Gentoo leaves democracy

[Zucca]

The bash ebuilds are also restrictive.

As you learn Portage better, you will probably realize the bash is the least of Portage's problems (or perhaps not a problem at all). Bash implements a Turing complete programming language, so almost by definition, it's not restrictive. But perhaps you meant something different. Ugly? Excessively terse? Not your favorite language? (It's not mine.) I could agree with all of those without thinking that it's even in the top 10 problems with Portage.

I like bash. But the reason is because it's ~everywhere in *NIX world. And the rare cases where there isn't bash I can use POSIX sh. It surely isn't a nice one to learn, but after many years with it I can say I know most of the features it offers. But the thing is - you don't need to know all the features of bash to write good ebuilds. Just basic knwoledge is enough. I go as far as to say that, if one reads the ebuild creation guides, he/she learns bash at the same time. Win-win. Double benefit.
If ebuilds weren't bash, then what would be better? Awk? Lua? PHP? Follow systemd and have ini -style config files instead?

Yeah. I think bash based ebuilds aren't a problem.

[Hu]

My main objection to bash as an ebuild language is that it's a bit too powerful. There are some ebuilds where the only way to know their dependencies, SRC_URI, etc. is to evaluate their global scope with bash or an interpreter that is almost bash-complete (and there are very few fully bash-complete interpreters other than bash itself). I like that the phases run for building and installing are a full shell. I would prefer that the metadata be retrievable without resorting to regex hacks or evaluating the global scope.

[krinn]

Moreover, a user may not receive help and may not have the required qualifications.

You must be kidding!
I have seen:
* gentoo family (gentoo base but not gentoo) distro user getting help
* even non gentoo at all distro user getting help
* analyse, patch... for a program not even in any overlay or our tree!
* help for some random proprietary binary issue!

You can say all you wish, but this is not acceptable, in fact most of unanswered threads are for two reasons :
* user should really learn to explains the problem properly, if the thread is too dirty, it's sometimes too hard answering it as you must goes into a lot of speech in order for the user to do simple things. Language barrier is not helping of course. But with some nice words and net etiquette, they mostly are all answered.
* we're fucking too busy, i won't say "under staff", because we're a lot helping there, but we have so many users and questions, covering a range of problems, devices, software, configuration so wide i'm even surprise some thread get answered!

You have a bunch of guys there with highly specific skills and a lot with a huge general understanding and skill in so many domains.
You even have stars (NeddySeagoon is more a myth than a real person at this point, in what forum could you ask something about dhcpcd and get answered by Roy Marples seriously?)
And even moderation is well known to be top skill, our mods take time to answer and help too, instead of just doing forum task, and when they have to deal with an issue, they are not brain dead banning everyone.

Go help users, you will see how huge the task is, and you'll be amaze by how much they get answered!

[Ant P.]

My main objection to bash as an ebuild language is that it's a bit too powerful. There are some ebuilds where the only way to know their dependencies, SRC_URI, etc. is to evaluate their global scope with bash or an interpreter that is almost bash-complete (and there are very few fully bash-complete interpreters other than bash itself). I like that the phases run for building and installing are a full shell. I would prefer that the metadata be retrievable without resorting to regex hacks or evaluating the global scope.

Maybe once Oil stabilises (and vapier stops sabotaging our distro with ricer glibc patches) Gentoo could consider switching over to it. It's meant to be fully bash-compatible, among other things. The fact that it's written in python may be a plus too.

[bunder]

i would prefer sticking to standard languages instead of random hipster languages, but that's just me.

[Ant P.]

If bash was a standard, maybe gentoo wouldn't have started and subsequently abandoned libbash to cope with it...

[CasperVector]

See also rc(1) from Plan 9 and its Unix port which fixes some of its unsatisfactory aspects.

[Mr. T.]

John R. Graham, you quoted a post that comes from another thread: [post]8199816[/post] !

Edit: @John R. Graham: a user contributes to his level of interest but some interest may be hard and Gentoo is designed for power users.

[Dr.Willy]

Maybe once Oil stabilises (and vapier stops sabotaging our distro with ricer glibc patches) Gentoo could consider switching over to it. It's meant to be fully bash-compatible, among other things. The fact that it's written in python may be a plus too.

That seems like an ambitious project to me. Let's see if they get anywhere.

See also rc(1) from Plan 9 and its Unix port which fixes some of its unsatisfactory aspects.

There is also fish and ion - not that I would recommend using them in a ebuild-esque setting.

[Fitzcarraldo]

There is also fish and ion - not that I would recommend using them in a ebuild-esque setting.

[off-topic]
I happened to see a demo using fish last week, and it looks really nice. That auto-suggestions feature is nifty.
[/off-topic]

[CasperVector]

There is also fish and ion - not that I would recommend using them in a ebuild-esque setting.

I like rc(1) not only because of its attempt at fixing problems, but also because it is cost-effective, in the sense that it provides a very small set of primitives.
Using these primitives, you can easily implement many features, quite a lot of which are provided as builtins in other shells.

[Dr.Willy]

I happened to see a demo using fish last week, and it looks really nice. That auto-suggestions feature is nifty.

fish is a very nice shell, in fact I use it as my default.
Still I'm not convinced it is suited for use as the fundamental component of a distribution. E.g. the upcoming 3.0 release will contain breaking changes, which is of course perfectly fine for interactive use, but if you'd have to re-write half the ebuild tree …

[mv]

[off-topic]
I happened to see a demo using fish last week, and it looks really nice. That auto-suggestions feature is nifty.
[/off-topic]

So far, I have not seen anything which comes close to zsh's interactive features. Concerning "auto-suggestions", you might want to have a look at auto-fu-zsh (and probably also zsh-syntax-highlighting). The mv overlay contains both and also zshrc-mv which activates them.

[Dr.Willy]

### THIS THREAD IS NOW ABOUT SHELLS ###

I like rc(1) not only because of its attempt at fixing problems, but also because it is cost-effective, in the sense that it provides a very small set of primitives.
Using these primitives, you can easily implement many features, quite a lot of which are provided as builtins in other shells.

I'm a bit at odds with rc's `{…} and if-not-constructs.
I like the redirection features, even though I think fish provides the same in a nicer syntax.

[Zucca]

### THIS THREAD IS NOW ABOUT SHELLS ###

Yup. This topic might need a split.

[mv]

### THIS THREAD IS NOW ABOUT SHELLS ###

It got off-topic already much earlier. I am afraid that there is not much more to say about the original topic. Decisions have already been made.

[proteusx]

Please let us continue the discussion about the creeping totalitarianism
behind which hides the incompetence and the arrogance of some devs.

I dislike many of the decisions and choices of some of the devs
but going to another distro is unthinkable. I wouldn't know what to do there.

[frostschutz]

More mailing lists could do with such a split.

[Fitzcarraldo]

I dislike many of the decisions and choices of some of the devs
but going to another distro is unthinkable. I wouldn't know what to do there.

The grass is always greener on the other side of the fence, but the truth is that nowhere is perfect. I expect all other distributions are in similar situations. Developers are just like everyone else: some more competent than others; some more sensible than others; some more altruistic than others.

[khayyam]

Gentoo has never ever been a democracy.

NeddySeagoon ... true, but only because the Foundation has failed to do what it exists to do, and similarly failed to see the inherent contradiction between its stated purpose of "caretaking/protecting" and its "non-intervention". You've said in the past that you "have nightmares" regarding accountability (or the lack thereof), and the foundations exposure ITR, but from where I'm standing it's the foundation which is the primary source of legal jeopardy, because the charter is in essence a fraud (and by that I mean fraud in the legal sense, not an intent to "con"). You see, the foundation can't have it both ways, it can't operate as a holding company for "gentoo assets" (intellectual property, financial contributions, etc) and at the same time wash its hands when it comes to other matters (ie, "decoupl[ing] necessary bureaucracy from development"), similarly it can't say the charter "does not contain any policies" and then go on to provide "principles" by which "gentoo" operates, these are in essence the same thing. If the foundation provides a charter under which others operate, it can't legally discharge its responsibility for what those acting under that charter do with a "non-intervention" clause, or, if it does so it would be a serious violation of its legal standing. So, the fact that "gentoo is not a democracy" is entirely the fault of the foundation, the irony being its stated "principle/policy" of "for the community, by the community".

The problem with leaving is that you can only do it once and it reduces your influence.

I'm not sure I buy that, people vote with their feet, and hanging around also has negatives, it can normalise the status quo, etc, etc. After all, this sort of arrangement is supposed to be mutually beneficial, and not the sacrifice of the individual on the alter of the greater good.

best ... khay

[NeddySeagoon]

khayyam,

No volunteer organisation is ever a democracy. They all move in the direction set by the people actually doing stuff.
Gentoo is no different.

Look how long its taken to get the mailing list whitelist implemented.
The decision and effective date was announced by the council ages ago (Jan?) but they had no idea how to implement it.
Its being worked on now but maybe the current council won't be in office to actually see the whitelist in action.
As GLEP 39 used to say "Vote the Bums Out".

That's an example of what happens when the leadership in a volunteer organisation points in a given direction ...
In a paid workplace, the implementation mechanism would be known and tested in advance, so the change would have happened as announced.

[pjp]

In a paid workplace, the implementation mechanism would be known and tested in advance, so the change would have happened as announced.

Had to laugh as that has generally not been my experience.

[khayyam]

No volunteer organisation is ever a democracy. They all move in the direction set by the people actually doing stuff. Gentoo is no different.

NeddySeagoon ... your definition (if it can be said to be one) only functions by strictly limiting recognition of "actually doing stuff" to certain parties, and by offering a completely non-functional conception of "demos" (people, community) "arkhi" (authority, governance) ... but ok, when the charter states "for the community, by the community" this should be prefaced with "no volunteer organisation is ever [...]"?

best ... khay

[1clue]

@mv, khayyam:

Why are you not developers?

I was unaware of any distro or even open source project which claims to be a democracy. Some take more input from the user base than others, but they all have a standard by which the decisions are made to achieve. Open Source projects have a limited number of people who are allowed to update the source code in the official repository. There is a review process before outside submissions are accepted. There is a similar process for alterations to a distro.

The United States Government is not a democracy. It's a constitutional republic with some democratic principles. A democracy is mob rule, majority wins in every case, and the vote of the most ignorant, least-informed person counts as much as someone who has devoted their life to understand everything involved. Practically speaking the vote of the uninformed majority will almost always turn out to be most detrimental for the uninformed majority in the long run.

[khayyam]

@mv, khayyam: Why are you not developers?

1clue ... why, is there a reason why I should be? This question speaks volumes: you're only properly a contributing member of the community, and so can access/wield power, if you're a developer.

I was unaware of any distro or even open source project which claims to be a democracy. Some take more input from the user base than others, but they all have a standard by which the decisions are made to achieve. Open Source projects have a limited number of people who are allowed to update the source code in the official repository. There is a review process before outside submissions are accepted. There is a similar process for alterations to a distro.

I think you've got it wrong on a number of levels, the community (or demos) is constituted by the fact that the project as a whole is dependent on users for all manner of things, mutual exchanges only function properly when all the various parties are getting something from it ... and by "getting something" I also mean getting access to power. Those users can (as I said) "vote with their feet" and look elsewhere ... and the forums, bgo, ml, go silent (as does the list of potential candidates becoming developers). There is a difference between democratic procedure (ie, elections, voting, and such) and agency, the later is what constitutes a democracy, its the agreement to act together for common mutual benefit. How you go about doing this (so, the procedures, regulations, etc) are secondary, and reflect the needs, and difficulties, of sustaining that community.

The United States Government is not a democracy. It's a constitutional republic with some democratic principles. A democracy is mob rule, majority wins in every case, and the vote of the most ignorant, least-informed person counts as much as someone who has devoted their life to understand everything involved. Practically speaking the vote of the uninformed majority will almost always turn out to be most detrimental for the uninformed majority in the long run.

Your founding fathers (along with every political theorist of that period) recognised only three forms of government, monarchy (rule of the one), oligarchy (rule of the few), and democracy (rule of the many). For the later the details, such as who were enfranchised/disenfranchised and under what conditions (property, citizenship, etc), the procedures used to make decisions (ie, the recall of representatives, and how those representatives were chosen) were all a matter to be contested. So, I don't see how, or why, anyone should accept your description (majority rule, etc) as providing a definitive statement as to what democracy is, or isn't.

best ... khay