This is a log or summary of an Edubuntu Meeting. Please go to the Meeting Page for more information about our meetings.
Meeting January 10, 2007
Technical
- Herd 2 announced this week
- Call for testers
- new sound architecture for LTSP will have volume and microphone support
- licence glitches with new flash support library
- Keep discussion on secnond CD inclusion alive
Documentation
prepare SVN checkout for edubuntu-docs package
- website and wiki need updating
- Edubuntu leaflet created for BETT 2007
Community
- Edubuntu represented with OFE at BETT 2007
- Education community site starting soon
- Proposed call for new Edubuntu Council member on Mailing List
- Nominations on 31st Jan
- Vote on 7th Feb
- Will van der Leij (willvdl) elected as Edubuntu Member
01:04 RichEd TECHNICAL UPDATE 01:04 ogra sorry, building herd2 alongside the meeting 01:04 ogra so most important for tech ... 01:05 ogra we'll have herd2 this week, PLEASE TEST !!!! 01:05 ogra the next CD build on http://cdimage.ubuntu.com/edubuntu/daily/ should be ready to test 01:05 ogra (20070110) 01:06 ogra apart from that i worked massively on the new sound architecture for ltsp last week, we'll soon have volume control and mic support there 01:06 ogra there are some licence gliches with thze flash support library we need for backwards compatibility with the old esd architecture ... 01:07 ogra i'm not yet sure we'll get that sorted ... 01:07 ogra if we dont, we wont have sound support on systems where admins upgraded the server but not their ltsp install 01:07 willvdl hmm, flash licences. 01:07 ogra so that will need mentioning in the docs for feisty 01:07 ogra its not flash 01:08 ogra the new flash9 offers a programmer API to attach any kind of sound backend 01:08 willvdl thought I was confused 01:08 RichEd ogra: please explain "upgraded the server but not LTSP install" ... 01:08 ogra but to make it possible to hack on that they introduced an opensourced library ... 01:08 Mithrandir willvdl: the libflashsupport library uses openssl and lgpl-ed libs which uses gpl-ed libs, and the openssl and GPL licences are incompatibly. 01:08 Mithrandir s/y.$/e./ 01:09 willvdl thanks 01:09 ogra RichEd, the ltsp clients have their own linux system *inside* the server 01:09 ogra you can get away with only upgrading the server and keep the old installation of ltsp in the old state ... 01:09 RichEd so why would someone update the server only ? any decent reason ? 01:09 rodarvus ogra, anything you want specifically tested besides that for Herd 2? 01:10 ogra which usually does no harm unless we change the package selection in ltsp massively 01:11 ogra rodarvus, in the links sercion of the edubuntu part on https://wiki.ubuntu.com/Testing/Current are some instructions and links to more 01:11 ogra *section 01:11 kgoetz RichEd: not thinking about it would be my excuse ;) 01:11 rodarvus nice 01:12 RichEd my issue is : do we worry about a workaround / fix or do we just document what they should be dong themselves. 01:12 RichEd doing not dong :) 01:12 ogra edsadmin (piece of the network auth spec) also has license issues ... 01:12 kgoetz RichEd: you shouldnt force people to upgrade 01:12 ogra seems feisty will become my bureocracy release, where i have more to do with licenses and main inclusion reports than code :) 01:13 ogra RichEd, why should i upgrade a server that works fine ... 01:13 rodarvus ogra, Testing/Current lists 20061025 as current edubuntu. I suppose cdimage.u.c has something newer, right? :) 01:13 ogra many admins will go with the "never touch a running system" approach 01:14 ogra rodarvus, yes, Testing/Current will get an overhaul anyway, i just wanted to point to the testing procedure 01:14 RichEd ogra & kgoetz: but they have upgraded the server ??? so they have made a decision, but only gone 1/2 way thourgh the process ... or is that not a valid thought appraoch 01:14 rodarvus sure 01:14 ogra the links have some edubuntu sepcific tests ... 01:14 kgoetz RichEd: upgrading clients and upgraing servers is two thoughts, not one 01:14 ogra apart from that the normal ubuntu testing should be done 01:14 kgoetz and, for that matter, two actions 01:14 ogra right 01:15 ogra at some point i want to automate that so update-amanger will upgrade the thin clients as well 01:15 kgoetz i'd be... 'unhappy' if i got forced to upgrade parts of my ltsp 'because you said' 01:15 ogra but thats rather something for feisty+2 01:15 RichEd But the LTSP client resides in the server ... so essentially it is an update of the one box ? 01:15 ogra or for +1 if we get more manpower ;) 01:16 ogra RichEd, try to see it as two distinct systems 01:16 kgoetz RichEd: the packages are on one host yes, where they get installed and how is two seperate processes 01:16 ogra right 01:16 ogra a future target is to merge that ... 01:16 kgoetz we can both have a ~ on a server, we dont mess with each others ~/Desktops though :) 01:16 RichEd okay ... I am happy to accept that, just want to make sure we are not creating work for ourselves when "a dual upgrade" may be a more natural appraoch. 01:16 RichEd *approach 01:17 ogra its just something that we need to document 01:17 ogra we always forced upgrades of ltsp ... even rebuilds ... 01:17 ogra but ltsp is now in a state where thats not urgently necessary anymore 01:18 ogra so people who want to keep the old client setup can do so ... 01:18 ogra but will loose flash sound ... 01:18 RichEd I'm just trying to understand if there would be a valid reason / circumstances why someone would want to update the server only. 01:19 ogra (unless i find that libflashsupport works without libssl support) 01:19 ogra RichEd, because they forgot about the fact that ltsp needs to be upgraded separately for example ... 01:20 RichEd ogra: but that is an omission ... not a reason :) 01:20 ogra anyway, lets not discuss that to death, time is limited 01:20 RichEd okay 01:20 ogra just note that we need that documented, i'll care for the technical side 01:20 willvdl noted 01:21 ogra beyond that i merged a lot of ltsp fixes from contributors (i reviewed about about 100 patches during the christmas holidays) 01:22 ogra and had to care for my general ubuntu stuff (gnome-screensaver, gnome-power-manager, package merges) 01:22 ogra thats it from the tech side 01:22 willvdl I don't imagine cbx33 has had much time to work on the MOTD/ldm login thingy he showed last time 01:22 ogra he should rather get up to speed with SCP ;) 01:22 ogra even ldm/MOTDS is a nice thing i'd rather see that SCP is done by release ;) 01:23 willvdl Reminder to all, Pete Savage is representing us at BETT at the moment 01:23 RichEd ogra: w.r.t. rodarvus and his increased bandwidth for education ... can you "sit with him" to see what he can take over naturally to ease your load ? 01:24 rodarvus ogra, we can do it anytime you want, just arrange the meeting when you're available 01:24 ogra starting with CD testing, seed management and management of the metapackages would be a big help already ... 01:24 rodarvus (after herd 2, I suppose) 01:24 ogra oh, and CD building ... 01:24 ogra that should suffice for a start ... 01:24 rodarvus nice 01:25 RichEd ogra: can you list all of the "sections / components" you look after and mail to rodarvus and myself. i'll need this for the overview page anyway 01:25 ogra RichEd, ok 01:25 RichEd thanks 01:26 ogra rodarvus, i'll be travelling a lot this cycle ... so we should see that you are up to speed with most of the above before herd4 01:26 rodarvus indeed 01:26 rodarvus we need to do that asap 01:26 ogra there might be coming CD builds where i'm not around or even able to get online ... 01:26 rodarvus we can arrange for me to arrive "at work" a few hours earlier every day, so we have more time to communicate 01:27 ogra note that we wont need to care for ppc to much 01:27 rodarvus (while you're passing me these duties) 01:27 ogra so if you cant test it thats ok for a milestone 01:27 rodarvus ok. I have ppc here, but it needs to be arranged a few days in advance for testing 01:28 ogra (ppc is officially a community port from feisty on) 01:28 rodarvus yup 01:28 RichEd === TECHNICAL DOCUMENTATION === 01:28 RichEd Anyone with anything here ? 01:28 ogra well, its up to you ... if you can test it we dont need to care to much on the official side ... its expected that the community takes more responsibilities here 01:29 ogra s/can/cant/ 01:29 willvdl In the classic tradition of me mixing tech docs with other docs... 01:29 willvdl It's been mentioned a few times that we need to look at the scope of the handbook carefully 01:30 willvdl so that we can make use of topic based help etc. in the future (and present) 01:32 ogra could someone from our doc team prepare a svn checkout of selected docs i casn put into the edubuntu-docs package ? so we can get up to speed with the packaging after herd2 ? 01:32 ogra (and send it to me) 01:33 willvdl will ask on the doc-team channels 01:33 ogra edubuntu-docs is still empty ... and you guys know the quality of the specific docs and whicdh are shippable and which not (i hope) ... 01:33 willvdl perhaps LaserJock or nixternal might be of most help here 01:34 ogra yep 01:35 ogra oh, LaserJock started a nice discussion on the ML about packages for the second CD ... please participate there to keep it running ... we need an applist ... 01:36 ogra (and tons of main inclusion reports) 01:36 willvdl will speak to him about maintaining the discussion on the wiki-spec page 01:36 willvdl moodle popped up a few times 01:37 ogra well i think we reach more people through the ML 01:37 ogra i know :( 01:37 ogra moodle is my big nightmare 01:37 ogra it needs repackaging 01:37 willvdl ogra, meaning his list is under his wiki "home" 01:37 ogra thats fine, we can put the final list somewhere else ... 01:38 ogra this way people wont start linking to a WIP doc ;) 01:38 willvdl I like WIP docs :) 01:38 ogra i know ;) 01:39 willvdl on the wiki side: still busy archiving, cleaning and scraping stuff around 01:39 willvdl whenever I get a chance 01:39 ogra yeah, some people already complained :P 01:39 RichEd ?? about ? 01:40 ogra there was a breezy user who was looking for the lts.conf parameters wikipage ... 01:40 ogra i wouldnt even have expected people to still run breezy ltsp ... it was so minimal 01:40 willvdl I stopped deleting stuff without redirects after that 01:40 ogra thats good 01:41 willvdl ogra, the info is still there (never removed any breezy stuff) but was duplicated on help.u.c 01:41 RichEd have we come to any conclusion / standard as to how we maintain similar info for releases ? 01:41 ogra willvdl, right, but i couldnt point him to my bookmarked page :) 01:41 willvdl the doc-team has a spec on the subject 01:42 willvdl so any technical docs that end up on help.u.c is at the command of the doc-team 01:42 willvdl they are aware of the issues but still need to resolve a plan 01:42 ogra which is represented by LaserJock and nixternal for us 01:43 willvdl for release notes, etc or anything that goes on wiki.u.c, we just need to be intelligent on our naming 01:43 ogra but i'd like to not put to much load on LaserJock here, he's busy with assembling the second CD list and he wanted to take a lot of the MIRs 01:44 willvdl when pips1 is around, we can put some effort into shaping our wiki pages to be release specific etc. 01:45 ogra good 01:45 RichEd okay ... we must get this right ... it will avoid a lot of frustration & admin 01:46 RichEd ready to move on to artwork ? 01:46 willvdl it is straightforward enough to do. as ogra put it last time, simply using the namespace correctly solves most things 01:46 ogra right 01:46 RichEd === ARTWORK === 01:47 ogra well, given that cbx33 is missing and AliasVegas isnt around either ... what about artwokr ? 01:47 RichEd As willvdl mentioned ... cbx33 is not here today ... he is at BETT ... more on that later. 01:47 ogra there was still no mail or something to the artwork mailing list ... 01:47 ogra ah 01:48 RichEd Do you have any urgent artwork issues ogra ... or can we leave the topic for next week ? 01:48 ogra i'd really like to see something going on ... would be nice to have the artwork on schedule ... feature freeze is on feb 8th 01:48 willvdl okie. will chat to cbx33 about it again when he's back 01:48 ogra by then we should at least have a basic concept ... 01:49 RichEd moving on ... 01:49 RichEd === COMMUNITY & DOCUMENTATION & WEB === 01:50 RichEd Community wise ... edubuntu is represented at 2 big events this week and next week: 01:50 RichEd #1 BETT show in the UK - today, tomorrow & friday 01:51 RichEd Pete Savage (cbx33) is sharing a stand with Open Source Europe on our behalf 01:51 willvdl : OpenForum Europe 01:51 RichEd (thanks) 01:51 RichEd Jono Bacon is cruising the exhibition halls & training area and networking for Edubuntu and Ubuntu community 01:52 ogra in case you didnt read the UWN ... there is also http://www.itwire.com.au/content/view/8392/53/ 01:52 RichEd If anyone is interested: http://www.bettshow.com/ 01:52 ogra :) 01:52 RichEd <quote> 01:52 RichEd BETT is the world's leading educational information & communications technologies (ICT) event, attracting 600 educational suppliers and over 28000 visitors, and bringing together the global teaching and learning community for four days of innovations and inspirations. 01:52 RichEd <endquote> 01:53 RichEd BETT = British Education and Training Technology 01:54 RichEd There are a few other Open Source exhibitors there, and we hope that there will be some good networking with them. 01:54 RichEd #2 Linux Conference Australia - in Sydney ... next week Mon-Fri 01:55 RichEd I'll be representing Edubuntu there, and will be delivering a presentation at the Education Mini Conference. 01:55 juliux i in germany we will present ubuntu via edubuntu and edubuntu on all big expos 01:56 RichEd Part will be a presentation on Edubuntu and where we are and where we have come from ... 01:56 willvdl cbx33 created an edubuntu leaflet for BETT 01:57 willvdl haven't had time yet to pop it into the marketing team channels but will do so soon 01:57 RichEd And then I will be trying to get a discussion going around how we take the spirit of Open Source software developement into the classroom to get the teachers & learners working in a collaborative way to address software / curriculum. 01:57 juliux willvdl, cool 01:58 juliux willvdl, did you have a link to the leaflet? 01:58 willvdl RichEd, are there workshops or just presentations? 01:58 RichEd So I hope to recruit people for our mailing lists and community, more from the end-user / education space than from the technical space. 01:58 willvdl juliux, not at the moment but can email to you 01:58 juliux willvdl, thxs 01:58 willvdl RichEd, great 01:59 RichEd Will I have 40 mins available ... I will present for about 25-30 and then explain how we are now looking at addressing the gap between desktop o/s and curriculum delvivery. 01:59 RichEd *delivery 02:00 RichEd I'll try to get people discussing in the meeting room, and then will take it offline for informal chats. There are quite a few Open Source and Education contacts there, also giving presentations, so we will be able to share ideas. 02:01 RichEd Ubuntu is also well represented at the main conference ... 3 or 4 presentations and some demo's as well. 02:01 RichEd This is the key Open Source conference for Australia for 2007 ... so we will have a good joint presence. 02:01 RichEd --- 02:02 kgoetz i'll try and make it to edubuntu stuff, just let me know when it is ;) 02:02 RichEd kgoetz: monday :) 02:02 kgoetz RichEd: ah, ok. i'll be there :) 02:03 RichEd Further on the community side, pips1 will be available from next week, and we will be (finally) getting the education community site. Lots of discussion and planning has been done, and now we need to get the site running. 02:04 RichEd --- 02:04 willvdl and we need nominations for the EC 02:04 RichEd ogra: is the EC vote on the first meeting of the month ? 02:04 ogra usually, yes 02:05 RichEd Either way, I'd like to nominate willvdl & cbx33 02:05 RichEd How many positions do we need to fill ? 02:05 ogra but for a new EC memeber we should first have a call on the ML and some nominations 02:05 ogra only jeromes 02:06 ogra i thought about having someone nominate someone on the ML, if this gets a second the person is on the list for the vote 02:06 RichEd And for the balance of community / canonical ... do we need an external or internal person ? 02:06 RichEd I presume community if it is to replace Jerome ? 02:06 ogra we initially said we want more community members than employees 02:06 RichEd And what dictates the size of the EC ? 02:07 ogra but i dont really see a reason why we shouldnt rotate that and say this time we'll have more employees, next time more community people again 02:07 ogra we wanted to have an odd number to make decisions easier ... and five sounded like a good number 02:08 ogra there was never a dictate for amount of members 02:08 ogra we can go on with four as well ... 02:08 ogra even with three 02:08 RichEd 3 is a bit low ... 02:08 ogra i like odd numbers more though ... 02:08 ogra right 02:08 RichEd let's get up to 5 again in feb i think 02:09 ogra but more than 5 is overkill 02:09 ogra right 02:09 willvdl agree 02:09 ogra even though we're only two EC members here atm, do we want to go over wills application ? 02:09 ogra (if he wants to go for EC he needs tzo be a member anyway) 02:10 RichEd Can you put a call out on the mail list for nominations this month ... and we consider nomination on the 31st Jan and vote on wed 7th Feb 02:10 ogra yep 02:10 RichEd Then we can make sure we have a god EC representation at both meetings. 02:10 ogra yep 02:11 ogra will is on the agenda .... 02:11 RichEd sorry ... 02:12 ogra i mean its a no brainer anyway ... 02:12 willvdl I have a brain 02:12 ogra looking at the wikipage there are a lot of substantial contributions ... (would be odd if not for a paied contributor ;) ) === RichEd add strong support for willvdl 02:13 ogra so since i know what will does and how much time he invests in edubuntu thats a general +1 from me 02:14 ogra RichEd, so thats a +1 as well ? 02:14 RichEd indeed 02:14 RichEd +1.5 if that is allowed 02:14 ogra oki, i'll contact LaserJock and highvoltage to confirm ... 02:14 willvdl why thank you 02:15 ogra hmm, we could even set a special rule that two voices suffice as long as we're only 4 members in the EC 02:15 willvdl 50% quorum === ogra thinks for four weeks that should work :) 02:15 RichEd i'd say rather get support from 1 more via email ... 02:15 ogra RichEd, do you agree ? 02:15 ogra ok 02:15 ogra i'll care then 02:16 ogra willvdl, 50% welcome then ;) 02:16 willvdl Thanks :) 02:16 RichEd 50% could lead to a split 02:16 RichEd And also I am sure that highvoltage will give +1 witrhout even thinking about it :) 02:16 RichEd *wirhout 02:18 RichEd Okay ... are we ready to wrap up for today ? I have a whack of a document pack to get through before silbs leaves the office today. === highvoltage says a belated +1 for willvdl 02:21 RichEd thanks highvoltage :)