[CentOS-devel] Is there any way to follow errata for Stream 8?

Fri Aug 20 19:35:12 UTC 2021
Neal Gompa <ngompa13 at gmail.com>

On Fri, Aug 20, 2021 at 2:41 PM Josh Boyer <jwboyer at redhat.com> wrote:
>
> On Fri, Aug 20, 2021 at 1:37 PM Carl George <carl at redhat.com> wrote:
> >
> > On Fri, Aug 20, 2021 at 11:35 AM Neal Gompa <ngompa13 at gmail.com> wrote:
> > >
> > > On Fri, Aug 20, 2021 at 12:28 PM Johnny Hughes <johnny at centos.org> wrote:
> > > >
> > > > On 8/19/21 11:21 PM, John R. Dennison wrote:
> > > > > On Fri, Aug 20, 2021 at 06:05:49AM +0200, Steven Rosenberg via CentOS-devel wrote:
> > > > >> Even emails like I see for for CentOS 7 would be ok.
> > > > >
> > > > > Considering that people have had nearly 2 years to get such notices out
> > > > > for 8 and it's still not happened I wouldn't hold my breath if I were
> > > > > you.
> > > > >
> > > >
> > > > I would provide the information if i could, it is not easy to do because
> > > > of modularity.
> > > >
> > > > The thing that builds el8 modules is called MBS .. if you look at MBS
> > > > operations, one of the things that gets generated as part of the
> > > > filename.  Here is an example:
> > > >
> > > > https://koji.mbox.centos.org/koji/buildinfo?buildID=18783
> > > >
> > > > Part of the file name is dynamic, created by MBS at build time.  For
> > > > example, one of the Source RPM filenames generated is:
> > > >
> > > > runc-1.0.0-74.rc95.module_el8.4.0+886+c9a8d9ad.src.rpm
> > > >
> > > > That is not it's filename in RHEL8.  In RHEL 8 .. the filename is:
> > > >
> > > > runc-1.0.0-74.rc95.module+el8.4.0+11822+6cc1e7d7.src.rpm
> > > >
> > > > There is no easy way to figure out the file names that match up between
> > > > the two systems.  I took me 15 minutes to figure out that one filename,
> > > > this does not scale.
> > >
> > > Everything prior to ".module" should be unique, identifiable, and
> > > identical between RHEL and CentOS. MBS whacks %dist to add MBS
> >
> > Not exactly.  Sometimes RHEL maintainers add digits after %dist, which
> > results in NVRs like foo-1.0-1.module_el8.4.0+123+a0a0a0a0.1.  It's
> > not impossible to parse, but it's much more complicated that just
> > ignoring everything after ".module".
> >
> > > information at the end. So there is some mapping. Additionally, when
> > > the RPMs are imported from RHEL into CentOS, the original NVR is
> > > present as a tag. Ignoring transmodrifier remapping modulemd commits
> > > between RHEL and CentOS, you have enough baseline references to be
> > > able to connect the dots because the RHEL dist-git shorthash is
> > > present in the import tag, which would exist in the imported modulemd
> > > before transmodification.
> > >
> > > That process could be automated, but I was never particularly
> > > motivated to do it because of the historical attitude around providing
> > > errata for CentOS users like Fedora users get.
> >
> > I'm not aware of any policy against allowing this in the project.  If
> > there is I hope board members will speak up and clarify that.  I
> > suspect it's more of a resource thing than anything.
>
> I think lack of awareness of a publicly documented policy against
> allowing this in the project is likely true, but also irrelevant.  We
> don't have a policy against allowing a FreeBSD kernel or using
> Ubuntu's version of gcc, yet we wouldn't do those.  In the absence of
> meticulously detailed bylaws, we have historical precedent setting
> defacto policy.  I don't expect this to change.
>
> That being said, an update metadata mechanism for CentOS Stream is
> certainly hampered by resource constraints both in terms of tooling
> and in terms of the impact on the people developing the OS through the
> CentOS Stream project.  For a continuously developed and continuously
> delivered OS, we expect a large amount of churn on a day to day basis.
> Updates are a regular occurence, and they're important either because
> of fixes or because of new features.  Changes are documented in MRs,
> RPM changelogs, and referenced bugs for those interested.
>

It's always been possible to have updateinfo generated as build
submissions go through. That's literally how it's done in Fedora with
Bodhi.

It's not that much of a stretch to say "deploy Bodhi, make voting
advisory or turn it off, and have builds submitted through it with the
right information and auto-release based on gating checks". That
structured data can be pulled in and used for Red Hat update
advisories internally too, which simplifies the pipeline to validate
and release updates. Or if you have a beef against Bodhi, then why not
use the tooling Scientific Linux created to make updateinfo? Troy and
Pat are very familiar with it, and it's publicly available:
https://pagure.io/python-Updateinfo

Okay, let's say we can't do it for CentOS Stream 8 because of resource
constraints. Well then, what about CentOS Stream 9, where the RHEL
developers themselves are submitting the builds? There's no logical
resourcing problem there. Deploy Bodhi for update submissions and tie
the gating into the auto-release criteria. The Fedora CI folks were
already doing that for Fedora Rawhide, so it's no stretch to have it
for CentOS Stream too.

The idea is not new: I've talked to the CentOS project folks about it
many times in the past. They get *extremely* uncomfortable and tell me
that they can't do it for various reasons even though they want to.
It's one of the biggest complaints everyone has about the project.
It's made worse by the fact that none of the ecosystem tooling for
updates works in any useful manner without updateinfo. RPM changelogs
are no substitute because no automation works with that. You know that
as well as everyone else here.



--
真実はいつも一つ!/ Always, there's only one truth!