October 2020 - Arch-dev-public - lists.archlinux.org

[arch-dev-public] Mkinitcpio replacement with Dracut
by Giancarlo Razzolini 19 Feb '21

19 Feb '21

Hi All, Recently, Dave announced his intention to step down as mkinitcpio maintainer. I have been handling a few things on it, made some small changes to our mkinitcpio-busybox [0], closed a few old bugs, while also made sure some of the other bug reports are still valid. [1] I have been testing a few patches to mkinitcpio for a while to fix those bugs, but last week Dave and I had a discussion on IRC and we agreed that we could spend better time contributing somewhere else than keeping working with mkinitcpio. Currently mkinitcpio cannot boot from NFS properly, mknitcpio-nfs-utils [2] uses very old code. Even though ipconfig works, it has several drawbacks compared to using more modern tools. Not to mention that we have two use cases for mkinitcpio, which are base and systemd enabled initramfs. Even though we use by default our base enabled initramfs, we have to support systemd related issues and we have to keep developing our systemd hooks. I have been looking into dracut for some time now, I copied some stuff from them on a few of my own scripts and they also have an actual test suite, that we currently can't use on Arch, but I plan to change that. With this in mind, I have packaged dracut for Arch and put it on Extra [3]. I have been using a dracut initramfs for a while now to boot my encrypted partition. Surprisingly, I only had to create a small patch to one of the dm-crypt module scripts [4] In this initial phase I want to ask as many of you to test this as a replacement to mkinitcpio in your setups, as many as possible, and in as many scenarios as possible. We will probably have to keep both packages on our repos for a long time, but once we are confident it's a good fit, we can replace mkinitcpio on our iso and base, so new installs get dracut by default. Please, drop in your comments as well. Regards, Giancarlo Razzolini [0] https://git.archlinux.org/svntogit/packages.git/commit/trunk/PKGBUILD?h=pac… [1] https://bugs.archlinux.org/index.php?string=mkinitcpio&project=0 [2] https://git.archlinux.org/mkinitcpio-nfs-utils.git/ [3] https://www.archlinux.org/packages/extra/x86_64/dracut/ [4] https://git.archlinux.org/svntogit/packages.git/tree/trunk/0001-90crypt-Cha…

4 7

[arch-dev-public] Arch Linux in GSOC 2021
by Konstantin Gizdov 01 Feb '21

01 Feb '21

Hi all! Last year Arch Linux applied to be a mentoring organisation in the Google Summer of Code program. There were quite a few cool projects and lots of keen people. Unfortunately, we were not selected. However, I was hoping people are excited about trying again this year as well. I have already been contacted by a couple of people who saw the GSOC page on the Dev Wiki and are showing quite some interest. I presume, if we advertise we will get a lot of interested people. GSOC application period starts on January 29, 2021 for mentoring organisations and closes on February 19, 2021. We should make sure we satisfy the requirements [1]: 1. Mentor organisations must run an active open source or free software project. 2. Have produced and released software under an OSI approved license [2]. 3. Must not be based in a country currently embargoed by the United States. I think we do fall into those categories and I would suggest this year we start preparing a bit earlier to improve our chances. Let's try and coordinate an effort. Maybe start with the people keen on mentoring and collation of prospective project ideas. [1] - https://summerofcode.withgoogle.com/get-started/ [2] - https://opensource.org/licenses -- Regards, Konstantin

3 3

[arch-dev-public] Pam lockout
by Tobias Powalowski 06 Nov '20

06 Nov '20

Hi guys, https://bugs.archlinux.org/task/67644 I second Levente's post of it's a configuration issue that needs to be addressed by user and not by the package itself. Typing 3 times wrong password is a sane default imho. Any other opinions out there? Thanks. greetings tpowa -- Tobias Powalowski Archlinux Developer & Package Maintainer (tpowa) http://www.archlinux.org tpowa(a)archlinux.org

4 6

[arch-dev-public] News draft: Accessibility features added to installation media
by David Runge 01 Nov '20

01 Nov '20

Hey all, below is the news item I would like to post once the installation medium is released some time tomorrow: ``` We are very happy to announce that accessibility features have been added to our installation medium with [archiso v49](https://gitlab.archlinux.org/archlinux/archiso/-/tags/v49). From release 2020.11.01 onwards these are available via the 2nd boot loader menu item. Many thanks go to Alexander Epaneshnikov who integrated the features from the [TalkinArch](https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/TalkingArch) project into archiso's releng profile, which is used for creating the installation medium. Note: The bootloader timeouts have been set to 15s to allow blind users to select the menu item as the bootloaders themselves do not offer accessibility features. The timeout is stopped as soon as e.g. an arrow key is pressed. ``` If you have improvement suggestions, please let me know! Best, David -- https://sleepmap.de

3 2

[arch-dev-public] archiso v49 with new features
by David Runge 30 Oct '20

30 Oct '20

Hey all! So, there are some exciting news for the upcoming archiso release! Maybe some of you have followed the presentations during Arch Conf 2020. I did one on archiso. The upcoming v49 will include accessibility features for blind and visually impaired, making it possible to install Arch Linux with the help of auditory feedback. Not only the resulting ISO itself has accessibility support now, but also the script to test a built image locally - run_archiso (via an option flag). Many thanks go to Alexander Epaneshnikov for spending the time to integrate his efforts from the talking-arch project into our builtin releng profile! Additionally, the use of build.sh scripts per profile has been removed. This is due to the fact that archiso has moved to (mostly) declarative profiles, which makes creating profiles less complicated (as now only mkarchiso is required to build a profile). There are still a few outstanding rough edges, but most of those are already tracked and I believe we have arrived at a pretty decent state by now. Many thanks go to nl6720 for a lot of brainstorming, implementing, breaking and fixing! :) If this mail reads like a changelog, then well, it is because I don't have a changelog in the project yet! ;-) Apart from that I thought it might be worthwhile to write a news item about it after the next ISO has been released and share the above two changes on the website. What do you think? Best, David -- https://sleepmap.de

3 2

[arch-dev-public] New version of the pkgstats client
by Pierre Schmitz 27 Oct '20

27 Oct '20

Hi all, I just released the initial version of a new pkgstats package. As it now requires different arguments (e.g. it does no longer submit the list when run with no arguments) it is technically a BC break; therefore version 3. For most users who simply install it to enable the weekly submission of packages no intervention is needed. The command now supports displaying statistics right from the terminal. E.g. pierre@skynet ~> pkgstats show go nodejs nodejs 65.26 go 61.34 For more information see the integrated help; I also wrote a quick post at https://pierre-schmitz.com/pkgstats-version-3-lookup-package-statistics-fro… Greetings, Pierre

2 3

Re: [arch-dev-public] News draft: libtraceevent>=5.9-1 update requires manual intervention
by Jan Alexander Steffens 26 Oct '20

26 Oct '20

On Mon, Oct 26, 2020 at 2:16 PM Sébastien Luttringer <seblu(a)seblu.net> wrote: > On Sat, 2020-10-24 at 23:27 +0200, Sébastien Luttringer wrote: > > > > Sure, I didn't know that rule. It's written somewhere or well known habit? > > > Jan? Sorry; I don't think it's written down anywhere; it's just what I did last time. It helps us (and users of [*testing], who are encouraged to subscribe to arch-dev-public) make sure that the draft is actually correct.

1 0

[arch-dev-public] Mail server migration
by Jelle van der Waa 24 Oct '20

24 Oct '20

Hi All, Tomorrow we will migrate the mail server starting at Saturday the 24th October (tomorrow) on 12:00 GMT. The migration should take around four hours, but could take longer. This migration affects everything which sends email, so not only your @archlinux.org address but also the bbs, AUR, etc. The reason is why we migrate the mail server, the current server costs us ~ 40-60 euro / month (dedicated server) and we will be moving to a VPS which is around ~ 3 euro / month. Greetings, Jelle

2 2

[arch-dev-public] News draft: libtraceevent>=5.9-1 update requires manual intervention
by Sébastien Luttringer 24 Oct '20

24 Oct '20

The libtraceevent package prior to version 5.9-1 was missing a soname link. This has been fixed in 5.9-1, so the upgrade will need to overwrite the untracked files created by ldconfig. If you get any of these errors libtraceevent: /usr/lib/libtraceevent.so.1 exists in filesystem when updating, use pacman -Syu --overwrite usr/lib/libtraceevent.so.1 to perform the upgrade. Sébastien "Seblu" Luttringer

2 2

[arch-dev-public] SVN to Git Migration work and POC
by Morten Linderud 21 Oct '20

21 Oct '20

We are moving to git! Hopefully...maybe...someday! This has been a change that has been discussed for years, but progress has been stalled because of different reasons. I decided to pick it up and work on getting devtools and dbscripts up to speed. It's important to note that nothing is changing in the very-near future, and there is still A LOT left to be figured out. This email is intended for the ones that wish to help out testing the current point of concept and come forward with thoughts and ideas. # tl;dr A quick summary of the technical changes so far: - Each package is it's own git repository located under a packages group on gitlab - Consolidated the dbscript distinction between "community" and "packages" into "packages" The git repostitories still keep the namespaces "community" for TUs, and "packages" for developers. - devtools creates .SRCINFO files upon commit - devtools creates signed tags in the package repository - Git tags has a seperate version scheme from pacman because git has limitations - pacman version: 1:1.2.3-1 - git tag: release-1-1.2.3-1 # Testing ## Gitlab Access We have gotten a gitlab instance running where we can create repositories. To help testing svn2git migration you need to access this instance. All accounts from team-members should have been created already, and all you need to do is to reset the password with your archweb email. https://gitlab.archlinux.org If you don't get any emails, you should contact devops. Important to note that I need to add you to the `package-test` group on gitlab if you wish to test the tooling. Please reply to me offlist, or poke me on `#archlinux-projects`. ## SVN Repository to Git conversion Anthraxx, with the great help of Ismael, has rewritten the original `gitsvn2git` bash script to a nice python tool to help us convert git2svn packages into standalone git repositories. When following the instructions below you can make your own packages or play around with the script with your current packages. https://github.com/anthraxx/arch-svn-package-to-git ## WIP Repository Currently there is a POC server running dbscripts on svn2gittest.archlinux.org. This server is provisioned by the devops team, with me being the administrator. Install the WIP devtools package from my repository: https://pkgbuild.com/~foxboron/repos/devtools/ It should live alongside the current devtools package and only provide the WIP tooling with git support. - Ensure you can ssh into svn2gittest.archlinux.org - The box has been deployed with our archusers ansible role and should contain the same users as orion - Navigate the package-tests project; https://gitlab.archlinux.org/packages-test - Create a repository in either packages or community. - You can use any package you want. Any consistency checks in the WIP repository has been removed and shouldn't interfer with any packages you push. - Work with the package as normal. - When you commit the changes use: `git-extrapkg` for packages under `packages-test/packages` `git-communitypkg` for packages under `packages-test/community` - When you have uploaded the package: ssh svn2gittest.archlinux.org "/packages/db-update" Note: The dbscripts tooling has been consolidated. There is not need for `/community/db-update` If there are any bugs, please poke me in #archlinux-projects The technical overview is currently being worked on in on in the archwiki: https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/User:Foxboron/GitMigration Cheers! -- Morten Linderud PGP: 9C02FF419FECBE16

1 0