[ubuntu-studio-devel] Some thoughts, frustrations, and considerations.

[Erich Eickmeyer]

Hi Ross,

On 9/21/2018 2:03 PM, Ross Gammon wrote:
> Hi Erich, On 09/21/2018 05:55 PM, Erich Eickmeyer wrote:
>> Hi everybody, As many of you know, Eylul stepped-down from the core
>> leadership of Ubuntu Studio on Saturday. With Eylul's departure, we
>> lost one of our key developers. She had planned on stepping-down, so
>> this was not completely unforseen, and she isn't the only one who
>> wishes to depart. He can correct me if I'm wrong, but it's my
>> understanding that Len was looking at stepping-down when the timing
>> was right as well.  This has me rethinking some of the ideas we've
>> had with the less-than handful of people we have working on this
>> project. 
> Thanks for taking the time to write this. I was not aware of any of
> this. Probably because like everyone, I don't have a lot of spare time
> these days. If it didn't appear here, it didn't happen ;-) Anyway,
> that is a shame. Both will/would be missed.
>> When Ubuntu Studio was born, it started as an add-on to the existing
>> GNOME-based Ubuntu install. Those that were there can correct me if
>> I'm wrong, but as I understand it, the first ISO came about with Xfce
>> as the desktop when Ubuntu went to Unity. With Unity no longer a
>> major factor, I asked the team to explore other desktops, and, with
>> Len's recommendation, Plasma was chosen as a viable alternative to
>> Xfce. Unfortunately, getting an ISO spun-up with Plasma as the
>> desktop has proven to be more of a pain than previously thought
>> because we'd essentially be creating a new "flavor" of Ubuntu which
>> has to go through all of the steps necessary to make that happen.
>> With our dwindling numbers and lack of time to dedicate to a project
>> that got too tedious, I recommend we abandon this project. 
> Why is it a new flavour? I thought it would just involve updating the
> seeds and meta packages to use the kubuntu defaults instead of xubuntu. 

From what I understand, per the Technical Board and the Release Team,
the process to add another ISO is identical in that a lot of code has to
be modified to make the ISO a reality. Sad, really, that every other
flavor exists based on the desktop environment they run, which means the
infrastructure is developed around that paradigm. Makes it extremely
difficult to achieve what we are trying to achieve.

>> Also, creating Ubuntu Studio Welcome and the boutique to replace
>> -installer have proved to be nearly impossible without help that I
>> simply don't have. Another frustration is that it is nearly
>> impossible to get packages updated, and if they're synced from Debian
>> it is even more difficult. For example, I worked on and got the new
>> version of Calf (0.90.0 which has been out since November with a
>> point release to 0.90.1 in July) updated, and since it gets pulled-in
>> from Debian, I had to go to the Debian Multimedia Team to get it
>> updated, only to find that there was someone already working on it
>> without the point release (0.90.0), but it hadn't yet made its way
>> into Debian Testing or Unstable. The upstream developers had released
>> it in November and it's STILL not in Debian Testing or Unstable. It
>> shouldn't take 10 months to update a major release of a project.
>> Fedora doesn't have this problem because they don't have an upstream
>> project from which to pull as they ARE the upstream, and already have
>> the 0.90.1 package! Updating a project shouldn't have so many hoops
>> through which to jump! 
> I am a member of the Debian Multimedia Team. The activity in the team
> is pretty low at the moment. Especially Jaromir who was the last
> person to start updating Calf. Everyone is pretty busy. Unfortunately,
> the packaging uses CDBS instead of debhelper, which I am not very
> familiar with. Have you pinged Jonas if he has time to upload the
> latest? Otherwise, I will try and learn CDBS and give it a go over the
> next few weeks. 
I submitted my debdiff to the Debian Multimedia Team for Calf (0.90.1)
and it wasn't picked-up for reasons I can't understand. Of course, the
process for which to submitmerge proposals has no documentation that I
could find, so that's another barrier.Very difficult to get involved
when there's no process documented.
>> The biggest roadblock we have is the lack of active MOTUs on the
>> team. I would apply, but I don't feel as though I'm qualified since
>> I've had nobody to mentor me in package development. Additionally,
>> we've been unable to attract any dedicated MOTUs. 
> Yes - this has been a pain. At least in the past Kai had upload rights
> for the ubuntustudio-* packages. I have tried twice to get upload
> rights to some limited number of packages (not MOTU), but no developer
> will endorse me, because I have not had enough sponsored uploads. My
> sponsorship request for ubuntustudio-look has been sitting there since
> the 4th August.
> http://reqorts.qa.ubuntu.com/reports/sponsoring/index.html I suppose I
> should be sitting on IRC pinging people, but I don't have time for
> that. Like I don't have the time to prepare lots of other uploads. :-)
> If we have the packages ready, but nobody to upload them, why don't we
> put them in a team ppa, and put some instructions on the wiki for
> users to install manually? In the meantime, the packages can sit in
> the sponsorship queue until they get a sponsor. 

Unfortunately, that's how packages sit until after the release for which
they're targeted. Then we end up in a situation where our packages
aren't getting updated and are stale by the time they are updated. A PPA
isn't a bad idea, but it creates a situation where we can't officially
support something that we're developing.

>> If Ubuntu Studio is to survive, I believe it might be time for
>> another approach which would bring Ubuntu Studio closer to its roots.
>> My proposal is to keep Ubuntu Studio's ISO as Xfce, but to develop
>> metapackages that bolt Ubuntu Studio on to an existing install of
>> another flavor. There are a couple of different approaches to this:
>> 1) the metapackage pulls-in the required configureation files to
>> simply add some essential configuration such as the lowlatency kernel
>> selection in GRUB, or , or 2) pull-in said configuration and rebrand
>> the install to Ubuntu Studio. The other day, I took an afternoon and
>> packaged something to demonstrate the #2 option above on a default
>> Ubuntu (GNOME) install and it worked perfectly. This would require at
>> least one MOTU to be dedicated to this project. 
> This has been a goal for some time. It would be great to apt install
> ubuntustudio-<metapackage> and covert a standard Ubuntu to US. Have
> you pushed that package somewhere so we can give it a try? 

I have it in my own personal PPA for now (ubuntustudio-branding), but if
everyone would like I could throw it into the Autobuilds PPA. One thing
I've been considering doing is having it switch the gdm3.css over to the
upstream version to go with the Ubuntu Studio Grey that closer matches
the Plymouth theme.

>> There is yet another option, one that I don't like, but it was
>> proposed from outside this mailing list when I first got involved.
>> Perhaps Ubuntu Studio, as a downloadable flavor, has run its course.
>> We're no longer in a world where people have to download whole ISOs
>> to get the software they need quickly since it's all available in the
>> repos and most people have a high-speed connection. This world no
>> longer requires that every single piece of software be included in an
>> ISO. Additionally, community support is dwindling, and Ubuntu Studio
>> has gone from the premiere multimedia distribution to the one people
>> are staying away from, with referrals to what are now arguably more
>> successful projects for audio (KXStudio and AVLinux). Perhaps it's
>> time to sunset the flavor. I'd appreciate your thoughts. Overall, I
>> understand now why there has been so much burn-out in the Ubuntu
>> Studio development community. 
> As long as someone is around to do the ISO testing for the release
> milestones, and the release announcements, I don't see why we can't
> keep the flavour going with whatever Debian gives us, and with support
> from the Xubuntu team as required. We can tackle the improvements one
> little step at a time, as time permits. Personally, I like the fact
> that I can grab an ISO, install it on a PC or spare hard
> disk/partition, and just start recording music without worrying about
> what I have to install, and what configuration files to change. And as
> I am already using normal Ubuntu on other machines, I don't need to
> join more mailing list and bug tracker systems. Losing Ubuntu Studio
> for me would be a real shame. I had such high hopes when you and all
> the other potential helpers stepped up to try to help. It had been a
> lonely year or so for me, turning up on IRC to do each release
> milestone, and not knowing who would be around to help. Sometimes I
> was lucky, and after a hard days work, I got home and someone else
> from the Ubuntu Release Team had done all the tests and pressed all
> the buttons. Then I only had to do the release notes. Please don't get
> disheartened. And please, anyone willing to help, please sing out. We
> will probably be very slow to help you get started, but please persist
> if you want Ubuntu Studio to continue. Regards, Ross
The frustration I'm having is that we're attracting a lot of willing
testers, but that's not necessarily where we need the most help. For
instance, without Len, ubuntustudio-controls dies and I don't have the
know-how to pick it up. I have no problem with editing defaults or other
system configuration, and since -installer is simply a script I can pick
that up as well. But, I can't do it all alone.

Also, we've had people willing to help, but then they don't know where
to start, and I don't quite know how to address individual skill sets,
especially when those skill sets aren't presented. The conversations are
something along the lines of "I want to help!" "Great! We need help with
____." And then silence.

Additionally, I've had people even questioning Ubuntu Studio's
relevance. It's nice to have a Live CD with everything, but there
apparently aren't that many people requiring that anymore.

I hope that I have further helped you understand my thoughts.

Erich