[Xastir-Dev] Re-org of file releases?

[Jack Twilley]

>>>>> "David" == David L Norris <David> writes:

[...]

David> I know at least a dozen people (including hams) using Linux who
David> haven't a clue how to use a terminal let alone how to use tar
David> to extract the source.  I spent 5 hours the other night trying
David> to walk someone through building a simple program from a source
David> tarball; he eventually gave up.  People coming from DOS who do
David> know how to use a command line often have so many horrible "do
David> what I mean not do what I say" habits that it's hard to even
David> explain how to type a command with parameters.  If it isn't RPM
David> or DEB they are mostly lost.

This may spawn some decidedly off-topic threads, but I have a serious
question:  is it reasonable to assume a certain level of competency on
the part of an amateur radio operator with regard to non-amateur
equipment such as a computer?  On the one hand, having a low threshold
opens the pool of users to a wider range -- and that's a very nice
thing to feel as a user and a contributer.  On the other hand, it
will require quite a bit of work to provide the support infrastructure
to allow the non-technical users to continue to use the software.

There's also an emotional side to this -- I guess I always figured the
average ham should be geeky and into these kinds of things.  I mean,
they don't have to be a master sysadmin or programmer, but if they use
computers with their ham stuff, they should be able to handle
something like building the software from scratch.  That's just my
humble opinion, though.  I've got high expectations for hams.

David> And, preinstalled Linux systems such as those sold by Walmart,
David> TigerDirect, etc (for ~$200) have no build environment.  It's
David> either .deb, .rpm or bust unless they know how, where and which
David> packages to install to get a build environment.  It seems to me
David> like there should be some way to get packages out for these
David> people.  Their vendors probably aren't going to help them much.

I picture the kind of ham who'd use Xastir to be able to fix that kind
of problem.

David> Maybe a few people running different distributions could
David> contribute binary packages for official releases of XASTIR.  I
David> know I'd be willing to do something like that.  Granted, this
David> would be an extra burden.  And, only worthwhile if several
David> people are willing to (reliably) contribute binaries of the
David> releases.

There are a few other dependencies as well.  Releases will have to be
made more frequently and more documentation will be needed as well.
The compile farm that sourceforge provides may be helpful in this
case, but then again, it might not be depending on what kind of build
is being made -- a full bells-and-whistles build may require stuff
that's not installed on the farm, and I personally do not look forward
to the nightmare of supporting software built on people's home
machines.  "Fred built it and his system has some odd little tweaks so
it might or might not work for you."  Ugh.  Craziness.

Jack> Otherwise, you should consider making .rpm's and .deb's, and
Jack> madness lies down that path.

David> I really like having the option of using RPMs.  Even when
David> building from source I'll always create my own RPM when there's
David> a spec file.  It makes it easy to see what's installed, where
David> it's installed, and what it needs to work correctly.  And, once
David> the RPM is built all I have to do is click an icon to install
David> it on all my other machines.  I can even give it to a friend
David> and not have to spend 5 hours on the phone with him.  :-)

I'm a fan of source RPMs.  I'm not sure that binary RPMs will remove
the need for tech support.  Reading the questions on the mailing list
by people who have installed the wrong RPMs for everything from their
widget set to their image conversion software makes me think you're a
little optimistic.  Your mileage may vary, of course.

David> Perhaps a compromise for RPM-based systems is to provide source
David> RPMs via SourceForge.  It should be fairly simple even for
David> newbies to build a source RPM.  "rpmbuild --rebuild
David> xastir.src.rpm" Building RPMs from the spec file is a slightly
David> more involved but not complex at all; extract spec file, copy
David> tarball to the RPM SOURCES directory, "rpmbuild -ba
David> someprog.spec".  But, both require build environments which,
David> these days, are not always installed on "default" Linux desktop
David> systems.  Why, I have no clue.  But, that's the way things are
David> going lately.

Luckily, in the open source software environment, you have ways to
deal with this situation that are more effective than just saying
"that's the way things are going lately".  If you use a distribution,
write to the people who maintain it.  Build software to make the
distribution do what you want.  Make it available via the web and post
links in relevant places (like here, for instance) and you're more
than halfway there.

Some of the reasons you've mentioned are reasons I chose to stop
running Linux several years ago.  As I've mentioned, I personally
prefer FreeBSD as I consider the unity of its system design an
advantage over the diversity of Linux distributions.  But there's no
reason for me to advocate FreeBSD, though I am willing to provide any
support to folks who can't get Xastir going on their FreeBSD machines
because it's nice to know others are taking advantage of the work I've
done.

Jack.

-- 
Jack Twilley
jmt at twilley dot org
http colon slash slash www dot twilley dot org slash tilde jmt slash
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