[ASLO] [Sugar-devel] Activities added to GithHub

Tony Anderson tony at olenepal.org
Sun Apr 23 23:48:16 EDT 2017


1. The original repository is ASLO. The git.sugarlabs.org was added 
later. The intent, as I understand it, is to have the master source code 
under git version control on github as a replacement for 
git.sugarlabs.org. The git record of the programming change from version 
to version should be invaluable in understanding how the activity 
evolved. Out of 71 repositories, 47 were not duplicates and so 
development history has been captured.

I assume you know that ASLO is short for activities.sugarlabs.org. It is 
not source code.

Yes, the original idea of ASLO is that individuals would create and 
submit activities. The permission schemes does not permit community 
maintenance. I believe the goal is to create a repository for each 
activity on ASLO so that the community can undertake further development 
and maintenance.

2. Certainly if the community decides this was a bad idea, it can be 
easily corrected. However, this deserves discussion more than rants.

3. There was a lot of discussion of this issue in connection with GCI 
2016 where making these ports was the main task. This is when most of 
the 137 activities were added to the github/sugarlabs. I fully agree 
with the concern about dilution - I believe we should have a separate 
organizational github (e.g sugar-activities) for the activities. 
However, the current course was adopted over a year ago and has not been 
further discussed.

The comment that everything  done was mechanical and unqualified is spot 
on. My /faux pas/ with the duplicates is clear evidence of my being 
unqualified. I hope to prove educable.

4. Here are some issues that deserve thought and comment.

In ASLO, the submitter specifies the license. The submitter is the 
assumed copyright owner. So can we assign a different license on github. 
Unfortuately the submitters choice of license is not displayed on ASLO 
but I have to believe it was recorded in the mysql database.

I believe the activity.info should include the developer, summary, 
description, and license as well as a link to the repository on github 
plus any other valuable information displayed on ASLO. In this way, the 
ASLO site can display information provided and maintainable by the 
developer. This requires revisiting the current definition of 
activity.info. Perhaps the Readme file could contain this supplemental 
information to be added to the bundle by bundlebuilder.

Tony

On 04/24/2017 07:08 AM, James Cameron wrote:
> Dissent.
>
>
> 1.
>
> For the duplication by Tony from activities.sugarlabs.org to
> github.com/sugarlabs;
>
> - for the commit history, we still have the original repository for
>    some activities.
>
> - for the source code, now we have two places for some activities; the
>    original repository, and a copy with a history collapsed to release
>    versions.  While this may be helpful for users, it isn't helpful for
>    developers.
>
> As I'm a developer, I'll continue to use the original repositories
> rather than the duplicated repositories.
>
> I don't understand why this duplication was done.
>
> The problems in activities.sugarlabs.org are fixed by editing the
> source code and configuration files, not a transition to GitHub.  ASLO
> is on GitHub and is a relatively simple web application.  See
> https://github.com/sugarlabs/aslo/issues for some technical analysis
> of the issues.
>
>
> 2.
>
> For the duplication by Ignacio from activities.sugarlabs.org to
> github.com/sugar-activities, in addition to what others have said;
>
> - it pollutes the search space of GitHub,
>
> - it dilutes the /sugarlabs/ GitHub organisation.
>
> Again, I don't understand why this duplication was done.
>
>
> 3.
>
> Overall, I don't recall seeing any consultation on a transition from
> ASLO to GitHub; no Wiki page, no sugar-devel@ posting, just a spray of
> GitHub notifications.
>
> The whole thing smacks of automaticity and unqualified work.  ;-)  But
> I'm open to hearing what the plan is, in detail.  If it helps me, I'll
> jump on board, but if it doesn't I'll avoid it.
>
>
> 4.
>
> Repositories can be moved to GitHub with full commit history.  It's a
> feature of GitHub that we have used well in the past.
>
> .gitignore is documented in the Git manual.
>
> README.md is Markdown source that GitHub presents on the default view
> of a repository.  For an activity without one it could include parts
> of the activity/activity.info file.
>
> License must be clearly defined and compatible with GitHub's
> requirements.  We cannot host repositories on GitHub that don't have a
> license.
>
>
> On Sun, Apr 23, 2017 at 11:25:49AM +0800, Tony Anderson wrote:
>> Thanks to all for the valuable suggestions.
>>
>> Your advice seems to me to check on each activity in ASLO to see if it has a
>> repository on git.sugarlabs.org. Since there is no obvious way to know if the
>> current repository in git.sugarlabs.org is consistent with the version(s) on
>> ASLO.
>>
>> Are you comfortable with making the most recent version on ASLO a build from
>> git.sugarlabs.org?
>>
>> Should I send an email to the developer on git if active on github (or from
>> recent activity on the lists) to make the move as they feel appropriate.
>>
>> In any case, the person creating the repository on github must have owner
>> authority in github.
>>
>> I still have received no advice on how the repository should be filled out
>> (.gitignore, readme, license, ....).
>>
>> Tony
>>
>> On 04/23/2017 11:11 AM, Samuel Cantero wrote:
>>
>>      I'm agree with Walter.
>>
>>      We should move activities repos from [1]git.sugarlabs.org to [2]github.org
>>      with the whole commit history. It would be nice to keep all repos with same
>>      format in name and inside one Github organization exclusively dedicated for
>>      activities.
>>
>>      Regards,
>>
>>      On Sat, Apr 22, 2017 at 10:42 PM, Tony Anderson <[3]tony_anderson at usa.net>
>>      wrote:
>>
>>          Hi, Ignacio
>>
>>          I am open to suggestions (accusations not accepted). I am a newbie in
>>          this and largely unqualified; however, I don't see a rush of more
>>          qualified volunteers to take this task on.
>>
>>          Many, possibly a majority of these activities have not been touched
>>          since 2010. I would not like to wait until we get contact from
>>          contributors who have moved on to a day job.
>>
>>          If all of the ASLO activities can be moved as repositories to github/
>>          sugarlabs - nothing has been lost. Corrections can be made to those
>>          repositories to include the famous 'repeal and replace'. The immediate
>>          benefit is that the developer hub on ASLO can be discontinued
>>          simplifying an effort to make ALSO itself more stable and maintainable.
>>
>>          In addition, github makes it easier for the community at large to make
>>          corrections or improvements to the activities knowing that they are
>>          working on the one and only official version.
>>
>>          In any case, a repository appears to give no credit to the creator -
>>          only to contributors. Contributions are, by definition, post the move
>>          of the repository to github.
>>
>>          I am looking for advice on how to relate [4]git.sugarlabs.org to the
>>          github repositories.
>>
>>          Tony
>>
>>          On 04/23/2017 10:23 AM, Ignacio Rodríguez wrote:
>>
>>              I think we should focus on contact the creators of the activities
>>              before moving them -- sugar-activities org basically contains all
>>              aslo activities and nothing else (which can be used in case any
>>              activity has no maintainer/git repository)  --; probably most of
>>              the activities are in [5]git.sugarlabs.org (so we can move them
>>              safely).
>>
>>              On Apr 22, 2017 22:24, "Walter Bender" <[6]walter.bender at gmail.com>
>>              wrote:
>>
>>                  Tony,
>>
>>                  I can not speak for every contributor, but there is a lot more
>>                  to contributing to a project than the end result. Many
>>                  contributors take pride in their contributions and these days,
>>                  one's GitHub contributions have value in the job market. A
>>                  wholesale removal of the git history by Sugar Labs does not
>>                  send a very welcoming message to past or future contributors.
>>                  On a more mundane level, the lack of history means as a
>>                  developer I have no way of knowing whom to ask for help.
>>
>>                  -walter
>>
>>                  On Sat, Apr 22, 2017 at 9:17 PM, Tony Anderson <[7]
>>                  tony_anderson at usa.net> wrote:
>>
>>                      The process for installing repositories requires that the
>>                      target repository be empty.
>>
>>                      I would appreciate someone who could itemize what needs to
>>                      be in a repository such as the license, .gitignore,
>>                      README.md, and so on. Much of that can probably be done by
>>                      a script using the information available from ASLO.
>>
>>                      My sense is that PRs are appropriate for changes to an
>>                      activities functions (such as a port to gtk3) but not for
>>                      housekeeping.
>>
>>                      Tony
>>
>>                      On 04/23/2017 07:27 AM, Love Mehta wrote:
>>
>>                          There are many activities lacking a description at [8]
>>                          [9]https://github.com/sugar-activities/  and it is hard
>>                          to know the name and purpose of the activity specially
>>                          in the web activities where one has to open the
>>                          index.html file. I think we should add the descriptions
>>                          from [10][11]https://activities.sugarlabs.org for each
>>                          activity to the readme markdown file. I thought of
>>                          doing this but this will lead to a large number of pull
>>                          requests. Should I go ahead with it?
>>
>>                 
>>
>>                  --
>>                  Walter Bender
>>                  Sugar Labs
>>                  [12]http://www.sugarlabs.org
>>
>> References:
>>
>> [1] http://git.sugarlabs.org/
>> [2] http://github.org/
>> [3] mailto:tony_anderson at usa.net
>> [4] http://git.sugarlabs.org/
>> [5] http://git.sugarlabs.org/
>> [6] mailto:walter.bender at gmail.com
>> [7] mailto:tony_anderson at usa.net
>> [8] https://github.com/sugar
>> [9] https://github.com/sugar
>> [10] https://activities.sugarlabs/
>> [11] https://activities.sugarlabs/
>> [12] http://www.sugarlabs.org/
>> _______________________________________________
>> ASLO mailing list
>> ASLO at lists.sugarlabs.org
>> http://lists.sugarlabs.org/listinfo/aslo
>

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