Ana's blog http://ekaia.org/blog Mon, 20 May 2013 22:02:29 +0000 en-US hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.9.1 long due TO-DO item: removal of Qt3 from Debian http://ekaia.org/blog/2012/05/20/long-due-to-do-item-removal-of-qt3-from-debian/ http://ekaia.org/blog/2012/05/20/long-due-to-do-item-removal-of-qt3-from-debian/#comments Sun, 20 May 2012 16:54:22 +0000 http://ekaia.org/blog/?p=121 A couple of weeks ago was the first anniversary of orphaning Qt3 in Debian, see bug 625502.

In this year, Qt3 has got a few QA uploads with the most relevant change being support to multiarch. And, more importantly, nobody seemed to care enough to step into maintaining it.

In the last days, I have taken a look into how much needed to be done to remove Qt3 and there were slightly more than 50 packages depending directly or indirectly from Qt3. A removal from Wheezy seemed doable given that removing packages is never a problem during the Debian freeze ;-)
All the packages affected have a bug opened since more than one year and half ago and I have pinged all the bugs with some maintainers responding quick (thanks!). I also filed some removals for packages that were clearly unmaintained and didn’t seem worth keeping, with ftp-masters responding quick too (Thanks!). And finally, a couple of QA upload for orphaned software that were still useful without Qt3.

There is a wiki page tracking the status of the removal if you are curious:
http://wiki.debian.org/qt3-x11-freeRemoval

If in the future, you are reading this and you need Qt3 in Wheezy, you can fetch it from Debian snapshots.

]]> http://ekaia.org/blog/2012/05/20/long-due-to-do-item-removal-of-qt3-from-debian/feed/ 13 Debian in the Google Summer of Code 2012 http://ekaia.org/blog/2012/04/27/debian-in-the-google-summer-of-code-2012/ http://ekaia.org/blog/2012/04/27/debian-in-the-google-summer-of-code-2012/#comments Fri, 27 Apr 2012 20:20:10 +0000 http://ekaia.org/blog/?p=108 This year our efforts have paid off and despite there being more mentoring organizations than there were in 2011 (175 in 2011 and 180 in 2012), this year in Debian we got 81 submissions versus 43 submissions in 2011.
You can see here the graphs of applications against time from this year:

2012

The result is this year we’ll have 15 students in Debian versus 9 students last year! Without further ado, here is the list of projects and student who will be working with us this summer:

If you want to know more about these projects, follow the links and ask the students (and mentors)!

]]> http://ekaia.org/blog/2012/04/27/debian-in-the-google-summer-of-code-2012/feed/ 5 Debian accepted for the Google Summer of Code 2012. Students wanted! http://ekaia.org/blog/2012/03/17/debian-accepted-for-the-google-summer-of-code-2012-students-wanted/ http://ekaia.org/blog/2012/03/17/debian-accepted-for-the-google-summer-of-code-2012-students-wanted/#comments Sat, 17 Mar 2012 11:47:03 +0000 http://ekaia.org/blog/?p=96 Great news! Debian has been accepted into the Google Summer of Code (GSoC) program this year for the seventh time.

Now we are looking for students to work this summer with us in one of our exciting projects. If you are interested, now would be a good time to get in touch with the mentors; remember that discussing your application before submitting it is always recommended so that you can get feedback from the community.
Please also read the FAQ and timeline in the Google Summer of Code website.

Besides contacting with the mentors, you can also get in touch with us on our IRC channel #debian-soc (in irc.debian.org) and the soc-coordination mailing list if you have any questions.

I am hoping to see many great applications from students wainting to improve Debian :)

]]> http://ekaia.org/blog/2012/03/17/debian-accepted-for-the-google-summer-of-code-2012-students-wanted/feed/ 1 RCBSaturday http://ekaia.org/blog/2011/12/05/rcbsaturday/ http://ekaia.org/blog/2011/12/05/rcbsaturday/#comments Mon, 05 Dec 2011 19:08:54 +0000 http://ekaia.org/blog/?p=82 On Saturday evening I started talking with Mònica about Bug Squashing Parties and how they work. I am not sure how it happened, we started doing one. Then it was too fun to stop :P

NMUs by Mònica:

Funny, there were a couple of NMUs by others uploading patchs by Mònica.

NMUs by Ana:

I also closed #646449 (libosip2) that has been fixed in a new release upload, sponsored a NMU to Sven Joachim who had a patch sitting in the BTS for a month NMU-fixing #646147 (lie), sponsored dbus-c++ and reviewed for sponsoring a new version inspircd.

]]> http://ekaia.org/blog/2011/12/05/rcbsaturday/feed/ 0 Help wanted for Google Code-in http://ekaia.org/blog/2011/11/05/help-wanted-for-google-code-in/ http://ekaia.org/blog/2011/11/05/help-wanted-for-google-code-in/#comments Sat, 05 Nov 2011 11:26:49 +0000 http://ekaia.org/blog/?p=73 Debian has applied to the Google code-in program as mentoring organization. In the Google code-in, pre-university students (ages 13-17), have the opportunity of contributing to Debian, trying to complete different tasks.

We are hoping to get accepted and improve our outcome from last year. To achieve this, we need the help of more Debian contributors proposing and mentoring simple tasks for the students. Please take a take a look at the archives in the mailing list and join us with your proposals.
The list of tasks is at http://wiki.debian.org/GoogleCodeIn2011/Applying, we are specially missing translation and training tasks!

You can also join us in the IRC channel #debian-soc (irc.oftc.net)

]]> http://ekaia.org/blog/2011/11/05/help-wanted-for-google-code-in/feed/ 0 Qt 3 looking for adopters http://ekaia.org/blog/2011/05/01/qt-3-looking-for-adopters/ http://ekaia.org/blog/2011/05/01/qt-3-looking-for-adopters/#comments Sun, 01 May 2011 18:25:16 +0000 http://ekaia.org/blog/?p=68 With KDE 3 almost gone in unstable, the KDE team is not longer interested in Qt 3 and we are looking for new maintainer(s).

If you want to have Qt 3 in wheezy, now is the time to step up! Please, read this email and reply in list.

]]> http://ekaia.org/blog/2011/05/01/qt-3-looking-for-adopters/feed/ 1 Apply for Debian’s GSoC projects! http://ekaia.org/blog/2011/03/31/apply-for-debians-gsoc-projects/ http://ekaia.org/blog/2011/03/31/apply-for-debians-gsoc-projects/#comments Thu, 31 Mar 2011 22:03:48 +0000 http://ekaia.org/blog/?p=60 The student application period for applying to GSoC opened last Monday and we already have a couple of very good applications from students. We are still missing yours!

The list of Debian projects includes a nice variety of projects:

There is only one week left, so do not leave it for last minute. Get in touch with the mentors of the projects you are interested in and add your proposal to the Debian wiki and in Google Melange.

If you are a Debian contributor wanting to mentor a project, you still can. Please read this email with some hints.

]]> http://ekaia.org/blog/2011/03/31/apply-for-debians-gsoc-projects/feed/ 0 Small applications missing in KDE 4 http://ekaia.org/blog/2011/03/21/small-applications-missing-in-kde-4/ http://ekaia.org/blog/2011/03/21/small-applications-missing-in-kde-4/#comments Sun, 20 Mar 2011 23:25:31 +0000 http://ekaia.org/blog/?p=53 I have been working in the last weeks in the removal of the last pieces of KDE 3 from the Debian archive and I have found there are a lot of packages that is sad having to remove.

If you are looking for a good idea/excuse to learn and improve your KDE 4 / C++ /Qt4 skills, have to do a small application for school or you just feel like some useful coding, here is the list:

  • creox – real-time guitar effects
  • kbarcode – barcode and label printing application for KDE
  • kbiff – KDE mail notification utility
  • KKBSwitch – keyboard layout indicator for KDE (see this post also)
  • kmyfirewall – iptables based firewall configuration tool for KDE
  • kpogre – a graphical administrator tool for PostgreSQL
  • kredentials – KDE taskbar applet to update kerberos/AFS credentials
  • ksociograma – technical educational software to make sociograms
  • ktechlab – circuit simulator for microcontrollers and electronics
  • qalculate-kde – Powerful and easy to use desktop calculator – KDE version
  • score-reading-trainer – trainer for reading music notes

Note that I do not list here software whose port in KDE 4 is being developed although it is still not finished and therefore it is not packaged in Debian.

By the way, even if all those packages are being removed from Debian testing and unstable, they will remain in Squeeze, so you can keep using them or install it from there.

]]> http://ekaia.org/blog/2011/03/21/small-applications-missing-in-kde-4/feed/ 49 post and pre-release fun http://ekaia.org/blog/2011/02/07/post-and-pre-release-fun/ http://ekaia.org/blog/2011/02/07/post-and-pre-release-fun/#comments Mon, 07 Feb 2011 21:06:21 +0000 http://ekaia.org/blog/?p=51 The last weeks before a Debian release are usually boring with respect to working on new stuff since unstable is pretty much closed to development. Now that the release is finished, this fun is back \o/

I have been in an ‘upload frenzy’ since yesterday night and I have updated some packages in unstable: KOffice[1] and KOffice-l10n 2.3.1, yakuake, rsibreak and tintin++. Another of my packages, kid3, got magically updated itself in unstable before I had time to look at it, the magic of having active co-maintainers.

[1] Thanks for the gentle push to update this, Pino :)

I also emailed one of my upstream maintainers to ask him about the KDE 4 version of his application and he will likely make a release soon. One of the goals for wheezy is remove completely KDE 3 and Qt 3. If you are maintaining a KDE 3 or Qt 3 based application, we are about to start annoying you about this! See http://wiki.debian.org/kdelibs4c2aRemoval and http://wiki.debian.org/qt3-x11-freeRemoval

The last 2 weeks before the release I had some fun watching how the Squeeze release countdown banner I published at http://news.debian.net spread to a lot of websites, personal blogs, community sites, forums to news portals.
The traffic has been increasing little by little through the 2 weeks the banner has been online and currently is still moderately high, since people keeps retweeting the news item about the Debian release. While writing these lines, the banner has been served 449575 times to a total of 244975 unique IP addresses!

]]> http://ekaia.org/blog/2011/02/07/post-and-pre-release-fun/feed/ 7 Debian at the Google Code-in 2010-11 http://ekaia.org/blog/2011/02/01/debian-at-the-google-code-in-2010-11/ http://ekaia.org/blog/2011/02/01/debian-at-the-google-code-in-2010-11/#comments Tue, 01 Feb 2011 22:55:04 +0000 http://ekaia.org/blog/?p=50 As you might know, Debian was one of the 20 organizations selected to participate in the first Google Code-in.

We got a moderate success since we started preparing the contest very late (I joined as mentor/admin the very first day of the contest!). Because of this, unlike other organizations, we did not manage to engage interested students from the very beginning of the Code-in. Since we did not have too many Debian tasks the first days, we did not attract many students, and thus did not have very many throughout the contest.

Given Debian tasks were mostly about improving and contributing to Debian, it was quite hard having tasks that did not require having a Debian installation and that made it difficult for many students to get involved. Also, until the last two weeks we did not have any translation task that could have attracted earlier students without too much confidence in their technical and English skills.

Nonetheless, Debian got 39 tasks done:

With about 30 students participating and at least one of the students has keep contributing to Debian after the contest!

The contest was sometimes stressful with several students wanting their tasks to be reviewed at the same time, and the date was problematic due to the winter (or summer!) holidays but still I am quite happy with the final result :D

Debian will be also participating again this year in the Google Summer of Code 2011. Join the soc-coordination mailing list and stay tunned if you want to participate as mentor or student.

]]> http://ekaia.org/blog/2011/02/01/debian-at-the-google-code-in-2010-11/feed/ 3