blog/archives/2010/04zack's home pagehttp://upsilon.cc/~zack/blog/archives/2010/04/zack's home pageikiwiki2010-06-26T17:24:03Zthe DebConf Newbies initiativehttp://upsilon.cc/~zack/blog/posts/2010/04/the_DebConf_Newbies_initiative/2010-06-26T17:24:03Z2010-04-26T12:03:31Z
<h1>DebConf newbies: we want you!</h1>
<p>You've probably already read <a href=
"http://kitenet.net/~joey/blog/entry/Sponsoring_non-regulars_for_DebConf10/">
a nice blog post by Joey</a> about the <a href=
"http://wiki.debian.org/DebConfNewbies">DebConf Newbies</a>
initiative. Let me recap in case you didn't: Debian will invest
some money to explicit <strong>sponsor <a href=
"http://debconf10.debconf.org/">DebConf10</a> attendance</strong>
for "non-regulars", i.e. <strong>for those that have not attended
DebConf ever, or quite in a while</strong>. If you are interested
you should check the <a href=
"http://wiki.debian.org/DebConfNewbies">wiki page</a> and mail Joey
as requested. <small>(Including a big thank you to him would be
more than appropriate, given that he'll be taking care of most gory
details.)</small></p>
<p><strong>Why</strong> are we doing this and why is it separate
from the regular DebConf sponsorship process? Answering the latter
is rather easy. The initiative has sponsoring criteria different
than regular DebConf sponsoring (which is well oiled and taken care
of by the DebConf orga team) and it didn't seem fair to mix the
two, possibly keeping out from regular sponsoring requests some
people, just because of this new initiative. Also, as we're well
past the deadline for requesting regular DebConf sponsoring, it
wouldn't have been nice to induce <em>extra</em> work to the
DebConf sponsoring team (and Joey has been kind enough to volunteer
anyhow, so ... <img src="http://upsilon.cc/~zack/smileys/smile.png" alt=
":-)" /> ).</p>
<p>Answers to the former question (why are we doing this in the
first place?) are possibly subjectives. My personal belief is that
<strong>attending DebConf increases the enthusiasm of
attendees</strong> and ultimately will make them <strong>better
Debian citizens</strong>. It surely happened to me years ago: in
the beginning of my Debian membership (as DD, since DMs did not
exist back then) I just cared about my pet packages. It was only
after meeting the Debian crowd in person at a FOSS event (LinuxTag
2004, IIRC) that I got <em>really</em> enthusiastic about Debian,
gradually increasing my involvement in the project. I've never
regretted it.</p>
<p>I hope it can happen to some of you too, possibly starting with
DebConf10.<br />
See you in New York!<br />
<a href="http://debconf10.debconf.org/"><img src=
"http://wiki.debconf.org/upload/3/36/Imgotodc10_150px.png" /></a></p>
oh myhttp://upsilon.cc/~zack/blog/posts/2010/04/oh_my/2010-04-17T15:14:24Z2010-04-17T15:14:24Z
<h1>let's face it</h1>
<p>After having tamed for a day and a half my INBOX, my IRC log,
and my @replies, of an unexpected message flow about the <a href=
"http://www.debian.org/vote/2010/vote_001">election results</a>,
after having being pinged by the -press team to contribute a quote
for a very nice and professional <a href=
"http://www.debian.org/News/2010/20100416">press release</a>, after
having fired <code>mutt -s "Bits from the (newbie) DPL"
debian-devel-announce@lists.debian.org</code>, ... it's time to
realize that <strong>I've been elected DPL</strong>.</p>
<p>I <em>still</em> have a bunch of mixed feelings (happiness,
fear, responsibility, etc.) to disentangle, but above all I'm
really proud of our processes (well I don't mind the result
either!). I'm <strong>grateful to the other candidates</strong> and
to all the people that took part in <a href=
"http://upsilon.cc/~zack/hacking/debian/dpl-2010/">campaigning discussions</a>.
As I've <a href="http://upsilon.cc/~zack/blog/posts/2010/04/campaigning_woes/">observed
already</a>, campaigning has been exciting for me. It wouldn't have
been so without the courage of all candidates and the inquiries of
all contributors. No wonder we have had both the highest percentage
of voters of recent years (yes, WAT runs of course helped that),
and an absolute number of voters close to that of past "heated"
elections.</p>
<p>In days in which most of the big players in the distro market
are companies (and hence take money-driven decision), I can't be
more proud to be a member of a <em>huge</em> volunteer project
whose processes are driven by a truly <strong>do-ocratic and
democratic constitution</strong>.</p>
<p>See you in a bit.</p>
<p><strong>PS 1</strong> in case you wondered, yes, I've fired
<code>mutt</code>, but I'm far from having written something in the
body of the mail! In the next few hours I'll first distill a
personal TODO-list / detailed-plan out of my platform and of the
inputs that I've <em>already</em> received. Then I'll finalize my
first ever DPL bits to <code>d-d-a</code>.</p>
<p><strong>PS 2</strong> In the meantime ... I'll surely be looking
for a new "maintainer" for <strong><a href=
"http://upsilon.cc/~zack/hacking/debian/rcbw/">RCBW</a></strong>, any taker?
<img src="http://upsilon.cc/~zack/smileys/smile.png" alt=":-)" /></p>
<p><strong>PS 3</strong> <em>shameless plug!</em> The
<strong>mythical <a href=
"http://www.flickr.com/photos/wouterverhelst/581894457/">Debian
Kilt</a></strong> is being weaved again, and you still have your
chance of getting one in time for <a href=
"http://debconf10.debconf.org">DebConf10</a>. If you're interested,
check out <a href=
"http://wiki.hands.com//chezfil/entry/debian-tartan-2.0-pre1/">this
post by Phil Hands</a> and <a href=
"http://wiki.debconf.org/wiki/DebConf7/Tartan#Second_Order">sign up
on the wiki</a>, I'm definitely getting one!</p>
bubulle running ...http://upsilon.cc/~zack/blog/posts/2010/04/bubulle_running_.../2010-04-12T13:28:21Z2010-04-11T15:37:53Z
<h1>... <strike>for DPL</strike> in the Paris marathon</h1>
<div class="center">
<table>
<tr>
<td><a href=
"http://upsilon.cc/~zack/blog/posts/2010/04/bubulle_running_.../bubulle1.jpg"><img src=
"http://upsilon.cc/~zack/blog/posts/2010/04/bubulle_running_.../300x-bubulle1.jpg"
width="300" height="200" title="Bubulle running the Paris marathon"
class="img" /></a></td>
<td><a href=
"http://upsilon.cc/~zack/blog/posts/2010/04/bubulle_running_.../bubulle2.jpg"><img src=
"http://upsilon.cc/~zack/blog/posts/2010/04/bubulle_running_.../300x-bubulle2.jpg"
width="300" height="225" title="Bubulle running the Paris marathon"
class="img" /></a></td>
</tr>
</table>
</div>
<p><a href=
"http://www.perrier.eu.org/weblog/2010/04/09#paris-marathon-2010">Cheers
Bubulle</a>, and I've been told you did quite match your
objectives, with an impressive (it definitely is for me!) 3h49m29s
in the Paris marathon.</p>
<p>Thanks to <a href="http://www.pps.jussieu.fr/~treinen/">Ralf</a>
for the pictures and for organizing the rendez-vous with Christian.
It is quite exciting to see people and friends running a marathon.
Next year, as I doubt I can be ready for anything more than the
semi-marathon, I'll try to run a few kilometers of the marathon
side by side with friends, to let them continue alone when I'll die
on the ground <img src="http://upsilon.cc/~zack/smileys/smile.png" alt=
":-)" /></p>
RC bugs of the week - issue 26http://upsilon.cc/~zack/blog/posts/2010/04/RC_bugs_of_the_week_-_issue_26/2010-04-08T20:52:21Z2010-04-08T20:52:21Z
<h1><acronym title=
"Release Critical Bugs of the Week">RCBW</acronym> - #26</h1>
<p><a href=
"http://upsilon.cc/~zack/blog/posts/2010/04/RC_bugs_of_the_week_-_issue_26/rcbw-beast.png">
<img src=
"http://upsilon.cc/~zack/blog/posts/2010/04/RC_bugs_of_the_week_-_issue_26/rcbw-beast.png"
width="608" height="201" alt="RC bug count: 666" title=
"RCBW: the number of the beast" class="img" /></a></p>
<p>It <em>is</em> getting down, even though the current number is
scary. My personal <a href=
"http://bts.turmzimmer.net/details.php?bydist=both&sortby=packages&ignhinted=on&ignnew=on&ignpending=on&ignmerged=on&ignotherfixed=on&new=7&refresh=1800#podlators-perl">
RC bug count</a> is not so mystical and as low as 205 RC bugs to
go, which is quite encouraging. Without any further ado, here are
this week squashes:</p>
<ul>
<li><span class="bug strike"><a href=
"http://bugs.debian.org/571817">Debian bug #571817</a></span> -
python-data - avoid spurious py2.4 dep (sponsored NMU for Obey
Arthur Liu)</li>
<li><span class="bug strike"><a href=
"http://bugs.debian.org/574020">Debian bug #574020</a></span> -
h5utils - switch to octave 3.2 (sponsored NMU for Obey Arthur
Liu)</li>
<li><span class="bug strike"><a href=
"http://bugs.debian.org/559609">Debian bug #559609</a></span> -
hstore-new - drop pgsql 8.3 package (sponsored NMU for Obey Arthur
Liu)</li>
<li><span class="bug strike"><a href=
"http://bugs.debian.org/575384">Debian bug #575384</a></span> -
ethos - add inter-lib dep to avoid dangling .so link (patch by
Andreas Henriksson)</li>
<li><span class="bug strike"><a href=
"http://bugs.debian.org/460338">Debian bug #460338</a></span>,
<span class="bug strike"><a href=
"http://bugs.debian.org/565153">Debian bug #565153</a></span> -
apt-proxy - requested removal RM/RoQA (see <a href=
"http://bugs.debian.org/576821">Debian bug #576821</a>)</li>
<li><span class="bug strike"><a href=
"http://bugs.debian.org/574557">Debian bug #574557</a></span> -
qpsmtpd - fix virtual deps in init script (patch by Petter
Reinholdtsen)</li>
</ul>
<p>Random points:</p>
<ul>
<li>I've exploited quite a bit my (now ex) NM <strong>Obey Arthur
Liu</strong>: 3 of the above squashes come from him. I've been
tempted to put Arthur on hold just to have him fix some more RC
bugs <em>g</em> (just kidding, of course)</li>
<li>It has been observed that <a href=
"http://info.comodo.priv.at/blog/archives/2010/04/#e2010-04-05T03_10_00.txt">
<em>*cheering up Gregor</em>8</a> produces beneficial effects on
the RC bug count, so why not doing it again? <img src=
"http://upsilon.cc/~zack/smileys/smile.png" alt=":-)" /></li>
<li>Last week I forgot to mention Rhonda's regular <strong>stable
RC squashing</strong>, and in particular the <a href=
"http://alfie.ist.org/blog/debian/RC-squashing-2.en.html">"below
1000" milestone</a>. Cheers!</li>
</ul>
campaigning woeshttp://upsilon.cc/~zack/blog/posts/2010/04/campaigning_woes/2010-04-08T16:56:13Z2010-04-08T16:56:13Z
<h1>lots of votes!</h1>
<p>In principle, I just meant to blog saying that I've really
enjoyed <a href=
"http://lists.debian.org/debian-vote/2010/03/threads.html">campaigning
this year</a>: <strong>thanks</strong> to the other candidates and
to all the people who asked questions. <small>(... and kudos to a
couple of who-know-who-you-are-persons which have managed to ask
very inflammable questions with a lot of tact)</small> But given
that a blog post that way would have been too empty for my
standards, here are a couple of extra random remarks:</p>
<ol>
<li>
<p>I believe that the <strong>campaigning summary</strong> on my
<a href="http://upsilon.cc/~zack/hacking/debian/dpl-2010/">DPL 2010 page</a> is
now complete</p>
</li>
<li>
<p>One week into the voting period, we seem to have quite more
votes than last year: we've just <a href=
"http://master.debian.org/~secretary/leader2010/">passed the 200
ballot thresholds</a>, whereas <a href=
"http://master.debian.org/~secretary/leader2009/">last year</a> the
very same threshold got passed only after the second call for votes
(which corresponds to steep increases in most Debian votes).
Considering that the number of potential voters is lower this year
(i.e. a bit more than 1'000 vs a bit less than 900), this might
well be the first year after a while, in which the
<strong>percentage of voters increases</strong> (which I consider
to be a good indicator of interest, no matter what).</p>
</li>
</ol>