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Annotation of wikisrc/users/jdf.mdwn, revision 1.7

1.1       wiki        1: [[!toc ]]
                      2: 
                      3: # jdf's wiki page
1.2       wiki        4: 
1.7     ! jdf         5: Note: This is not what I'm really working on, it's just a place to gather some 
        !             6: notes I took about some topics.
1.2       wiki        7: 
1.7     ! jdf         8: ## NetBSD flavoured
1.2       wiki        9: 
1.7     ! jdf        10: Currently, NetBSD is a very generic operating system, leaving almost all
        !            11: choices up to the user. While some consider this a strength, and it
        !            12: definetly is for people who know what they're doing, it's an obstacle for
        !            13: people who then have to setup *everything* by hand.
        !            14: 
        !            15: Creating a *NetBSD flavoured* distribution shouldn't be much work, and require 
        !            16: just minor sysinst modifications.
        !            17: It shouldn't be much work to just package distribution sets that already
        !            18: include a list of packages it installs and several preconfigured configuration
        !            19: files, maybe also some additional wrapper scripts.
        !            20: On the other hand, you could also add some package calls to sysinst and just 
        !            21: provide a list of packages you consider necessary.
        !            22: 
        !            23: My original attempt was to create a range of distributions for different 
        !            24: purposes, i.e. one for developers, one for graphic designers, one for servers, 
        !            25: etc. I don't know if this is the right way, esp. since some of the applications 
        !            26: are *very* specific. You cannot really provide a sane server default 
        !            27: installation except for some basic things like installing a vim, but that's all.
        !            28: My current idea is to provide just one, maybe named *NetBSD flavoured*, with at 
        !            29: least the following tools on board:
        !            30:  * vim
        !            31:  * pkgin
        !            32:  * git
        !            33:  * fossil
        !            34:  * subversion
        !            35:  * some other important VCSes
        !            36:  * light-desktop (i.e., LXDE)
        !            37:  * screen (tmux is in base)
        !            38:  * some sane X terminal emulators
        !            39:  * a browser (Firefox?!)
        !            40:  * a mailer (Thunderbird? Claws-mail?)
        !            41:  * emacs (maybe too large?)
        !            42:  * perl
        !            43:  * python
        !            44:  * mplayer (when it's possible to pack it up)
        !            45:  * pdf viewer
        !            46:  * preconfigured bozohttpd running on localhost showing documentation
        !            47: 
        !            48: ## NetBSD documentation
        !            49: 
        !            50: In [http://mail-index.netbsd.org/netbsd-docs/2012/09/20/msg000295.html](this 
        !            51: post) I shared some ideas about what to do with documentation. Though much of it 
        !            52: was proven not practical by the replies, I still have one idea: Unify 
        !            53: documentation of NetBSD, and provide it all on a NetBSD system.
        !            54: 
        !            55: The first step is to merge as much content as possible into the NetBSD wiki. 
        !            56: Currently, the NetBSD documentation is very diverse in its distribution form.
        !            57: 
        !            58: Then, the Google Code-In produced some nice results, including a CGI for a small 
        !            59: markdown wiki to browse the wiki (if it was offline), and maybe even a terminal 
        !            60: markdown browser.
        !            61: 
        !            62: Finally, ship these two in a pkgsrc package or even with base, and provide a 
        !            63: small script which regularly updates the documentation.
        !            64: 
        !            65: ## NetBSD website
        !            66: 
        !            67: Currently, the NetBSD website is written in HTML and Docbook and requires many 
        !            68: tools to be edited and committed. The final goal should be to have just a small 
        !            69: homepage with a bit important information, but all the essential technical 
        !            70: information should be in the wiki. There's also a separate page for this: 
        !            71: [[htdocs_migration]].
        !            72: 
        !            73: Though the plan is currently to migrate *all* contents to the wiki, I don't 
        !            74: think this is the way to go. A wiki just doesn't leave a good impression.
        !            75: 
        !            76: ## NetBSD community and marketing
        !            77: 
        !            78: Just some thoughts... I think NetBSD has a very bad way of making technical 
        !            79: ecisions which are counterproductive from a marketing point of view, or just are 
        !            80: not used for marketing purposes.
        !            81: 
        !            82: The world has changed; nowadays, there's a growing *hacker community* which 
        !            83: consists of many people with an age below 30. They're just not used to the 
        !            84: flexibility of the old tools Unix provides, and to the flexibility you have 
        !            85: with a modern Linux.
        !            86: 
        !            87: There are repeating questions why NetBSD doesn't use git as its primary VCS, but 
        !            88: rather CVS. CVS *is* indeed a very mighty tool, but many people don't know. They 
        !            89: like git more because they can explicitly `push` with it (and don't know about 
        !            90: hooks in CVS or Subversion).
        !            91: The same holds for many other decisions.
        !            92: 
        !            93: NetBSD has a very... oldish view of how a community should be organised. On the 
        !            94: one hand, there are the developers, which are coding the project, maintaining 
        !            95: the website, maintaining packages, maintaining documentation, organising events, 
        !            96: organising NetBSD itself... and on the other hand, there are the users. They're 
        !            97: rather consumers than contributors.
        !            98: 
        !            99: The few ones which want to contribute are doing so, and after some time becoming 
        !           100: developers with the right and possibility to do everything, but there's nothing
        !           101: in between. There's only few community involvement overall, though there are
        !           102: many topics which don't require a developer status.
        !           103: I think breaking with the old habits and providing more community involvement 
        !           104: and community support is the way to go, but except for starting with a 
        !           105: user-editable wiki, I don't have many ideas how to do so.
        !           106: 
        !           107: ## NetBSD current
        !           108: 
        !           109: The same problem exists imho with the release cycle. The standard release cycle 
        !           110: of NetBSD is too slow for many people who use it privately (just see how 
        !           111: wide-distributed Arch Linux got), and tracking current is a rather obscure thing 
        !           112: with compiling things on your own, etc. ...
        !           113: And it's not well-documented. There *are* changes, but who knows them? Which was 
        !           114: the current version where tmux was imported? Etc.
1.2       wiki      115: 
1.7     ! jdf       116: Tracking these changes more centrally, and providing a nice way to install and 
        !           117: track a current installation would be a great benefit for NetBSD.