[Debian-sf-devel] Latest news about Debian-SF

[Roland Mas]

  Hello all,

  I just wanted to point out that I have started working on the (long
overdue) splitting of the package.  Instead of having one monolithic
package installing the whole of Sourceforge, it should soon be
possible to have several subpackages.  My current draft contains the
following subpackages:

sourceforge -- meta-package depending on all others
sourceforge-common -- common files and configuration used by others
sourceforge-web-apache -- web part with Apache
sourceforge-db-postgresql -- database with PostgreSQL
sourceforge-mta-exim -- mail configuration with Exim
sourceforge-shell-ldap -- shell hosting with LDAP auth
sourceforge-cvs -- CVS stuff (this one is a bit tricky to define)
sourceforge-ftp-proftpd -- FTP stuff with ProFTPd
sourceforge-ldap-openldap -- LDAP directory, with OpenLDAP
sourceforge-dns-bind9 -- DNS with Bind 9
sourceforge-lists-mailman -- mailing-lists with Mailman

  This serves two main goals.

  First, it allows us to be more modular and flexible.  A frequent
request from users is that they would like to use Sourceforge, but are
not prepared to change their MTA.  Exim works rather well, but some
people have reasons to prefer keeping their running Sendmail or
Postfix or other.  The same applies to other parts of Sourceforge:
Bind 9, ProFTPd, Apache, Mailman, maybe others.  Splitting the package
allows a user to choose any package providing the sourceforge-mta
virtual package.  We will initially release sourceforge-mta-exim as
the only such package, but others will probably follow.  It will also
allow for independently-developed themes to be packaged.

  Second, it is the first step on the way to multi-hosted Sourceforge
installations.  It should be possible, after a probably non-negligible
amount of time, to install the database on one specially tuned server,
the shell and CVS server on another box, maybe the LDAP directory on
yet another one, and have several boxes dedicated to the web
interface.

  What this means is that the package I'm working on will probably
have to be considered broken for the next few days (I'll try to keep
that under two weeks, but I have no real idea how hard it will be).
I'm not sure yet whether I'll make a dedicated branch in the CVS for
that, but in any case I'll try to concentrate my neurons on that
particular problem rather than on other ones, except if big bugs
appear on the stable (2.5) branch.  If you want to checkout the CVS
tree just before the splitting work started, use the "starting_split"
tag.

  For you contributors (we love you), this also means that your
patches will probably not be handled as fast as they should.
Especially if they change things in the debian/ and deb-specific/
directories.  Other patches might be considered when I get fed up with
this main splitting task.  Make sure they are adapted to this
condition: make them simple, short, as non-intrusive as possible, and
documented.

  I'll call out for volunteers at some point when I have reasonably
confident that it at leaast *might* work.  In the meantime, have fun,
don't forget to report bugs, and bring out those themes :-)

Roland.
-- 
Roland Mas

Why did the tachyon cross the road?
Because it was on the other side.