GLEP: 42 Title: Critical News Reporting Version: $Revision: 1.5 $ Author: Ciaran McCreesh Last-Modified: $Date: 2005/12/13 03:21:59 $ Status: Draft Type: Standards Track Content-Type: text/x-rst Created: 31-Oct-2005 Post-History: 1-Nov-2005, 5-Nov-2005, 7-Nov-2005, 11-Dec-2005, 13-Dec-2005 Abstract ======== This GLEP proposes a new way of informing users about important updates and news regarding tree-related items. Motivation ========== Although most package updates are clean and require little user action, occasionally an upgrade requires user intervention during the upgrade process. Recent examples of the latter include the ``gcc-3.4`` stabilisation on ``x86`` and the ``mysql-4.1`` database format changes. There are currently several ways of delivering important news items to our users, none of them particularly effective: * Gentoo Weekly News * The ``gentoo-announce``, ``gentoo-user`` and ``gentoo-dev`` mailing lists * The Gentoo Forums * The main Gentoo website * RSS feeds of Gentoo news * ``einfo`` and ``ewarn`` messages in ``pkg_setup`` or ``pkg_postinst`` A more reliable way of getting news of critical updates out to users is required to avoid repeats of the various recent upgrade debacles. This GLEP proposes a solution based around pushing news items out to the user via the ``rsync`` tree. .. Important:: This GLEP does not seek to replace or modify ``einfo`` messages which are displayed post-install. That is a separate issue which is handled by ``elog`` [#bug-11359]_. Requirements ============ An adequate solution must meet all of the following requirements: Preemptive Users should be told of changes *before* they break a system, not after the damage has already been done. Ideally, the system administrator would be given ample warning to plan difficult upgrades and changes, rather than only being told just before action is necessary. No user subscription required It has already been demonstrated [#forums-apache2]_ that many users do not read the ``gentoo-announce`` mailing list or ``RSS`` feeds. A solution which requires subscription has no advantage over current methods. No user monitoring required It has already been demonstrated [#forums-apache2]_ that many users do not read news items posted to the Gentoo website, or do not read news items until it is too late. A solution that relies upon active monitoring of a particular source has no advantage over current methods. Relevant System administrators who do not use a particular package should not have to read news items which affect purely that package. Some news items may be of relevance to most or all users, but those that are not should not be forced upon users unnecessarily. Lightweight It is not reasonable to expect all users to have an MTA, web browser, email client, cron daemon or text processing suite available on their system. Users must not be forced to install unreasonable extra software to be able to read news items. No privacy violations Users of the solution should not be required to provide information about their systems (for example, IP addresses or installed packages). Multiple delivery method support Some users may wish to view news items via email, some via a terminal and some via a web browser. A solution should either support all of these methods or (better still) make it simple to write clients for displaying news items in different ways. The following characteristics would be desirable: Internationalisable Being able to provide messages in multiple languages may be beneficial. Quality control There should be some way to ensure that badly written or irrelevant messages are not sent out, for example by inexperienced developers or those whose English language skills are below par. Simple for developers Posting news items should be as simple as is reasonably possible. Simple for users Reading relevant news items should be as simple as is reasonably possible. Compatibility with existing and future news sources A news system would ideally be able to be integrated with existing news sources (for example, Forums, GWN, the main Gentoo website) without excessive difficulty. Similarly, easy interoperation with any future news sources should not be precluded. Specification ============= Overview -------- News items are published and delivered to users as follows: 1. A news item is written. The format to be used is described below. 2. The news item is reviewed, following the process described in `News Item Quality Control`_. 3. The news item is committed to a CVS (or Subversion [#glep-36]_) repository. From here, it is merged with the rsync tree. This is described in `News Item Distribution`_. 4. Users fetch the news item when they sync. This ensures that the news items in question are pushed to the user before the user accidentally makes an unwanted change. No changes to the existing rsync process are required by this GLEP. 5. The package manager filters the news item and, if it is relevant, marks the news item for reading. The package manager should also display a notice informing the user that there are unread news items. 6. The news item is handled by the user's choice of news item reader. See `News Item Clients`_. News Item Identities -------------------- Each news item will have a unique identifier. This identifier will be in the form ``yyyy-mm-dd-short-name``, where ``yyyy`` is the year (e.g. ``2005``), ``mm`` is the month (``01`` through ``12``) and dd is the day of the month (``01`` through ``31``). The ``short-name`` is a very short name describing the news item (e.g. ``yoursql-updates``), consisting only of the characters ``a-z``, ``0-9``, ``+`` (plus), ``:`` (colon) and ``-`` (hyphen). News Item Directories --------------------- Each news item will be represented by a directory whose name is the same as the news item's identifier. The directory will contain a file named ``yyyy-mm-dd-short-name.en.txt``, which contains the text of the news item, in English, in the format described below. If a news item is translated, other files named ``yyyy-mm-dd-short-name.xx.txt`` (where ``xx`` is the ISO 639 [#iso-639]_ two letter country code) will also be provided. However, only the English version of a news item is authoritative. This anglocentricity is justified by precedent [#glep-34]_. News Item Files --------------- A news item file is a text file, encoded using UTF-8 [#rfc-3629]_ for compatibility with and for the same reasons as existing Gentoo documentation [#docs-policy]_ and the tree [#glep-31]_. News items should be signed with a detached GPG signature: :: gpg --armour --detach-sign ????-??-??-*.??.txt A news item file's content will consist of an RFC 822 style header [#rfc-822]_ followed by the main body of the message as plain text. This GLEP defines various optional and mandatory headers. Future GLEPs may propose new headers — tools handling these news items must ignore any unrecognised header. News Item Headers ''''''''''''''''' The following headers describe the purpose and format of the news item: ``Title:`` A short (maximum 44 characters) descriptive title. Mandatory. ``Author:`` Author's name and email address, in the form ``Real Name ``. Mandatory; multiple author headers may be specified if appropriate. ``Translator:`` For translated news items, the translator's name and email address. Multiple translator headers may be specified if appropriate. ``Content-Type:`` Must be ``text/plain``. Mandatory. ``Posted:`` Date of posting, in ``dd-mmm-yyyy`` format (e.g. 14-Aug-2001) for compatibility with GLEP 1 [#glep-1]_. UTC time in ``hh-mm-ss +0000`` format may also be included. Mandatory. ``Revision:`` Initially 1. Incremented every time a non-trivial change is made. Changes which require a re-read of the news item should instead use a new news item file. Mandatory. ``News-Item-Format:`` Must be ``1.0``. Future revisions to the format may increment the minor number for backwards-compatible changes, or the major number for major changes. The following headers are used for filtering: ``Display-If-Installed:`` A dependency atom or simple package name (for example, ```` (which may also include a red warning message) * Before an ``emerge --ask `` sequence The package manager may use a timestamp check file to avoid having to process news items unnecessarily. The package manager must keep track of news items that have already been added to the unread list to avoid repeatedly marking a deleted news item. This could be handled via a ``news-magic-chicken.skip`` file, but implementation is not specified by this GLEP. Users who really don't care about news items can use ``rsync_excludes`` to filter out the ``metadata/news/`` directory. News Item Clients ----------------- Once a news item is marked for reading, third party tools (or traditional core Unix tools) can be used to display and view the news files. When a news item is read, its name should be removed from the ``news-magic-chicken.unread`` file. If a news client acts as an interactive reader rather than a gateway, it should then add the name to a ``news-magic-chicken.read`` file in the same directory with the same file format (again, ``magic-chicken`` should be a wildcard rather than hardcoded). An ``eselect`` [#eselect]_ module shall be created as the 'suggested' display tool; other display tools (for example, a news to email forwarder, which would be ideal for users who sync on a ``cron``) are left as options for those who desire them. News Item Removal ----------------- News items can be removed (by removing the news file from the main tree) when they are no longer relevant, if they are made obsolete by a future news item or after a long period of time. This is the same as the method used for ``updates`` entries. Integration with Existing Systems ================================= It would be simple to convert these news items into the format used for news items on the Gentoo website or posts for the ``gentoo-announce`` mailing list. There is an existing automated tool [#forums-glsa]_ for posting GLSAs to the forums. A similar tool can be used for these news items. Backwards Compatibility ======================= Backwards compatibility is not a concern here. Existing tools will simply ignore the ``news/`` directory. Reference Implementation ======================== Portage Code ------------ TODO Simple ``eselect`` News Client ------------------------------ TODO Removed until the exact format details are figured out. Simple News to Mail Forwarder ----------------------------- TODO Removed until the exact format details are figured out. Credits ======= The idea behind notifying users of news updates via Portage comes from Stuart Herbert [#stuart-blog]_. Thanks to Lance Albertson, Stephen Bennett, Donnie Berkholz, Grant Goodyear, Brian Harring, Dan Meltzer, Jason Stubbs, Paul de Vrieze and Alec Warner for input. Some of the ideas presented here are theirs, others go completely against their suggestions. Example Files ============= TODO Removed until the exact format details are figured out. References ========== .. [#bug-11359] Bugzilla Bug 11359 "[NEW FEATURE] pkg_postinst/pkg_preinst ewarn/einfo logging", https://bugs.gentoo.org/show_bug.cgi?id=11359 .. [#docs-policy] Gentoo XML Guide, Daniel Robbins et al., http://www.gentoo.org/doc/en/xml-guide.xml .. [#eselect] eselect modular framework for configuration and administration utilities, http://www.gentoo.org/proj/en/eselect/index.xml .. [#forums-glsa] Forums user GLSA, http://forums.gentoo.org/profile.php?mode=viewprofile&u=55648 .. [#forums-apache2] Forums thread "Gentoo Apache2 Config Change Idiocy", http://forums.gentoo.org/viewtopic-t-384368.html .. [#glep-1] GLEP 1: "GLEP Purpose and Guidelines", Grant Goodyear, http://www.gentoo.org/proj/en/glep/glep-0001.html .. [#glep-22] GLEP 22: "New "keyword" system to incorporate various userlands/kernels/archs", Grant Goodyear, http://www.gentoo.org/proj/en/glep/glep-0022.html .. [#glep-31] GLEP 31: "Character Sets for Portage Tree Items", Ciaran McCreesh, http://www.gentoo.org/proj/en/glep/glep-0031.html .. [#glep-34] GLEP 34: "Per-Category metadata.xml Files", Ciaran McCreesh, http://www.gentoo.org/proj/en/glep/glep-0034.html .. [#glep-36] GLEP 36: "Subversion/CVS for Gentoo Hosted Projects", Aaron Walker, http://www.gentoo.org/proj/en/glep/glep-0036.html .. [#iso-639] ISO 639 "Code for the representation of names of languages" .. [#ramereth-repo] "Re: [gentoo-dev] GLEP ??: Critical News Reporting", Lance Albertson, http://marc.theaimsgroup.com/?l=gentoo-dev&m=113111585907703&w=2 .. [#rfc-822] RFC 822 "Standard for the format of ARPA Internet text messages" .. [#rfc-3629] RFC 3629: "UTF-8, a transformation format of ISO 10646" http://www.ietf.org/rfc/rfc3629.txt .. [#stuart-blog] "Favouring an automatic news mechanism", Stuart Herbert, http://stu.gnqs.org/diary/gentoo.php/2005/10/28/favouring_an_automatic_news_mechanism Copyright ========= This document has been placed in the public domain. .. vim: set tw=80 fileencoding=utf-8 spell spelllang=en et :