problem with pxe boot in gutsy?
[08:34] <siretart> Mrfai: I haven't created one. but it should be pretty easy to create one in an ubuntu chroot on a debian system
[08:35] <siretart> Mrfai: (debian's debootstrap can install ubuntu chroots nowadays)
[08:35] <Mrfai> siretart: I have no time to build a ubuntu fai-cd of my own. But I may test an iso image.
[08:35] <lazyb0y> siretart: is that already with the deboostrap in etch?
[08:35] <siretart> I've started gutsy's d-i via pxe just today
[08:35] <allee> torkel: pxe.cfg/xxx download via tftp then I get boot:.  that it.
[08:35] <Mrfai> It may also be nice to have a fai-cd iso image after the next ubuntu release
[08:35] <siretart> lazyb0y: I think you need lenny's debootstrap
[08:36] <lazyb0y> ok
[08:36] <lazyb0y> or rinse of something like that
[08:36] <siretart> Mrfai: yes, that would be great
[08:36] <torkel> allee: permissions problem?
[08:36] <allee> 5 days ago test host booted, with lots of error
[08:36] <allee> torkel: let's move debug session to after the meeting
[08:36] <siretart> allee: so it doesn't even load the kernel and initrd?
[08:37] <torkel> allee: sure
[08:37] <allee> siretart: no
[08:37] <siretart> Mrfai: I see that I can build an gutsy fai-cd and will notify you when I've published it on my webserver, okay?
[08:37] <Mrfai> fine
[08:37] <siretart> great
[08:37] <siretart> the other issue I'm aware of was that unionfs on nfs was broken in gutsy
[08:37] <siretart> glance reported that in a launchpad bug
[08:37] <siretart> luckily, gutsy's kernel was upgraded and the bug disappeared
[08:37] <siretart> so that seems to be a no issue again :)
[08:37] <siretart> btw, has anyone heared of glance?
[08:38] <allee> never before
[08:38] <siretart> he was interested in the team as well. hm
[08:38] <siretart> any other problems you've noticed with fai in ubunut?
[08:38] <torkel> I saw him a couple of days ago :-)
[08:39] <torkel> I have tried to install dapper using PPA but from the looks of it it will require some work
[08:39] <Mrfai> It would be nice to check if several FAI environment are working in gutsy. E.g. fai-cd boot, pxe boot, dirinstall
[08:39] <Mrfai> that way, we se were are stille some problems
[08:39] <siretart> Mrfai: yes, perhaps we can collect that information in a test matrix on wiki.ubuntu.com?
[08:39] <Mrfai> s/se were/ see where/
[08:40] <siretart> opinions?
[08:40] <lazyb0y> test-matrix: ACK
[08:40] <torkel> sounds good
[08:40] <Mrfai> maybe a test matrix on faiwiki, that we will also use for Debian as well
[08:40] <allee> test-mateix: ACK
[08:41] <Mrfai> I vote for the test matrix on faiwiki
[08:41] <siretart> ok, who else is for using faiwiki?
[08:41] <lazyb0y> yes, better in the fai wiki - there are some notices about testing general already, which I pout in there someday
[08:41] <allee> faiwiki is fine with me.
[08:41] <siretart> I don't really care, I can setup pointers from wiki.ubuntu.com to faiwiki
[08:42] <siretart> I assume I need an account in faiwiki, right?
[08:42] <lazyb0y> siretart: yes, please do that! so we  can collect all information on how to test fai on a single place
[08:42] <torkel> keeping everything at one place is probably easier
[08:42] <siretart> well, we can clear that afterwards, okay?
[08:42] <lazyb0y> siretart: you can setup an account sourself since the wiki upgrade
[08:42] <Mrfai> HAs anyone an example for such a matrix?
[08:42] <siretart> [AGREED]  setup a test matrix fai-cd, pxe boot, dirinstall on faiwiki
[08:42] <siretart> lazyb0y: great!
[08:43] <lazyb0y> [LINK]  my notes about testing: http://faiwiki.informatik.uni-koeln.de/index.php/Testing
[08:43] <allee> siretart: + softupdate
[08:43] <siretart> [AGREED]  setup a test matrix fai-cd, pxe boot, dirinstall, soft update on faiwiki
[08:43] <siretart> :)
[08:43] <siretart> next topic?
[08:44] <lazyb0y> Mrfai wanted an example of such a matrix
[08:44] <allee> k
[08:44] <siretart> Mrfai: I've thought of a simple table: x-axis: ubuntu distro, y-axis: one of fai-cd, pxe boot, dirinstall and soft-update
[08:44] <siretart> Mrfai: we are using such matrixes in ubuntu for iso testing
[08:45] <siretart> wow, only 15 minutes left
[08:45] <Mrfai> siretart: ok
[08:45] <lazyb0y> ok, that was what I also thought :)
[08:45] <siretart> [TOPIC]  #
[08:45] <siretart> [TOPIC]  short term plans for Ubuntu 7.10 (gutsy)
[08:45] <siretart> #
[08:45] <siretart> my personal plans for gutsy is to look at the fai-cd problem
[08:45] <siretart> and see if there is an easy fix
[08:45] <siretart> does anyone else have plans he wants to do for gutsy?
[08:46] <Mrfai> I think main plan is to solve the bugs. I will help soilving the fai-cd problem
[08:46] <siretart> thanks! :)
[08:46] <allee> my plans are right now : get gusty pxe boot,  'error' free demohost install,  add class to get a (K)ubuntu install similar to live/alternative CD installation.
[08:46] <lazyb0y> I can add to my agenda settin up a chroot/xen vm for fai.cd creating testing
[08:47] <siretart> kubuntu class sounds great. I imagine it to be rather trivial by adding an additional class
[08:47] <lazyb0y> Mrfai: I could try setting uo a ubuntu chroot on faiwiki, so you can get isos from there?!
[08:47] <siretart> lazyb0y: that would be awesome!
[08:47] <allee> siretart: yes, I think so.  *UBUNTU classes should be easy
[08:47] <siretart> (and would spare me the trouble uploading the cd)
[08:48] <siretart> other ideas?
[08:48] <Mrfai> How much tinme do we have to solve the remaining bugs for gutsy?
[08:48] <siretart> Mrfai: https://wiki.ubuntu.com/GutsyReleaseSchedule
[08:48] <lazyb0y> [LINK] https://wiki.ubuntu.com/GutsyReleaseSchedule
[08:48] <lazyb0y> :)
[08:48] <siretart> :)
[08:49] <allee> siretart: Later I'll check with serverteam, about Puppy(?) integration (or stick with cfengine)
[08:49] <siretart> Mrfai: since fai is 'only' universe, we can do upload until october 17th, I'd expect
[08:49] <siretart> allee: is that a gutsy or hardy goal?
[08:49] <Mrfai> siretart: ok. Let's do it a few days eariler :-)
[08:49] <allee> realistically hardy
[08:49] <siretart> because hardy goals would be my next topic :)
[08:49] <Mrfai> allee: I think you meant puppet
[08:50] <siretart> Mrfai: that would be ideal ;)
[08:50] <siretart> Mrfai: but we have PPAs now, so we can provide updated fai packages any time from there
[08:50] <allee> Mrfai: yeah, probably.  Was written in ruby
[08:50] <siretart> for any ubuntu release
[08:50] <siretart> [TOPIC]  hardy ideas
[08:51] <siretart> what I have in mind for hardy: I will attend the UDS-Boston: http://wiki.ubuntu.com/UDS-Boston
[08:51] <siretart> and want to present fai on ubuntu there, to show it the server team
[08:51] <Mrfai> good idea
[08:51] <siretart> I hope I can find intereted people there to join the team or at least use it :)
[08:51] <allee> puppet/ cfengine like simple example, for stuff fai softupdate is too heavy
[08:51] <soren> siretart: You might :)
[08:52] <siretart> like soren :)
[08:52] <siretart> hello there ;)
[08:52] <lazyb0y> [LINK] http://wiki.ubuntu.com/UDS-Boston
[08:52] <soren> Just FYI: TB meeting in 7 minutes..
[08:52] <siretart> soren: espc. the softupdate stuff might be interesting for you!
[08:52] <siretart> right
[08:53] <siretart> further ideas: create fai-cds for all flavors of ubuntu: kubuntu, xubuntu, etc
[08:53] <siretart> however, they might not be Cd-sized, but rather dvd sized
[08:53] <Mrfai> let's try to prepare a fai-cd before UDS-Boston so siretart can show this CD.
[08:53] <siretart> that would really help!
[08:53] <lazyb0y> allee: I don't unseratdn the idea of replacing softupdate with puppet...
[08:53] <Mrfai> And the same installation from usb Stick
[08:53] <Mrfai> usb stick is much cooler than from CD/DVD
[08:53] <lazyb0y> that sounds a great goal!
[08:54] <siretart> for hardy, I also wanted to see, if we can replace the FAI Nfsroot with nbd
[08:54] <siretart> edubuntu is doing that for their ltsp-nfsroot
[08:54] <ogra> siretart, :)
[08:54] <Mrfai> siretart: file a wishlist bug for that, please
[08:54] <lazyb0y> siretart: what's the upside of this?
[08:54] <allee> btw we have bzr config mgnt for fai?
[08:54] <allee> ^^hardy:)
[08:54] <siretart> [ACTION]  siretart to file a whishlist bug for nbd support in fai nfsroot
[08:54] <Mrfai> no, not yet. Good idea to make ubuntu people happy
[08:55] <Mrfai> I mean bzr ccheckout of the config space
[08:55] <siretart> [ACTION]  allee to file a whishlist bug for bzr support in fai
[08:55] <siretart> :)
[08:55] <allee> Mrfai: I'm happy with git :)
[08:55] <lazyb0y> any problems with nfs trhat nbd will solve?
[08:55] <allee> but we want to reach to bzr fans too ;)
[08:55] <siretart> lazyb0y: no more portmapper. more performance, I'd expect
[08:55] <siretart> perhaps ogra can elaborate here
[08:55] <ogra> lazyb0y, better security control if you want it
[08:55] <lazyb0y> ok
[08:55] <Mrfai> some sites do not allow NFS for whatever reasons
[08:56] <siretart> ok
[08:56] <ogra> for us in ltsp nbd is only the undelying layer for a squashfs we mount together with a tmpfs into a unionfs
[08:56] <siretart> ogra: do you use casper in the squashfs?
[08:56] <allee> yeah, more (access) control would be a nice thing.
[08:56] <torkel> can we have support for afs installations too? :-)
[08:57] <Mrfai> nfsroot via afs?
[08:57] <ogra> nbd's design for serving imges instead of files as block devices made us look at that btw
[08:57] <siretart> torkel: if you hack that part, I'd see no problems ;)
[08:57] <ogra> siretart, well, a similar script called ltsp-nbd
[08:57] <allee> torkel: shudder
[08:57] <torkel> siretart: someday... :-)
[08:57] <siretart> ogra: ah, I see
[08:57] <ogra> but there is a lot stolen casper code inside :)
[08:57] <siretart> [ACTION]  siretart to talk with panthera about nbd support in live-initramfs
[08:57] <ogra> also some code for using network swap that makes it possible to boot systems with even 28M ram
[08:58] <siretart> ok, last point before we leave to our #fai channel
[08:58] <siretart> [TOPIC]  housekeeping (future meetings, communication, launchpad infrastructure etc.)
[08:58] <siretart> do we need a seperate mailing list?
[08:58] <siretart> or does Mrfai allow us to use linux-fai-devel? ;)
[08:58] <Mrfai> use linux-fai-devel
[08:58] <allee> no
[08:58] <siretart> objections from anyone?
[08:59] <torkel> no
[08:59] <allee> linux-fai-devel is fine
[08:59] <siretart> [AGREED]  ubuntu fai team is using the 'main' fai developer list: linux-fai-devel
[08:59] <siretart> we currently have the launchpad team for PPA uploads
[09:00] <siretart> I'd say every team member is fine to upload new package at anytime he sees fit, is that okay?
[09:00] <allee> okay
[09:00] <siretart> or do we need some more fine grained process?
[09:00] <torkel> depends on if you trust us to do uploads :-)
[09:00] <siretart> I think atm this would be allee, \sh and me as main uploads
[09:00] <allee> we should just be aware that other may use it and don't upload experimental stuff
[09:01] <siretart> [AGREED]  any team member is fine to upload as he seems fit until further notice
[09:01] <allee> At the end bzr-buildpackage would be used for testing the fai team branches
[09:01] <siretart> how about new team members?
[09:02] <siretart> the current policy is to mail me and I add him after a short introduction
[09:02] <allee> siretart: time over -> #FAI?
[09:02] <siretart> shall we change this to mail linux-fai-devel, and we talk about that in #fai?
[09:02] <siretart> well, allee is right, we should clear the stage for the technical board
[09:03] <siretart> let's move then to #fai. thanks for attending!
[09:03] <siretart> #endmeeting
[09:03] <allee> k
[09:05] <soren> @now
[09:05] <soren> mdz: tb meeting?
[09:10] <mjg59> Whoops. Good call.
[09:10] <soren> :)
[09:10] <siretart> hey, the fai team finished 7 minutes ago ;)
[09:10] <soren> mjg59: Don't feel bad. You seem to be the first one here :)
[09:11] <mjg59> I don't think I have contact numbers for the others at the moment
[09:11] <soren> I saw sabdfl active in #launchpad less than 10 minutes ago.
[09:12] <sabdfl> evening all
[09:13] <soren> Hi, Mark.
[09:13] <mjg59> Ok. Missing Scott and mdz. Anyone seen them this evening?
[09:13] <sabdfl> mdz is around, saw him online earlier
[09:14] <soren> Isn't he one of those screen+irssi kind of people who's always online?
[09:15] <sabdfl> (17:04:52) sabdfl: howdy mdz
[09:15] <sabdfl> (17:05:03) mdz: morning
[09:15] <sabdfl> that's a hell of an irssi trick :-)
[09:15] <mjg59> Is he on west coast time right now?
[09:15] <sabdfl> yes
[09:15] <mjg59> Ok, so lunchish
[09:15] <soren> Oh, ok.
[09:15] <ogra> thats a trivial script :)
[09:16] <mdz> sabdfl: I'm here
[09:16] <mdz> just finished lunch
[09:16] <sabdfl> lucky man i'm starving
[09:16] <mjg59> Ok, so we're quorate
[09:16] <mdz> #startmeeting
[09:16] <sabdfl> https://wiki.ubuntu.com/TechnicalBoardAgenda
[09:16] <mdz> MootBot: hello?
[09:17] <sabdfl> ah, that's why soren was pinging ;-)
[09:17] <soren> :)
[09:18] <mjg59> Hm. Go ahead without mootbot?
[09:18] <mdz> yes, just pulling up soren's application
[09:18] <mdz> https://lists.ubuntu.com/archives/motu-council/2007-September/000360.html
[09:18] <soren> https://lists.ubuntu.com/archives/motu-council/2007-September/000371.html
[09:19] <mjg59> Hm. Shall we try to grab pitti and kees?
[09:19] <mdz> thanks
[09:19] <soren> kees is around.
[09:19] <soren> Hang on.
[09:19] <mdz> sponsor feedback was received from pitti, kees and ScottK
[09:19] <soren> That's not right.
[09:19] <soren> ScottK is not -core-dev.
[09:20] <mdz> oh, I see
[09:20] <soren> ScottK: Thanks though :)
[09:20] <mdz> soren: so you've had a lot more time to spend on Ubuntu recently, by virtue of joining the Canonical team
[09:20] <ScottK> You're welcome.  You've been a lot of help to me.
[09:20] <soren> mdz: Sure have.
[09:21] <mdz> soren: how has that changed your views on Ubuntu?  do you have a different perspective on how the project works?
[09:21] <soren> mdz: Than before joining Canonical? Not much. I've gotten more aware of deadlines and such, though.
[09:22] <soren> I've always had a good feeling of the distro as a whole, I think.
[09:22] <sabdfl> do you have any new insights on the interaction of Canonical and volunteer contributors?
[09:22] <keescook> quick note from me: I've sponsored a few of soren's main uploads, and they've always looked good to me.  he's actually taught me a few things about some of the server packages in main.  :)
[09:23] <soren> sabdfl: It's certainly been interesting to get a first hand view of the inside of "the mother ship".
[09:24] <mdz> soren: it's difficult to know how things look to part-time contributors when living and breathing Ubuntu as a day job.  is there anything you've learned from this experience that you think would help MOTUs and prospective MOTUs to contribute more easily to Ubuntu?
[09:25] <soren> mdz: Well, as part of the day-to-day environment and also as part of the motu-uvf team, it's getting more and more obvious how we view it differently.
[09:25] <soren> When you only have so much time to spend on Ubuntu, it can be hard to see the big picture and only focus on the few packages you have time to worry about.
[09:26] <sabdfl> i need to commute to a home network. +1 from me for soren, on the back of excellent feedback from MC and all who commented, I'll be back online within 15 I hope for trackerd discussion
[09:26] <soren> I haven't spent a lot of time reflecting upon that, though.
[09:26] <soren> sabdfl: \o/ Thanks for that!
[09:26] <mdz> sabdfl: I don't have anything further to say about tracker; the email thread is...
[09:27] <mjg59> soren: How do you feel we're doing on the server?
[09:27] <soren> I think it might be a good idea to more thoroughly communicate what the purpose of the different slots in the development cycle is for.
[09:27] <soren> mjg59: Not good enough :)
[09:27] <mjg59> soren: Heh. Ok, can you expand on that?
[09:27] <soren> mjg59: It's interesting, really:
[09:28] <mdz> soren: we want it to be easy to contribute to Ubuntu in simple ways, like maintaining a few packages, and yet it's essential that that work be in harmony with the overall movement of the project, especially releases.  I'm wondering if there's anything you think we can do to improve that, in terms of communication or documentation for example
[09:28] <soren> mjg59: We're sometimese viewed as too much of a desktop OS, while the distro we're based upon has the exact opposite problem, and in the server area we really differ very little from Debian.
[09:28] <mdz> soren: pitti has been working just this past week on cleaning up exactly that, and I think the current documentation is miles ahead
[09:28] <soren> mjg59: There's definitely some work to be done to change that perception.
[09:29] <mjg59> soren: So it's mostly a perception problem, and not a technological one?
[09:29] <mdz> (different phases of development)
[09:29] <soren> mdz: Agreed. The MOTU team and especially the hopefuls seem to feel UVF as a hindrance in some way.
[09:29] <soren> mdz: Like an annoying, pointless obstacle.
[09:30] <soren> Sorry, that came out wrong.
[09:30] <soren> Not all, certainly.
[09:30] <soren> "some of".
[09:31] <soren> But I totally understand where it's coming from. I shared that feeling when I was "only" working on Ubuntu on a volunteer basis.
[09:31] <soren> mjg59: Well, Debian has a pretty decent reputation on servers. We really ought to have inherited that.
[09:31] <mdz> soren: do you think it is a practical problem or one of perception?
[09:31] <mjg59> How much of that is because universe tends to be less integrated to begin with?
[09:31] <soren> mdz: Both, but mostly perception.
[09:32] <soren> mjg59: Good question.
[09:32] <soren> mjg59: ...for which I don't have a good answer :)
[09:32] <mdz> it's a difficult thing to generalize whether an upstream release, with potentially a huge amount of new code and bugs, is appropriate for inclusion in Ubuntu, and UVF is one primitive way in which we try to assess that.  Do you think we could change it to be less burdensome without sacrificing its effectiveness?
[09:33] <mjg59> In main, it's pretty clear that we have UVF to concentrate on stability and integration for the remainder of the cycle
[09:33] <soren> mjg59: Definitely.
[09:33] <soren> mdz: Hm... I'm not sure.
[09:33] <mjg59> I guess there's an argument that the integration aspect of that is less applicable to universe
[09:34] <soren> mdz: The motu-uvf team is a good idea. It keeps the worst crack out, surely. :)
[09:34] <mdz> mjg59: perhaps somewhat...I don't want to promote an image of universe as a set of packages which don't matter as much
[09:34] <mdz> mjg59: because that downplays the valuable work that developers put into it
[09:34] <soren> mdz: ...but someone made the point earlier on that any motu ought to be able to make the call that motu-uvf does.
[09:35] <soren> Some of it stems from the fact that universe is "not supported", so it doesn't matter if it doesn't really work.
[09:35] <soren> Allegedly, of course.
[09:35] <mdz> what inevitably happens without such a limitation is that someone uploads something at the last minute, which is broken, and results in either releasing with a broken package, or a big headache for the release managers, archive admins and others to try to push a last-minute fix through
[09:36] <soren> Because most of our millions of users don't care where it comes from. If a package in universe doesn't work, Ubuntu doesn't work.
[09:36] <mdz> yes, there's something to be said for user expectations here
[09:36] <mdz> our policies for maintenance and support are far beyond what most desktop users expect
[09:37] <mdz> folks coming from the Windows world are used to getting their applications on CD or by download from a website, and never getting updates
[09:37] <soren> Interesting point.
[09:37] <mdz> in which case the distinction between main and universe doesn't matter much to them
[09:38] <mdz> I certainly use plenty of software from universe, because it meets my needs and doesn't put me at significant risk
[09:38] <soren> Sure.
[09:38] <soren> Are you suggesting we don't provide 18 months of support for non-lts releases?
[09:39] <mdz> not at all
[09:39] <soren> If it's way beyond what "the random users" expect, and we expect the "corporate users" to use LTS's anyway, it seems like a lot of work for little gain.
[09:39] <mdz> only agreeing that the distinction between main and universe is artificial for a certain (common) class of desktop users
[09:39] <soren> Oh, right.
[09:39] <mdz> consider ubuntu-backports
[09:40] <mdz> people who use backports are most interested in having fresh applications
[09:40] <mjg59> soren: How well is main serving our server users? Are most of them ending up using universe as well?
[09:40] <mdz> they accept the tradeoff in maintenance and support
[09:40] <soren> mjg59: Currently, yes.
[09:41] <soren> mjg59: We're reevaluating a lot of software to find out if it should be promoted.
[09:41] <mjg59> soren: Do you feel that that's something that needs changing?
[09:41] <soren> mjg59: Yes, indeed.
[09:41] <mdz> mjg59: even if they use packages from universe, I think the distinction is much more relevant to them, since they need to be informed about which software will receive security updates
[09:42] <soren> mjg59: I realise it puts more strain on the security team (and the rest of us, too), but there's a lot of really useful software in universe that really deserves proper support.
[09:42] <mjg59> I think that's pretty inevitable, yes
[09:42] <mdz> sure, but that's one area where a distinction needs to be drawn between Canonical and Ubuntu
[09:42] <soren> mjg59: I think it scales fairly well, though.
[09:42] <mdz> in large part, it's Canonical who backs the commitment to security updates by providing dedicated resources
[09:43] <mdz> and so those decisions need to be made with a view to what's best for Canonical and its customers, more than the inherent merit of the software
[09:43] <soren> mdz: Of course.
[09:44] <mjg59> I agree that we're failing to communicate the different levels of support. People enable universe and then never think about it again.
[09:44] <soren> mdz: My point just is that there's a lot of really useful software in universe that Canonical's paying customers would like to use.
[09:44] <soren> mdz: ...but if they're not properly supported, they might go elsewhere.
[09:44] <mdz> yes, there are some specific cases where we should make adjustments on that basis
[09:45] <mdz> but I'm wary of saying that software "deserves" support and therefore should be promoted to main
[09:45] <soren> Right. Bad choice of words.
[09:46] <soren> I mean that it's software that's in a good enough shape to not cause too much of a burden and also useful enough to make a difference to paying customers.
[09:46] <mdz> mjg59: no more questions from me, say when
[09:47] <mjg59> soren: So, arguably the two main issues facing us on the server are (1) people not taking Ubuntu sufficiently seriously, and (2) people not understanding the differing support levels, and this reflecting badly on the distribution as a whole?
[09:47] <soren> mjg59: No, our main issue, i think, is hardware support in LTS releases.
[09:48] <soren> mjg59: That's really what most people point out to me as our major shortcoming.
[09:48] <mjg59> Ok. How can we deal with that?
[09:49] <soren> mjg59: Well, the obvious solution is more kernel developers.
[09:49] <soren> However..
[09:49] <mjg59> Heh
[09:49] <soren> It would be much more interesting to get to the point where we can make the hardware vendors do it themselves.
[09:50] <mjg59> Hardware vendors are moving towards not being interested in doing so
[09:50] <mjg59> Intel have been making it pretty clear that they're not planning to
[09:50] <soren> Really? Becuase we're too good at it without them?
[09:51] <mdz> I do not think that a shortage of kernel developers is the main issue.  they can't do much about enabling arbitrary hardware without access to it, and can't efficiently do testing across a wide range of platforms
[09:51] <mjg59> No, because they end up with a large set of develoeprs doing nothing but backports, with most of the benefit going to the Linux vendors rather than them
[09:51] <mjg59> Though I suspect backporting hardware support is a discussion better suited to Boston than here...
[09:52] <soren> Agreed.
[09:52] <soren> mdz: That's also true.. It's a tough problem to tackle.
[09:52] <mdz> the only reasonable long-term solution to this problem is to enable portable (across Linux versions) drivers to be written
[09:52] <soren> I'm not sure that will happen anytime soon.
[09:53] <soren> AFAIK the kernel developers don't believe much in "API stability at all cost".
[09:53] <mjg59> The only way that's likely to happen is if the distributors cooperate on a porting layer
[09:53] <mjg59> It's unlikely to change upstream
[09:54] <mdz> I suppose it's also possible that Linux will one day stop regressing massively, and allow new kernels to be provided for older releases
[09:54] <soren> Ironic, really.
[09:54] <mdz> but I think portable drivers are more likely
[09:54] <soren> Since a considerable percentage of kernel developers (ie. upstream) work for distributors.
[09:55] <mdz> (as unfortunate as the current opinions upstream may be)
[09:56] <mdz> I don't know whether any of the current userspace driver work makes this more feasible
[09:56] <soren> I wouldn't know.
[09:56] <soren> I try to steer clear of anything in the kernel that deals directly with hardware. :)
[09:56] <soren> It's scary.
[09:57] <mdz> and we're getting a bit off-topic for the meeting
[09:57] <ogra> yeah, what about soren :)
[09:57] <soren> Oh, right.
[09:57] <mdz> mjg59: any other questions regarding soren's application?
[09:57] <mjg59> No, I think I'm happy now
[09:57] <soren> Wow.
[09:58] <mjg59> Vote?
[09:58] <mdz> ok, votes then
[09:58] <mjg59> +1 from me, packaging skills sound good and has a solid understanding of where we are and where we want to be in the server market
 i need to commute to a home network. +1 from me for soren, on the back of excellent feedback from MC and all who commented,
[09:58] <mdz> +1, demonstrated understanding of project policies and rationale, positive feedback from core sponsors and MOTU
[09:58] <mdz> soren: congratulations and welcome
[09:59] <soren> \o/
[09:59] <soren> Woot!
[09:59] <ogra> welcome soren :)
[09:59] <soren> mdz: Thanks!
[09:59] <mdz> I've updated Launchpad
[09:59] <mdz> mjg59: do you know what sabdfl was talking about regarding tracker?  I'm not aware of any decision before the TB or a need for discussion outside the ongoing email thread with TB, Ubuntu developers and upstream represented
[10:00] <ScottK> soren: Congratulations.
[10:00] <soren> mdz: He's back now.
[10:00] <soren> mdz: He just joined #u-d
[10:00] <soren> ScottK: Thanks!
[10:00] <mjg59> No, I wasn't aware of any further tracker discussion being scheduled
[10:01] <sabdfl> hey
[10:01] <mjg59> sabdfl: Good timing
[10:01] <mdz> sabdfl: you mentioned something about tracker?
[10:01] <sabdfl> first, a story
[10:01] <sabdfl> it took me a while to find a cab
[10:01] <mdz> sabdfl: you may or may not be aware, we discussed it is some detail at the previous TB meeting
[10:01] <sabdfl> when i climbed into it, he had a screen in there, where they usually show adverts and comedy
[10:01] <sabdfl> his said:
[10:01] <sabdfl> ERROR
[10:01] <sabdfl> Corrupt file
[10:02] <sabdfl> \WINDOWS\SYSTEM\etc etc
[10:02] <sabdfl> mdz: want to discuss today's email exchange re tracker here, or are you happy with the decision options?
[10:03] <mdz> sabdfl: I'm satisfied with the direction of the conversation, and it (unlike this meeting) includes representatives from upstream and the Ubuntu kernel team
[10:03] <sabdfl> ok
[10:03] <sabdfl> nothing more from me then
[10:03] <mdz> sabdfl: when we discussed it at the last meeting, we presented our concerns to upstream and interested developers
[10:04] <mdz> upstream acknowledged our specific concerns, and was confident they would be resolved in time
[10:04] <sabdfl> ok
[10:04] <sabdfl> are they excited to have their bits in the spotlight?
[10:04] <mdz> we accepted this, with the proviso that if things didn't go according to plan, tracker could be trivially disabled by default with a gconf key
[10:05] <mdz> I wouldn't want to speak on their behalf, but they do urge us to stick with it and believe it is a good option for us and for our users
[10:05] <sabdfl> ok
[10:05] <mdz> the kernel issue seems to be the main one at this point
[10:05] <sabdfl> that's me then
[10:05] <mdz> because we don't know the cause yet
[10:06] <mdz> ok, that's it for agenda then.  is there any other business?
[10:06] <mdz> ok, adjourned then.  thanks, all
[10:07] <sabdfl> thanks, and good night
[10:32] <sladen> mdz: see the Red Hat kernel ABI packaging stuff;  the RH people doing that are in Boston