Bacula-users

Re: [Bacula-users] [Bacula-devel] Patches

2008-10-26 04:04:44
Subject: Re: [Bacula-users] [Bacula-devel] Patches
From: Kern Sibbald <kern AT sibbald DOT com>
To: bacula-devel AT lists.sourceforge DOT net
Date: Sun, 26 Oct 2008 10:03:28 +0200
On Saturday 25 October 2008 21:53:00 Ulrich Leodolter wrote:
> On Sat, 2008-10-25 at 21:11 +0200, Eric Bollengier wrote:
> > Le Saturday 25 October 2008 13:41:15 Ulrich Leodolter, vous avez écrit :
> > > On Sat, 2008-10-25 at 11:32 +0200, Kern Sibbald wrote:
> > > > Hello,
> > > >
> > > > For some time now, I haven't really been happy with the Bacula patch
> > > > procedure. Basically, when we fix a bug (either from a bug report or
> > > > ourselves), we usually generate a patch, post it to the bug report,
> > > > if any, and upload it to the Bacula patches area of Source Forge.
> > > >
> > > > Providing you are subscribed to the bugs database and to the
> > > > bacula-patches release notification on Source Forge, you will see
> > > > these patches and can apply them if you deem necessary.
> > > >
> > > > The problems I have with this is that some people may not know about
> > > > patches (we see this in bug reports where a problem is already
> > > > resolved with a patch), and there is no formal mechanism for
> > > > developers when generating a patch.
> > > >
> > > > We already have more work than we can handle, so any change needs to
> > > > be simple and not time consuming for developers, but I am wondering
> > > > if anyone has suggestions how to improve this.  I can think of a few:
> > > >
> > > > 1. Change nothing (signing up for bugs and patch notification is
> > > > already not bad).
> > > > 2. Announce patches to the bacula-devel list
> > > > 3. Announce patches to the bacula-devel list and the bacula-users
> > > > list 4. Announce patches to the bacula-announce list as well as the
> > > > other two lists.
> > > > 5. Put patches in the news (time consuming and I doubt that many read
> > > > news). 6. Create an rss feed (I doubt that many users use rss, and
> > > > this also could be time consuming).
> > >
> > > Hello,
> > >
> > > One thing i am missing are patched packages, rpm and also deb packages
> > > have a mechanism to include patch files an apply during build process.
> > >
> > > For most bacula users it would be much easier to apply patches by "rpm
> > > -U ..." or "dpkg install ...".
> >
> > Yes, but you have to build, test and release a package for each disto
> > after each patch, this is a *huge* amount of work, we have something like
> > 10 patches between two releases.
> >
> > If someone want to build, test and package 10 more often than before for
> > free, no problem, but i prefere spend my time with new features and bugs
> > hunting.
> >
> > > Operating systems like RedHat, CentOS, SLES, Debian, ... are always at
> > > least one step behind last official version.
> > >
> > > An official bacula package repository (yum, apt) would be great.
> >
> > Fedora, debian and ubuntu already provide this kind of repositor, and
> > often, they  have a backport branch.

I was out yesterday, so will answer here in your second email.

Yes, I think having full packages available is the best way to get "patches".  
We already sometimes do that.  However, as Eric pointed out, it is a lot of 
work.  The packaging is done by the community.  I release a new source tar 
file and (with the exception of Win32), the community creates new packages if 
they want.  They always do so for new releases, and for what I designate as 
critical fixes, but possibly not for all the more minor patches.

>
> Sure u right, a lot of work and resources are needed.
>
> Just curious, how will Bacula Systems handle this ?

Bacula Systems will be releasing binaries (once we get everything setup).  For 
a patch that we know someone wants a binary, we will supply the binary, 
otherwise, we may accumulate patches before releasing a new binary.  The 
point is that there will be many more binaries.  As Eric points out, it is a 
huge amount of work, but then the customers are paying for it.  These 
binaries will be available all Bacula Systems customers and partners (many 
partners will probably build their own packages).

I have always had the desire to be able to supply our Bacula Systems certified 
binaries to the community (non-paying Bacula users), and we have discussed 
various ways of doing it:  free for individuals, charge a very small probably 
annual fee for companies and other oganizations, change everyone a annual 
fee.  Note, we are talking about Bacula Systems Certified binaries here, 
which have a fairly lengthy procedure that must be followed to produce them, 
which involves a number of hours of work for each platform.

We have also thought about packing Bacula binaries, or working more closely 
with our current packagers.  These would be created with the existing 
procedures: build, if it all goes well, release.  I.e. the procedure is 
rather minimal.  Such binaries if we help build and or host them for release 
would remain free of charge as they always have been, and as I hope they 
always will.

Finally, there are the distros.  Our Bacula Systems Certification procedure 
that we will use for our binaries can also be used by distros, and we are 
encouraging it, but it puts more work on thier back, and may conflict with 
their own work schedules, so we are not yet sure how it will go across.

We also have a Bacula Compliant packaging proceedure, which allows any 
packager or distribution to do a sort of self certification of the binaries.  
It is a procedure very close to the Bacula Systems Certification, but with a 
few additional alternatives that any person can follow to create binaries 
with no charge that we consider "best practice".

So the bottom line is that we are working on this, but none of the above is 
yet in place and as I pointed out, there are a number of aspects that are as 
yet undecided.


Best regards,

Kern

> Includes Enterprise-Class Support patched binary packages for Customers?
>
> Best Regards
> Ulrich
>
> > > Only Sourcecode an patches are released to sourceforge (maybe win32
> > > binaries too).
> >
> > Bye
> >
> > > Best Regards
> > > Ulrich
> > >
> > > > If anyone else has ideas we would like to hear them.
> > > >
> > > > Best regards,
> > > >
> > > > Kern
>
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