Date: Wed, 5 Sep 2012 18:35:48 +0000 (UTC) From: "Bjoern A. Zeeb" <bzeeb-lists@lists.zabbadoz.net> To: Garrett Wollman <wollman@bimajority.org> Cc: hubs@freebsd.org, Cluster Administrators <clusteradm@freebsd.org> Subject: Re: pkgng mirrors Message-ID: <alpine.BSF.2.00.1209051731340.98832@ai.fobar.qr> In-Reply-To: <20551.35538.119912.329917@hergotha.csail.mit.edu> References: <20120905112013.2d44783c@laptop> <09CB99A0-75BC-426C-BD44-9ACC7CD741D1@exonetric.com> <alpine.BSF.2.00.1209050925180.98832@ai.fobar.qr> <20551.35538.119912.329917@hergotha.csail.mit.edu>
next in thread | previous in thread | raw e-mail | index | archive | help
On Wed, 5 Sep 2012, Garrett Wollman wrote:
> <<On Wed, 5 Sep 2012 09:54:33 +0000 (UTC), "Bjoern A. Zeeb" <bzeeb-lists@lists.zabbadoz.net> said:
>
>> 4) we (FreeBSD) will be running the own official mirrors much the same
>> way as indicated on the SVN mirror thread. This will be what we
>> will be supporting.
>
> It would have been nice if this had been discussed with the people who
> have volunteered significant resources over the past nearly two
> decades to support FreeBSD by operating mirrors. Say, the ones on
> this mailing-list, perhaps? Rather than just a peremptory "thanks but
> we don't need you any more"?
>
> It may very well be the right thing to do, but it certainly doesn't
> come over well, particularly when (as in my case) people have just
> recently put substantial new resources into their mirrors.
Sorry I am direct rather than beating about the bush, esp. as you
agree it's time to get the news out. You'll find that some of this is
a result of last weeks discussions and the proper writeup is on TODO
lists. The ideas aren't new -- I can easily go back to 2008 and find
postings about CDNs for packages. The fact that it took us quite long
doesn't make it better. But to speak more of a timeline, you'll want to
know that about 2 months ago, I couldn't have told you anything of this
more than general ponderings that had existed for years one way or
another and possibly mostly totally different. The fact that you do
not see an official pkg mirror with packages yet is equally telling I
guess.
HOWEVER:
beware that the old stuff will continue to run for quite a while still,
probably longer than some of us would love to see or think currently,
but we need it, especially if run well (though the majority of mirrors
sadly aren't run well); so your investment in a good FreeBSD mirror site
is worth it and welcome! And we are talking into 2015 here probably (and
things tend to slip) by the current plans to my understanding and probably
a lot of people haven't realized that. So you are getting a multi-year
notice.
That's a lot of time for us to get experience with the current plans.
We might very well as well find that we do have a larger digit number
of users by an order of magnitude or two and suddenly say "oh *beep*,
let's forget about that plan quickly and then again have to figure out
how to equip mirrors with 10TB of usable disk space and 128+G of memory
or half a rack of machines";) The numbers might not be too far off in
total of what we are currently looking at -- though I am guessing
rather than doing maths.
In addition, as I mentioned, feel free to continue to run a mirror for
your local community it's not that you have to stop that out of a sudden
even after the magic year. The fact that we'll provide rsync from the
mirrors for you should tell that. In fact we'll provide you with way
better resources to do this than we currently do should you in a few years
still need or want to mirror.
And yes, we are aware at this point of having "3rd party mirrors" and we
are discussing how to continue to "endorse" (strong word) them to the best
we can for new stuff. The Australian SVN mirror case has clearly shown us
that we need to figure it out. The answer is - don't know yet and certainly
don't know before our own stuff is up and running but will let you as time
comes.
I think that's again my personal summary of what I think is the satte
of affairs but again, consider it informal.
/bz
--
Bjoern A. Zeeb You have to have visions!
Stop bit received. Insert coin for new address family.
Want to link to this message? Use this URL: <https://mail-archive.FreeBSD.org/cgi/mid.cgi?alpine.BSF.2.00.1209051731340.98832>