[RFC] Trusty plans for xen-api/xcp

[Stefan Bader]

This (and related) package has a bit of an upstream maintenance issue. All those
packages together (blktap, xen-api, xen-api-libs, openxenserver?) make up the
open source part of Citrix Xenserver. This was introduced in Precise LTS and
(please correct me if I am wrong) was to some degree used to integrate Xen into
OpenStack.

However there did not seem to be a lot of upstream work going into keeping it in
a working state (packages are in universe). At least the xen-api-libs source
package was FTBS in Saucy. And it is again (for a different reason) FTBS in Trusty.

Debian has removed xen-api/xen-api-libs from testing and were thinking about
removing it completely from Sid as nobody cared about it. Citrix is working on
some overhaul but have not come forward with something usable, yet.
When being asked they came up asking whether the build failure could get fixed
and then the current code be used for Trusty.

While this probably could be done (though the current ocaml type related problem
I have my problems in understanding, but I am no ocaml developer), I would have
my doubts about its quality (there unlikely will be much effort put into it). On
the other hand, it is universe.

But at least with respect to OpenStack we should not rely on xcp to integrate
Xen hosts. At least not as the only option. Currently I find much less xcp
package in Trusty but this very likely is because of the build failure of
xen-api-libs. Is there work being done to check whether libvirt could be used in
nova instead (maybe already done).

So basically throwing the general question into the air what should be done with
the xen-api* packages: removed (maybe bad as that could break upgrades from P),
make them compile and decide whether to replace nova plugins by libvirt use or
keep them and add libvirt use or ...?

-Stefan

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