Discussion about orphaned packages

[Anachron]

So we've talked about this a few times before, but I wanted to get this noted here as well.

We have different type of "Orphaned" packages currently in Void Linux, mainly:

1. System packages that we don't want to have a single maintainer set to
2. Other packages that even though being orphaned only one or a few people actually maintain (like zig)
3. Packages that actually are orphaned because nobody picked them up after their maintainer stopped support

It would be neat if we could somehow find a solution so that:

• We can easily figure out which packages are actual, real orphans (number 3)
• We could ship an utility for people to figure out which packages they use which are currently not maintained by a specific person but should probably be.

What are your thoughts and ideas about this?

[devilsclaw]

Just wondering could you not just check when the package was last modified via git and if its over a certain time that it would be suspect and the have the community list that could be crowd sourced validated ?

[classabbyamp]

this is something i've intended to do for a long time but haven't found the time

[devilsclaw]

Here is a simple example git is slow so it might take a while and there might be a better way

#!/bin/bash

OFS_save="$OFS"
OFS=$'\n'

UNIT_YEAR=31556952
UNIT_MONTH=2629746
UNIT_DAY=86400

MAX_AGE_DAYS=$(( 365 * ${UNIT_DAY} ))

CURR_DATE_DAY=$(expr $(date +"%d") + 0)
CURR_DATE_MONTH=$(expr $(date +"%m") + 0)
CURR_DATE_YEAR=$(expr $(date +"%Y") + 0)

CURR_DATE_SECONDS=$(( (${CURR_DATE_YEAR} * ${UNIT_YEAR}) + (${CURR_DATE_MONTH} * ${UNIT_MONTH}) + (${CURR_DATE_DAY} * ${UNIT_DAY}) ))

for f in $(find ./ | grep "srcpkgs/.*/template$") ; do
	TEMPLATE_DATE=$(git log -1 --pretty="format:%cs" ${f})
	TEMPLATE_DAY=$(expr ${TEMPLATE_DATE:8:2} + 0)
	TEMPLATE_MONTH=$(expr ${TEMPLATE_DATE:5:2} + 0)
	TEMPLATE_YEAR=$(expr ${TEMPLATE_DATE:0:4} + 0)
	TEMPLATE_DATE_SECONDS=$(( (${TEMPLATE_YEAR} * ${UNIT_YEAR}) + (${TEMPLATE_MONTH} * ${UNIT_MONTH}) + (${TEMPLATE_DAY} * ${UNIT_DAY}) ))

	if [ $(( ${CURR_DATE_SECONDS} - ${TEMPLATE_DATE_SECONDS} )) -ge ${MAX_AGE_DAYS} ] ; then
		echo "${TEMPLATE_DATE} : ${f} : TO OLD"
	else
		echo "${TEMPLATE_DATE} : ${f}"
	fi
done

OFS="$OFS_save"

[devilsclaw]

I don't know if this is possible but if you have control of any of the repos you might be able to tracks packages downloaded an how often they are download and give weight values to them for priority and what ones might be able to be dropped.

of course excluding devel packages and what not and only include base packages.

[Anachron]

I'd create a shell script that uses find and mtime and then compares them to the list of orphaned packages.

It should be an easy and fairly straightforward script that I will probably write myself soon. 👍

We could then go from the least recently updated package and create a list of "probably orphaned" pkgs and then mass modify those templates (without revbump) to show their new "orphan type".

I will try to get something done, but I need the help of some core members to double check.

[classabbyamp]

@devilsclaw this issue isn't about packages that have maintainers that should be orphaned, it's about packages that are marked orphaned when they're actually being maintained by a few different people or the core team

[Anachron]

@classabbyamp yeah but how likely is it that a package with orphan is actually maintained when it hasnt been touched in 5 years?

This list wont be perfect, but at least a good start.

Maybe also double check with pending updates. So if a package is orphaned, hasnt been updated in a while but has a new update pending, mark it as probably "real orphan".

[devilsclaw]

There is no perfect method, If you ask people to run a program then you have a limited number of people who will even know about it and even less that would be willing to run said program.

lets say you filter the list of apps that have not touched the template file for a year.

then you see if there is any updates available for that packages originator and if there are no updates to it on voids repo then its orphaned.

if you take the list generated from when last modified that meets the threshold and is still downloaded from the repo then you know its needs to be maintained. if its in the list and no body downloads it then its does not.

[ramblingenzyme]

As someone who isn't familiar with the project, but who is interested in some contribution at the moment, is there a canonical list of the first type of "orphaned" packages, i.e. system packages where we don't want a single maintainer set?

Is there also an opportunity to be explicit about those packages, perhaps with a "system@voidlinux.org" address, to reduce confusion/barrier to entry for newer users/contributors?