FWN/Issue258

= Fedora Weekly News Issue 258 =

Welcome to Fedora Weekly News Issue 258 for the week ending January 12, 2010. What follows are some highlights from this issue.

We have a shorter issue this week as several teams are still ramping up after the year-end break. In announcements, a call for input at Friday Fedora Board IRC meeting, and development announcements for evolution data server, gtk2, and a heads up that EPEL 6 will be moving to beta soon. In Ambassador news, one new Ambassador this week, representing Bangladesh. Also a summary of list traffic from both the Ambassadors and FAMScO lists. Quality Assurance reports on Fedora 15 Test Days planning, with the first test day scheduled at the end of January. Our issue wraps up with details on the security-related packages released this past week for Fedora 13 and 14. Enjoy!

An audio version of some issues of FWN - FAWN - are available! You can listen to existing issues on the Internet Archive. If anyone is interested in helping spread the load of FAWN production, please contact us!

If you are interested in contributing to Fedora Weekly News, please see our 'join' page. We welcome reader feedback: news@lists.fedoraproject.org

FWN Editorial Team: Pascal Calarco, Adam Williamson

Announcements
In this section, we cover announcements from the Fedora Project, including general announcements, development announcements and Events.

Contributing Writer: Rashadul Islam

Fedora Announcement News
The announcement list is always exclusive for the Fedora Community. Please, visit the past announcements at

Your input requested at the Fedora Board IRC meeting this Friday
Fedora Project Leader Jared K. Smith announced on Thu Jan 6 13:04:42 UTC 2011,

"Over the past few months, the Fedora Board has focused on coming up with two or three overarching goals that can be accomplished over the next few release cycles. We've got a fairly healthy list of goals at this point, and welcome your input in helping us decide which two or three goals are most important.  The Fedora Board will be having its bi-weekly IRC meeting this coming Friday, and we invite you to attend that meeting and share your input with us.  Instead of our normal question and answer session, we'll instead focus on prioritizing our list of goals.

The meeting is in the #fedora-board-meeting channel on the Freenode IRC network at 2:00pm EST (19:00 UTC). In order to keep the meeting organized and easy to follow, we ask that participants follow the instructions in the "General Rules" section of ."

Fedora Development News
The development list is intended to be a LOW TRAFFIC announce-only list for Fedora development.

Acceptable Types of Announcements
 * Policy or process changes that affect developers.
 * Infrastructure changes that affect developers.
 * Tools changes that affect developers.
 * Schedule changes
 * Freeze reminders

Unacceptable Types of Announcements
 * Periodic automated reports (violates the INFREQUENT rule)
 * Discussion
 * Anything else not mentioned above

evolution-data-server (2.91.5) soname bump and library files location changes in Rawhide
Milan Crha announced on Mon Jan 10 10:06:25 UTC 2011,

"with the recent evolution-data-server 2.91.5 release in Rawhide are done some internal changes in the soname versions and a location where the backend files for the addressbook and calendar should be saved.

>From the commit log:

Change the installation path for E-D-S backends. Address book and calendar backend modules are now split into different installation directories so the D-Bus factory processes will only load relevant backend modules.

This changes some pkg-config details for third-party backend modules. Instead of querying the backend directory with: pkg-config --variable=extensiondir evolution-data-server-1.2

you must query the directory for address book backends with: pkg-config --variable=backenddir libedata-book-1.2

and the directory for calendar backends with: pkg-config --variable=backenddir libedata-cal-1.2"

gtk2 2.99.0
Matthias Clasen on Mon Jan 10 20:00:33 UTC 2011 announced ,

"I have just tagged gtk3-2.99.0 into rawhide. There are abi and api changes, so all dependent packages will have to be rebuilt (the most obvious change is that the libraries are now called libg[dt]k-3.0.so instead of libg[gt]k-x11-3.0.so).

There are a number of api changes that I am not going to list one-by-one here, the following changes are relevant for packagers:


 * gtk-update-icon-cache-3.0 and gtk-builder-convert-3.0 have been dropped (since they were identical to their un-suffixed cousins in the gtk2 package). If you are using gtk-update-icon-cache in %post of a gtk3-using package, you should add Requires(post): /usr/bin/gtk-update-icon-cache (and similar for %postun).


 * The .pc files no longer define a 'target' variable, instead there is a 'targets' variable which can contain multiple gdk backend names (for now, it is still just 'x11', eventually it might change to be 'x11 wayland' or so). Some configure scripts use that variable to detect the platform they are running on and will need adjustment.

I have built most packages that had a gtk3 dependency already, and tagged them into rawhide. The following are the leftovers:


 * gtkmm30
 * libindicator-gtk3
 * tracker
 * gedit
 * gnome-color-manager
 * gnome-nettool
 * gtk-vnc2
 * eekboard
 * input-pad
 * ibus-input-pad
 * seahorse-plugins
 * rhythmbox"

bodhi v0.7.10 production update
Luke Macken on Mon Jan 10 23:46:02 UTC 2011 announced ,

"I just pushed a new release of bodhi into production.

It's a minor release that contains a small number of fixes, including:

Backend bug fixes

 * Don't try and remove the -pending koji tags when resuming a push
 * Don't fetch security bug details when resuming a push
 * Don't show obsolete critpath updates in our testing digest
 * Ensure the updateinfo epoch is '0' as opposed to None (rel-eng#3971)
 * Stop spamming proventesters with old critpath mails, as this data is available in the updates-testing digests that go out with each push

Web frontend changes

 * Fix the testing status tooltips for EPEL (#486)
 * Add the update ID back to the search results (#558)
 * Don't hide updates that are not approved by the security team from the admin push view, since we no longer require approval

API changes (for AutoQA)

 * Support querying and commenting on updates by the Update ID, as well as title

Tool changes

 * Make `bodhi --push-type` work for updates going to testing as well as stable (rel-eng only)
 * Add pkg_resources __requires__ hacks to get things working on F14

As always, please file tickets here: https://fedorahosted.org/bodhi/newticket

Thanks,"

New test case and package test plan creation SOPs in production: call for test cases!
Adam Williamson on Tue Jan 11 13:21:02 UTC 2011 announced ,

"Hi, everyone. Thanks to everyone who sent feedback on the drafts for the test case and package test plan creation SOPs. I have now put these SOPs into production, at the following addresses:

I have created links to them from other places in the QA wiki space. It would be nice to have them called out from within the developers/package maintainers space, but I'm not sure where would be appropriate: does anyone have suggestions?

Now these are in production, it would be great if people could start contributing test cases for packages, particularly test cases covering critical path functions. If you maintain a critical path package, please take a look at these two SOPs, and consider contributing test cases covering at least the critical path functionality of your package; this would help us greatly, and contribute to the improvement of critical path testing by the proven testers. For the QA group, please also consider contributing critical path test cases - you don't have to be a maintainer of a package to do it! If you know how to test the critical path functionality of a given package, please read the SOPs, write up test case(s) to do it, and categorize them appropriately. Thanks a lot!"

EPEL6 moving from Beta to release status soon
Kevin Fenzi on Tue Jan 11 21:33:21 UTC 2011 announced ,

"Greetings.

Just a heads up that EPEL will soon be moving it's EPEL6 branch from the Beta mode (like rawhide) that it's been in to a release mode (like EPEL4/5 are). (I have cc'ed Fedora's devel-announce here as there may be people not on the epel-devel list that might find this of interest).

Timeline:
2011-01-13 - Have any builds you wish done before release done. After this point you will need to request a package be tagged into the stable or testing repos or wait until bodhi is up for EPEL6. 2011-01-14 - EPEL rel-eng will work on composing and moving things around. This may include untagging packages that have broken deps, or moving them into testing, test composing, etc. Hopefully we can mirror out trees.

2011-01-15 2011-01-16 - Maintainers encouraged to check new trees and help with wiki prep, etc.

2011-01-17 - Bodhi will be enabled for EPEL6 and things will move to a release mode: All packages spend 2 weeks in testing or +3 karma, bodhi is used for updates, buildroot overrides are required as usual.

2011-01-18 - RELEASE DAY. Help with press release or announcements would be welcome.

Work/help needed:

 * Would be great if someone could make us a press release and had a way to distribute it out.
 * We need work on our wiki pages. A EPEL6 FAQ would be very nice.
 * Maintainers need to determine what packages they want to ship for EPEL6. If you do not want to ship whats there now, please untag it before thursday.

Feel free to drop by #epel on freenode or drop an email to the

Thanks for all the work folks, and enjoy EPEL6!"

Fedora Events
Fedora events are the exclusive and source of marketing, learning and meeting all the fellow community people around you. So, please mark your agenda with the following events to consider attending or volunteering near you!

Upcoming Events (Dec 2010 - Feb 2011)

 * North America (NA)
 * Central & South America (LATAM):
 * Europe, Middle East, and Africa (EMEA)
 * India, Asia, Australia (India/APJ)

Past Events
Archive of Past Fedora Events

Additional information

 * Reimbursements -- reimbursement guidelines.
 * Budget -- budget for the current quarter (as distributed by FAMSCo).
 * Sponsorship -- how decisions are made to subsidize travel by community members.
 * Organization -- event organization, budget information, and regional responsibility.
 * Event reports -- guidelines and suggestions.
 * LinuxEvents -- a collection of calendars of Linux events.

Ambassadors
This section covers the news surrounding the Fedora Ambassadors Project.

Contributing Writer: Sankarshan Mukhopadhyay

This week the Fedora Ambassadors Project had a new member joining.

Moniruzzaman Monir from Bangladesh mentored by Caius Chance

Summary of traffic on Ambassadors mailing list
Max Spevack informed about post FOSDEM Super Bowl party at Brussels

Bertrand Juglas informed about the non-selection of the Lightning Talk at FOSDEM 2011

Caius Chance provided responses to "Flood in Brisbane" questions

Note: For a reasonably current update on the situation one can click here

Bogomil Shopov and others worked out room sharing details at FOSDEM

Paul W Frields forwarded a query from Cheryn Tan at Red Hat's Brisbane office for Fedora 14 media required for Linux.conf.au. Harish Pillay responded with the information and status update on the media production

Summary of events reported on Ambassadors mailing list
No events were reported for this cycle of the Ambassadors Beat

Summary of traffic on FAmSCo mailing list
Larry Cafiero posted the Minutes/Log from FAmNA meeting on 2011-01-04

Pierros Papadeas posted FAmSCo Agenda for 2011-01-08 meeting with mention of the Ambassador SOPs Joerg Simon requested that the FAmSCo also put a priority to goals

Max Spevack (re-)introduced Harish Pillay to FAmSCo as the person designated to be the primary point of contact for community related issues in the APAC region.

Joerg Simon asked the FAmSCo about continuing with the monthly reports

Pierros Papadeas posted Minutes of the FAmSCo meeting on 2011-01-08

Igor Pires Soares posted about a possible topic structure for the monthly reports from FAmSCo

David Nalley wrote about a meeting with the Board with specific focus on the goals FAmSCo would like to achieve within the next release or two

QualityAssurance
In this section, we cover the activities of the QA team. For more information on the work of the QA team and how you can get involved, see the Joining page.

Contributing Writer: Adam Williamson

Test Days
The Fedora 15 Test Day calendar is starting to take shape, and you can see what events are planned so far on the Wiki page. The first Test Day slot is 2011-01-27. If you would like to propose a main track Test Day for the Fedora 15 cycle, please contact the QA team via email or IRC, or file a ticket in QA Trac. This week, Adam Williamson rescheduled the Graphics Test Week to late February and created the pages for it. Rui He proposed a preupgrade Test Day.

Test case management system proposal and requirements
Rui He continued to work on evaluating the possibility of a test case management system (TCMS) for Fedora. There was some useful feedback on the trac ticket and Rui updated the Wiki page comparing the current Wiki-based system with the Nitrate TCMS.

Security Advisories
In this section, we cover Security Advisories from fedora-package-announce from the past week.

http://lists.fedoraproject.org/pipermail/package-announce

Contributing Writer: Pascal Calarco

Fedora 14 Security Advisories

 * pyfribidi-0.10.0-1.fc14 - http://lists.fedoraproject.org/pipermail/package-announce/2011-January/052935.html
 * wordpress-mu-2.9.2-2.fc14 - http://lists.fedoraproject.org/pipermail/package-announce/2011-January/052932.html
 * evince-2.32.0-3.fc14 - http://lists.fedoraproject.org/pipermail/package-announce/2011-January/052910.html
 * wordpress-2.8.6-3.fc14 - http://lists.fedoraproject.org/pipermail/package-announce/2011-January/052879.html
 * collectd-4.9.4-1.fc14 - http://lists.fedoraproject.org/pipermail/package-announce/2011-January/052875.html
 * pidgin-2.7.9-1.fc14 - http://lists.fedoraproject.org/pipermail/package-announce/2011-January/052862.html

Fedora 13 Security Advisories

 * pyfribidi-0.10.0-1.fc13 - http://lists.fedoraproject.org/pipermail/package-announce/2011-January/052936.html
 * wordpress-mu-2.9.2-2.fc13 - http://lists.fedoraproject.org/pipermail/package-announce/2011-January/052917.html
 * webkitgtk-1.2.6-1.fc13 - http://lists.fedoraproject.org/pipermail/package-announce/2011-January/052906.html
 * pidgin-2.7.9-1.fc13 - http://lists.fedoraproject.org/pipermail/package-announce/2011-January/052905.html
 * wordpress-2.8.6-3.fc13 - http://lists.fedoraproject.org/pipermail/package-announce/2011-January/052892.html