EPEL (was [CentOS-devel] Octave for CentOS5)

Karanbir Singh wrote:
> EPEL is interesting and it has a lot of potential, but the fact that 
> they only care about, build for and expect usage on RHEL tends to sort 
> of exclude a lot of external participation in the project. So much so 
> that a @redhat person said that the only aim they have in pushing epel 
> is to they can go tell their customers about it!!

I think you have that wrong - there is an EPEL list now - everyone 
interested should join it:
https://www.redhat.com/archives/epel-devel-list/
...And read through the archives:
- me asking if I could contribute to EPEL, and not Fedora Extras - 
answer was yes - 
https://www.redhat.com/archives/epel-devel-list/2007-March/msg00080.html
- Thorsten Leemhuis (one of the leaders of Fedora I think) saying they 
are waiting for CentOS beta for testing - 
https://www.redhat.com/archives/epel-devel-list/2007-March/msg00086.html

>
> Added to that the overhead of needing to sign papers with Redhat and 
> the need to become a Fedora contributor first, only further increases 
> the bar to entry and creates really un-necessary issues for people who 
> are unable to, for various reasons to sign such papers etc. And given 
> the fact that Fedora packaging dynamics are drastically different from 
> packaging on *EL, whether the general Fedora guidelines and 
> infrastructure is even usable long term for EPEL is itself doubt.

By sign papers you mean gpg sign - I did that, it was pretty 
painless...You don't even need to read them ;-)


Greg