Re: [Gnewsense-dev] Documenting Release Notes

[Sam Geeraerts]

Op Sat, 31 Aug 2013 18:43:28 -0500
schreef Felipe Lopez <address@hidden>:

> 2013/8/30 Karl Goetz <address@hidden>
> 
> > Felipe Lopez <address@hidden> wrote:
> > > Hi,
> > >
> > > Just to let you know that I created a page called Release Notes
> > > [1]. There are still no release notes because I couldn't find any
> > > in the wiki.
> >
> > Great initiative :)

+1

> > Perhaps for the previous releases we can take some notes from the
> > relevant announcement emails? They should give some idea and will
> > let us populate the pages with /something/.
> >
> 
> I just populated release notes with announcements from the users
> mailing list.

Thanks for fishing those out.

> > >     [11:33] <comradekingu> It would be useful with
> > >
> > http://libreplanet.org/wiki/List_of_software_that_does_not_respect_the_Free_System_Distribution_Guidelines#$REFbeing
> > > seperated into what is different from debian
> > >    [11:33] <comradekingu> we took this, made it into this, doing
> > > these changes, and this is why that is better
> >
> > Not convinced its useful for us to do that, but perhaps others
> > disagree? I definitely wouldn't stop someone doing said list but
> > not sure I would write it myself.
> >
> > >    [11:35] <comradekingu> what modules are taken out/how is the
> > > kernel changed, what is taken out from main. And what packages
> > > are now "fixed"
> > in main
> > >     [11:39] <comradekingu> Something a little bit better than this
> > >
> > http://bzr.savannah.gnu.org/lh/gnewsense/metad/annotate/head:/parkes/blacklist.nonfree
> > >
> > bzr.savannah.gnu.org/lh/gnewsense/metad/annotate/head:/parkes/blacklist.needsclean
> > >
> > bzr.savannah.gnu.org/lh/gnewsense/metad/annotate/head:/parkes/blacklist.nonfree
> >
> > It seems like a lot of duplication to take that same blacklist
> > information out of bug reports (and the blacklists themselves where
> > applicable) and then put them in to the wiki. Could we come to some
> > compromise where we try and make sure bug reports have the relevant
> > details and link to them instead?
> >
> 
> I like that idea. Write better bug reports (more informative) and
> link in the release notes to the bugs that were fixed for that
> version.

I added a note to the development team page [1] about linking from
release notes page to solved bugs.

But I'm not sure bug reports, even well written ones, are very useful
to answer the much asked question "what's the difference between Debian
and gNewSense?". They're too detailed for users and if they're
only linked from the release notes then they're spread over several
minor releases. I think a list of modified/removed/added packages with
concise reasons for the changes are more informative to users. I've
added a task for that [2].

I suggested some months ago [3] that we gather this information
automatically from blacklists and README.gNewSense files. The
disadvantage of that is that it's single language and I'm not sure if
developing this is less work than compiling the list manually.

> > > The release notes page is now linked from the download [3] and
> > documentation [4]
> > > pages for people interested in knowing the details about the
> > > changes introduced with each gNewSense release.
> > >
> > > What do you think?
> >
> > I think it'll be good to have, and definitely something we want to
> > have. When we get some useful info into the release notes we'll be
> > able to link it in the topic of irc channels with the download
> > links.

+1

[1] http://www.gnewsense.org/DevelopmentTeam
[2] https://savannah.nongnu.org/task/index.php?12794
[3]
http://lists.nongnu.org/archive/html/gnewsense-dev/2013-01/msg00009.html