[conspire] Sat, 1/10 Installfest/RSVP

[Nick Moffitt]

Rick Moen:
> Quoting Nick Moffitt (nick at zork.net):
> > Because it saves me the work of recompiling or upgrading software
> > that is running a production service. 
> 
> All my software that runs production services upgrades just fine.
> However, you haven't answered the question:   Why do you, specifically
> -you-, need a consistent application _binary_ interface?  Do you
> install a significant amount of fragile software that's available only
> in binary form?

No, but I have to take builds from developers and deploy them.  And
"oops shit my libgubble is different from the one you tested on in a
subtle way and that meant that the rollout turned into a 500-fest" isn't
acceptable.

Likewise, being able to build custom packages strictly for Hardy
*myself* is a great load off.  Having to target the crack of the week
would take time away from real work.

> I fetch testing-branch packages except where I qualify my command with
> option "-t unstable".  Thus, no unstable-branch breakage because the
> glibc maintainer got roaring drunk and was sobering up only around 4 PM
> Monday -- but I also have optional access to unstable-branch packages
> and their dependencies when/if needed.

Do you unify which packages are from unstable and which are from testing
across all boxes?  How much time per week do you spend on these
dist-upgrades?  And how many (order of magnitude is fine) systems are
you managing in this way?

> I never assumed that the in-queue mail would be stable between releases,
> (or major ones, anyway) and always flush the queue.  This has thus never
> been a problem.

And all mail exits the mailman queues in an orderly fashion?  Do you
just blast away the shunt/ dir with prejudice and hope it was all spam?
How many list messages per second back up while you're doing this
upgrade?

-- 
"It is not very unreasonable that the rich should            Nick Moffitt
contribute to the public expense, not only in               nick at zork.net
proportion to their revenue, but something more than in
that proportion." -- Adam Smith, Wealth of Nations