Re: Ask the Council!
 

@SD69
I just read the minutes. Some of the things discussed there, we have discussed before (the two of us) here.
I hope writing the suggestion in a light tone does not diminish its value, otherwise I may have to use a more formal one whenever I have something to say.

@marxian, thanks for the link.

Re: Ask the Council!
 

Thanks for picking up all the important topics, SD69. At least in their "promises" it looks ok - we will see, how it ends in practice.

Ho ever, one thing rised my blood-pressure significantly - Maemo, please read from:
http://mg.pov.lt/maemo-meeting-irclo...01-12T16:05:05
...to the end.

Not to mention sophism and lack of respect shown in:
...they're basically treating Maemo org - through it's representatives - as puppets, that don't even need to be informed - nor asked - if they accept such significant thing as merging with meego/harmattan.

Of course Nokia representatives are also showing ignorance - denying to see significant differences between Maemo and Harmattan world - but, it's not the problem, ignorance is synonym of Nokia's anyway for a long time. The thing is, that they implicit rights to decide about our infrastructure, just because they host servers! I don't want to sound too "revolutionary", but it's probably cheapest sold independence in software world.

Considering size of our community, hosting services for all our infrastructure, would be amount of 100-150 bucks. Not to mention other (many times, great and worth checking) ideas from this thread, like Debian infrastructure etc. IMO, if Nokia thing they can drop harmattan mess on us, just because they provide such "services", we should prepare a nice "surprise" for them.

I don't want to play a conspiracy theories either, but this proposed "merge" also seems to be targeted @ [b]sucking developers[/b[ to Harmattan (and, possibly, some of them later to WinSh|tPhone, yet it's harder due to framework differencies), which would be nice continuation of damned N950 project.

Of course no one from Nokia asked us what we think about it (neither they acknowledged during last meeting, that they *should* ask), but IMO, we don't need to ask them either - so, as for me, merge is a no-go.

/Estel

Re: Ask the Council!
 

it is getting even worse sadly to say and it seems the gap is growing between TMO and Nokia.
Just thought i would pop in and have a look at the current situation as not been on for quite some time, good luck everyone hope all your dreams come true.... mine didn't sad'ly but never mind eh.

Hello Texrat hope your still on top of it these days :D

Re: Ask the Council!
 

It had been previously agreed to use the Council blog as notification of such things. Burying posts in a thread on TMO - even one as on-topic as this one - isn't very inclusive.

If you want a discussion of getting more volunteers, you need people to be able to see the requests and the topic.

Well volunteered. You are, however, wrong. There are two things needed:

1. Money
2. Time

From those you can get everything - and migrate everything from *.maemo.org to $SOMEWHEREELSE.

I suggest not approaching people who are paying the bills as part of some kind of evil conspiracy. That's not going to give a good working relationship.

Re: Ask the Council!
 

Can you explain how posting things in this thread as well as elsewhere would constitute burying them?

Re: Ask the Council!
 

I'll gladly do, as soon as people paying the bills will start to treat us seriously.

Just re-read council logs. It's perfectly seen - in every line - that they don't have a clue about things they're saying. Heck, they event were not aware of momcilo being Council member!

If You ask me, community projects around Maemo got now biggest momentum ever - of course, it's handbraked by "our friends" from Nokia, if not only by "resolving" bugs in repos for 6 months (still without success). Look at propositions they have for us - lets report problems once a month. I already feel the result - *maybe* fixing maintainership/other problems once per 3 months. It's totally unacceptable for dynamic projects like CSSU.

It's really so hard to give Council members technical privileges to chose volunteer from Community, that would be able to approve/reject maintainership requests, if original maintainers are not reachable?

It's just an example. They're repeating old promises and empty words over and over again, yet this time, they don't even *try* to play like they're respecting us (see negating Council mandate). As long as "paying the bills" by Nokia got side-effect of obstructing flagship Community projects, it's a loss, not a gain
---

All after all, take no offense Jaffa, but this time I don't see much reason behind Your post - I may be wrong, but it seems as an attempt to just "handbrake" current trend, without proposing any alternative solution.

/Estel

Re: Ask the Council!
 

I could live with a monthly donation of $10 or so if that would mean not having to cope with that BS played on "us" any longer. If no one else (company) would sponsor a server and let people freely administer.

Re: Ask the Council!
 

I just got confirmation from joerg_rw, that if - for some reasons - hosting our infrastructure @ Debian would fail, he's willing to sponsor a hosting for few months, as soon as wee get sysadmin that could actually set up the mirror repos, and of course packages maintainers that would like to use this mirrored repositories.

AFAIK, CSSU and kernel-power would be more than happy to "jailbreak" from Nokia maintained repos. I can just suppose, that other maintainers too ;)

/Estel

// Edit

As for donations, I'm absolutely sure that getting enough amount of money to host our (relatively small) community is trivial, in any case. After setting up stable infrastructure (hammering bugs etc), we can think about funraising for "bigger" things to community benefit 9hardware projects, that were never possible due to relationship with Nokia - but, first things first.

Re: Ask the Council!
 

@Estel: Ok. So what are the next steps then? I'm a bit at a loss here; having administered only ClearCase / SVN repositories, not Git or something else.

Re: Ask the Council!
 

Following the discussion on IRC today:
http://mg.pov.lt/maemo-ssu-irclog/%2...01-15T21:25:13
...mirroring has been started :) for now, pre-alpha 0.01 version of roadmap looks like:
---

Roadmap

1. Mirroring CSSU to independent hosting, where CSSU team got all privileges required to maintain it - started, progressing
1.a Preparing some magic, that will made CSSU sitting in 'official' Nokia controlled repos, into updating from *our* repos, without need to do it manually. So, CSSU in Nokia's repos would actually switch to mirroring our repos - started, being worked on

2. When Community Kernel (future version(s) of kernel-power) will be ready for prime time, it's going to be uploaded into our repos. CSSU will become dependent on Community Kernel.

3. After getting stable infrastructure for CSSU and Community Kernel, deciding if mirroring entire extras is needed. Probably would require (very)small fund-raising. Depends on both atmosphere and (more importantly) effects of our collaboration with Nokia's "partners".

---

4? In case of 3. required and DONE, negotiations with Nokia about state of Nokia's 'closed source things' repos (SSU, etc) and Maemo name.
4?.a. Meanwhile, contest for temporal/eternal name for project. in Nokians not willing to pass Maemo name to us, name becomes 'eternal'.
4? b. Steady registering legally-correct foundation.
4? c. Regular fundraising, for bigger community projects, that were not possible due to partnership with Nokia (designing decent hardware?)

---

Of course, it's just my proposition for roadmap. Suggestions warmly welcome.

/Estel

Re: Ask the Council!
 

@Estel what you said makes so much sense and i for one would fully support such a course of action. I would gladly give donations of £5 a month towards future support of the maemo community. I just think, we should build the foundations for our OWN open community, whereby the members have the final say and not nokia.

Re: Ask the Council!
 

What concerns me is the "define 'promised'" part from Nokia's representative. Here is some exact language relating to the Council mandate

I've forwarded it and asked for a response.

Re: Ask the Council!
 

maybe slightly off-topic:
I think if we would actually be able do do things like that we should leave Maemo as a platform completely.
Let's face it, Maemo as a software platform is so full of compromises and flaws that it's not worth using it when designing a new mobile device from scratch. The only argument that speaks for Maemo is that it's still the best platform out there because it's the only one which is half-way free and half-way alive.
There is this wild mix of software from different Debian releases somehow patched together in order to make it work. If that wouldn't be the case projects like kernel power or CSSU wouldn't even be necessary because their features would be part of the standard distribution. Porting all these problems to a completely new device doesn't seem as a good idea to me.

If we'd ever be able to design and produce our own N900 successor the software platform should be something that already exists and that's absolutely free (as in freedom). In my (biased) opinion the best idea would be to start as a Debian sub-project like there was Debian-eee for netbooks when they were new, which eventually was integrated into the Debian distribution completely. Of course when it comes to the user interface Maemo could be a role model in many aspects but if there is a platform that could actually be used as a fork source it should be Openmoko.

Re: Ask the Council!
 

Still not fixed.
Also problem with kernel-power packages in maemo interface is not fixed too.

Re: Ask the Council!
 

sulu: there is a project to get debian on n900. Can't remember the site. It's worth checking as the creator tracks hardware support in the kernel. He logs when it was incorporated into main tree, when support is due to be merged and what components are developed outside main tree.

Re: Ask the Council!
 

I know. You surely mean this site:
http://wiki.debian.org/pkg-n900

The problem is that for most of the N900's hardware there are only closed drivers. Up to now there isn't even a properly working X-server under a native Debian installation. The N900 might be pretty open for a phone but if you compare it to normal PC hardware it's one of the most locked down systems that exist.

But even if one could manage to integrate all the proprietary firmwares into a standard Debian kernel one might get a running system but the result would have nothing to do with what Debian stands for (e.g. DSG). Technically the result would be pretty close to running Easy Debian on a Maemo that has no other software installed.
The reason to get a native Debian running on the N900 is not a technical one (Easy Debian does a pretty good job here) but an idealistic/politic/religious one (whatever you like to call that). And that can only be fulfilled if either the existing drivers are released under a Free license or the specs of the hardware are published so that the community could write its own Free drivers.
Therefore I think if one designs a new platform from scratch one should make sure to use hardware that can run on Free drivers completely. If that's the case we don't need an operating system anymore which is closed in many aspects itself.

Re: Ask the Council!
 

sulu: I had the elektranox site thats linked to in the page you gave.

https://elektranox.org/n900/kernel/status.html

With regards to X, omap-drm is slowly coming together but doesn't support HW accel 3D

Re: Ask the Council!
 

I agree that there is a great benefit to a Debian-rebase. I don't see the binary blobs as such a big blocker though. There is form for this - things like the Nvidia binary blobs et al and of course the non-free section. We would still of course need our own kernel package though to maintain the binary interfaces until that magical day when we have enough OSS shims and replacements to update.

For all the things I might disagree with regarding the way Nemo/Mer plans does things, the hardware adaption model seems a sensible and practical one. Finding a way to manage those within the Debian infrastructure is the only way to give continued life to Maemo 5 by ensuring it can run on more devices than just the N900. Multiple kernels and binary blobs are the unavoidable price to pay for that.

Re: Ask the Council!
 

@Android_808:
Thanks for providing that link again! It made me have a closer look at the project and it seems like some things have changed to the better since I last checked.

Of course from a technical point of view the non-free blobs are not a blocker, but I'm one of those Debian users who don't use the system only for technical reasons. Therefore I'd appreciate it if a Maemo replacement on the N900 could run on free drivers only. But of course I'm aware that won't happen over night.
On the other hand having an extra kernel sounds pretty ugly to me because this way the project would never become part of the regular Debian distribution. I'd favor using the Debian mainline kernel plus something like a firmware-n900 package in non-free.
Frankly I have no interest in keeping Maemo alive just for its own sake. For me it has always been just a stopgap to run (Easy) Debian on this little "subnetbook" called N900 which just by chance happened to be able to replace my regular cellphone.

@some moderator:
I guess it's time to split this subthread before it get's completely off-topic. :o

Re: Ask the Council!
 

What a surprise ;) Please, try to catch DocScrutinizer and guly on IRC, about independent-repos progress. I'm quite out of IRC, due to tight personal schedule.

/Estel

Re: Ask the Council!
 

I agree it's what we have to aim for, but I feel being pragmatic is the only way we'll get there. Having a system in the (current) state the pure-Debian solution is in makes it a curiosity for developer interest only...

Having an old kernel is a big problem, yes, but unavoidable if we're going to have to maintain binary compatibility. In my eyes, strictly speaking I'm not too bothered about being part of the "mainline" Debian repos, and indeed I might wonder if that was too big a constraint. What I'd be more than happy with is a relationship akin to Ubuntu's, where we share source packages, have some packages of our own, push and pull source from Debian, and have bugs linked to those in their BTS. A tight integration of separate projects, if you will, sharing Debian's policies of pushing changes upstream (to Debian) as much as possible.

Mobile devices if nothing else will always have different sensible defaults than desktop packages!

Re: Ask the Council!
 

You are way off topic here. Please take your discussion to another thread.

Re: Ask the Council!
 

You are right. Where can I turn to, to ask for a separation of the off-topic posts?

Re: Ask the Council!
 

Just start another thread and hopefully a mod will move the off-topic posts. Please continue I am interested in a post-N900 maemo strategy. Thanks.

Re: Ask the Council!
 

Thanks for the suggestion! I created a new thread in "General" [1] since I wasn't sure in which direction the thread will go, which is partially due to this:
It seems like we want different things. You want a post-N900 maemo strategy. I'm more interested in a post-maemo N900 strategy.

[1] http://talk.maemo.org/showthread.php?t=81810

Re: Ask the Council!
 

@SD69:
See, http://talk.maemo.org/showpost.php?p...&postcount=694
What to do now?

Re: Ask the Council!
 

I've sent an email to X-Fade following up on the task. We'll see what happens.

Re: Ask the Council!
 

Ok thanks. Also do you know something if downloads.maemo.nokia.com OVI repository will be fixed?

Re: Ask the Council!
 

It has been more than a year probably since we having this problem.Ovi repository is such a pain in the arse and if we really own this websie till 2012 ,why we are having this problem at the first place ? And if we are facing with this problem where does this council stand?SD69 it would be great if you just get done with this asap .

Re: Ask the Council!
 

Ovi is outside the scope of maemo community. We don't really own or control maemo.org either. I know you probably heard that, but it was not me that said it, it was maybe here -

http://talk.maemo.org/showpost.php?p...8&postcount=10

If you read the minutes of the last meeting, you will see I objected to Nokia and their response was "Define promised". And so you see what we're up against, my email to Nokia on the subject is below, to which they have not responded (as they have not responded to most of council's emails and requests to schedule meetings).

This is not new way of thinking to me, but I'm satisfied the maemo community has been quite patient and hope others will now see that the community should plan its future without dependence on any more goodwill from Nokia.

Re: Ask the Council!
 

I was told two weeks ago the OVI thing would be fixed.

On power kernel, Niels says he has
1) removed all problematic packages from extras-devel and extras-testing
2) then cleaned package history from the database
3) imported only the latest version back in to extras-testing.

He says you should now be able to push that version to testing or upload newer versions without issues. I hope this fixes things for you.

Re: Ask the Council!
 

Confirming that kernel-power v49 is in extras-devel (web interface). Thanks for the help.

Re: Ask the Council!
 

Keep your thanks until promotion to (at least) testing ;)

Re: Ask the Council!
 

Well, my thanks are for SD69's help/effort, he is not the one to mess with the database, so if promotion is still locked for whatever reason, it is not his fault.

Re: Ask the Council!
 

Not fixed yet! See my comment in bug:
https://bugs.maemo.org/show_bug.cgi?id=12522#c9

Thanks! I will try to promote kernel-power packages (v49) to extras-testing.

Re: Ask the Council!
 

@SD69:

We (Maemo Community) needs more people with access to Extras-* repositories.

For example package rootsh (http://maemo.org/packages/view/rootsh/) version 1.5 which is in Extras has bug in uninstall script. This problem is fixed (and working without problem) in version 1.8 which is only in Extras-devel.

Only maintainer can promote package from Extras-devel to Extras. But maintainer of rootsh is off and nobody can fix this problem.

So in Extras is buggy SW, but fixed in Extras-Devel. I'm sure that there are more buggy packages (which are fixed in devel), but nobody has permission to promote it.

This problem with rootsh SHOULD be fixed ASAP - not in next year (as kernel-power). SD69, what can you do as memeber of Community Council? I'm suggesting (again) that Nokia (or X-Fade?) should add repository permission to Community and NOT only to maintainers of package.

Re: Ask the Council!
 

Bug is marked as fixed. Can other people check if Ovi repository is really fixed?

Re: Ask the Council!
 

i don't know if there was another Concil (IRC) meeting since the last one i attended (12th of Jan), but i meanwhile noticed that NOKIA store doesn't list the N900 anymore :(
doesn't mean the repository can't be there anymore, of course (in fact it is still possible to download (OVI) apps deb packages with aptitude download), but, well, not promising :confused:

Re: Ask the Council!
 

AFAIK the n900 is a end-of-life (EOL) product nowadays so wouldn't expect too much support for it..

Re: Ask the Council!
 

my understanding was that as far as support was concerned, the N900 was more or less DOA...
well, on intensive care, maybe ;)