Ibex design: user switching, presence and session termination (Here Be Dragons)

Posted Nov 1, 2008 3:59 UTC (Sat) by gouldtj (guest, #48027)
In reply to: Ibex design: user switching, presence and session termination (Here Be Dragons) by AlexHudson
Parent article: Ibex design: user switching, presence and session termination (Here Be Dragons)

Unfortunately the FUSA applet being used and the version of GDM being used are very closely tied together. In the new version of GDM the interface for the applet is entirely different.

When starting the work one of the things that we did is talk to the Ubuntu platform team about changing the version of GDM in Intrepid. We wanted it for several reasons, but it clearly wasn't ready to meet all of the demands that GDM would have placed on it in the distro. This left us with modifying the old applet.

In an attempt to make it easier to integrate upstream specifically I've broken out all the funcationality into individual patches. This could allow other distributions that are shipping with the older GDM/FUSA combo to cherry pick which features they'd like to ship. You can find information on the individual branches here:

http://gould.cx/ted/blog/Right_side_status

The fact that the code will never make it upstream directly is sad, but sometimes those are the choices that make sense at the time.

Ibex design: user switching, presence and session termination (Here Be Dragons)

Posted Nov 1, 2008 8:28 UTC (Sat) by AlexHudson (guest, #41828) [Link]

I can understand the reasons for needing to do that development like that in this case; I just worry about development that has a "push it upstream later" mentality (which probably applies less here).

I've said this on Mark S.' blog as well, and this isn't a criticism specific to Canonical - Novell have (had) exactly the same disease imho - but for pieces that are relatively crucial parts of a desktop (like Novell's new menu, and this user switcher thing) it seems to me potentially dangerous to do the development first and then try to seek agreement about it going upstream later.

Ibex design: user switching, presence and session termination (Here Be Dragons)

Posted Nov 3, 2008 16:54 UTC (Mon) by jspaleta (subscriber, #50639) [Link] (5 responses)

So instead of working with upstream to help make the active codebase good enough to distribute...you decided to enhance the old codebase. At any point did Canonical hold a discussion internally about tasking manhours to work on the new GDM codebase so that it is "ready" for your distro? If that discussion was public, I would appreciate a pointer to it. -jef

Ibex design: user switching, presence and session termination (Here Be Dragons)

Posted Nov 3, 2008 17:43 UTC (Mon) by gouldtj (guest, #48027) [Link] (4 responses)

So instead of working with upstream to help make the active codebase good enough to distribute...you decided to enhance the old codebase. At any point did Canonical hold a discussion internally about tasking manhours to work on the new GDM codebase so that it is "ready" for your distro? If that discussion was public, I would appreciate a pointer to it.

Yes, we decided that was the best approach for meeting the schedule that we wanted to hit. No, the discussion was not public.

Ibex design: user switching, presence and session termination (Here Be Dragons)

Posted Nov 3, 2008 17:57 UTC (Mon) by jspaleta (subscriber, #50639) [Link] (3 responses)

Do you mean the near term schedule for this release? What about a year out from now. What happens if the people working on GDM right now...never get around to working on what Canonical needs? Is Canonical going to commit manhours to the upstream work on the current GDM to ensure that it does meet Ubuntu's needs by the next Ubuntu release? Or is Canonical content on letting other people do the work to move the GDM codebase forward?

I look forward to seeing the Canonical commits in the upstream GDM codebase.

-jef

Ibex design: user switching, presence and session termination (Here Be Dragons)

Posted Nov 3, 2008 21:03 UTC (Mon) by gouldtj (guest, #48027) [Link] (2 responses)

I'm sorry that you disagree with my decision making. I hope that you're able to succeed where I have failed.

Ibex design: user switching, presence and session termination (Here Be Dragons)

Posted Nov 3, 2008 21:26 UTC (Mon) by jspaleta (subscriber, #50639) [Link] (1 responses)

Is that an implicit invitation for me to join future closed door Canonical planning session and make the case to Canonical to work directly in upstream trunk codebases like upstream GDM? I'm not sure I'm going to succeed in a closed door planning session. I would stand a far better chance of succeeding at that in a public forum.. and so would you.

-jef

Ibex design: user switching, presence and session termination (Here Be Dragons)

Posted Nov 6, 2008 22:54 UTC (Thu) by lysse (guest, #3190) [Link]

corbet: Please, please, please, please, please implement "ignore user" for LWN comments. Please, please, please, please.