Re: [gentoo-dev] Speaking of new kernels being added to the tree

[Brian Jackson <iggy@gentoo.org>]

On Friday 03 October 2003 11:16 am, Tim Yamin wrote:
> Brian Jackson wrote:
> > On Friday 03 October 2003 04:36 am, Brad Laue wrote:
> 
> > 
> >>The kernel team seems to be both the smallest and most behind the times, 
> >>and this is sad given that they're one of the most important teams 
> >>involved in the project. We're two kernel versions behind (and don't 
> >>justify that by claiming 2.4.21 or 2.4.22 had bugs, that doesn't fly), 
> >>and show no signs of making it to a 2.4.23 release.
> > 
> 
> True, but we have a pretty much bug-less product [current sources] [or 
> nearing there ;-) ]

That is very true and to be applauded, but in the linux world (and Gentoo 
specifically) you can't rest. You've got to be constantly supporting new 
hardware, new protocols, etc.

> 
> New patchset = lots of new problems, IMO... And because of the diversity 
> as a kernel, simple alpha-testing will NOT fix this.

That's why we have pfeifer-sources, which may be somewhat poorly named for 
people to figure out it's the "testing sources" is just that.

> 
> > 
> > The team is behind the times or the releases are ;)
> > Seriously though, we are definitely in need of more people, and things are 
> > likely to continue to be slow until there are mroe people working on 
stuff.
> > 
> > 
> >>The kernel team needs more people. It needs to drastically reduce the 
> >>number of kernels in the tree which are of a customized nature 
> >>(xfs-sources, gs-sources, wolk-sources) until it can manage 
> >>gentoo-sources in a timely fashion. The kernel team needs to build a 
> >>subset of patches which form the core of the gentoo kernel. They then 
> >>need to enable all the additional features provided by xfs-sources, 
> >>wolk-sources and gs-sources on a per-use-flag basis, rather than having 
> >>three kernels to manage, each with three different sets of incompatible 
> >>patches. There obviously aren't enough resources to manage this.
> > 
> 
> I don't really think so: the other kernels are managed by others [non 
> X86 devs] and things work fine there. Yes, we need more people, but what 
> I'm pledging here is that we need *quality* and *experienced* 
> [preferably with Gentoo and C/++] devs so that we don't get problems 
> with their collaboration and spend even more time than simply getting on 
> with it "as is".

We can't just keep getting on with it "as is", Gentoo users are notorious for 
liking life on the bleeding edge (and often times just the other side of it). 
the current gentoo-sources doesn't support nforce ide very well, it doesn't 
support sata, this list could get very long. Adding some of these features is 
not trivial. At some point it will become necessary to move forward to newer 
kernels.

> 
> > 
> > There will probably be a few -sources removed. But the decision of what is 
not 
> > made yet.
> > 
> 
> Like...? I'd be happy to take care of any which you are planning to scrap.

No, there are some that shouldn't have been there in the first place, there 
are some that shouldn't have time wasted on them, etc.

> 
> -- 
> 
> Tim Yamin [plasmaroo] :: Gentoo X86 Kernel Development
> plasmaroo@gentoo.org
> 

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