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Debian Software Linux

Make the Debian CDs Better by Installing popcon 378

Posted by CowboyNeal from the best-of-the-best dept.
JayBonci writes "Not popcorn, popcon! (Short for popularity-contest) According to a recent message posted to debian-devel-announce, popcon numbers are being used to determine how things get arranged on the 13 CDs of the upcoming Debian stable release. Participation so far has been good, but the project could use more numbers from a broader user base. Please take a moment to install the package 'popularity-contest,' and help us make the distro better by allowing it to send us anonymous package usage statistics. You can see the results at Popularity Contest page."
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Make the Debian CDs Better by Installing popcon More

Make the Debian CDs Better by Installing popcon

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  • I have this... (Score:5, Funny)

    by byolinux ( 535260 ) on Friday March 19, 2004 @08:43PM (#8617032) Journal
    Here's hoping I can get xbill to the top of the list.
    • I love xbill. You just shoot tomatotes at Mr. Gates.

      It remindes me of a dart game I saw on the Apple OS.

    • Re:I have this... (Score:2, Funny)

      by Anonymous Coward
      It says the fact that people have been over Bill. Now they are waiting for someone to come up an xdarl sort of thing.
      • Except that everything starts out as Linux, and Darl walks around taking them down. Hmm.. The Anti-XBill.
        • In xdarl, Darl and Bill would operate together in the shadows. You'd have a large Linux network, Darl will go off in the shadows, get $86 million from Bill, and come back with licenses and lawyers. Actually, in retrospect, it would be cool if someone actually coded this.

  • This is a really good idea (Score:5, Insightful)

    by dealsites ( 746817 ) on Friday March 19, 2004 @08:44PM (#8617036) Homepage
    As a Linux newbie (currently don't have Linux installed, but have used it and plan to install it soon), it would be nice to know which are the most popular packages. Most people would like to have an idea of what the more experienced users use, and thus would like to try it themselves. In addition to knowing the most popular packages, it would probably be a quicker install be having the best ones at the beginning of the installation process instead of having to swap CDs too many times.

    --
    Real time deal updates from all the major deal sites. Search easy and quickly! [dealsites.net]
    • As a Linux newbie (currently don't have Linux installed, but have used it and plan to install it soon), it would be nice to know which are the most popular packages

      I think kernel-image*.deb and libc6*.dev rate quite high.

    • Re:This is a really good idea (Score:3, Insightful)

      by Anonymous Coward
      The most used stuff=the stuff that's installed by default.

      else check freshmeat's popularity ranking
      • Uh, I have never used Tex. And it's installed (and updated) by default by every version of Debian I've tried.
      • How does it determine popularity?

        Does it actually look at what gets used, or just what is installed?

        I have 357 packages installed on my debian machine. Most of those are just there due to my distribution's base install. I was lazy and used knoppix. I don't even use X on that system.

        Now, the packages I actually use on it are:

        vi
        gcc
        perl
        exim
        ssh
        nethack
        apache
        wuft p
        samba
        ices
        icecast

        I'm sure there are a few others, but that is about it really.

        So does it take actually usage into consideration, or just the fact

    • Re:This is a really good idea (Score:5, Insightful)

      by ameoba ( 173803 ) on Friday March 19, 2004 @08:52PM (#8617130)
      The thing about the Debian install process is that you don't need all 13 CDs. After you do the base install, you scan the CDs that you feel like using and they get added to your local list of available packages (be it none, 1,2 or all 13). The first 2 CDs cover most of the stuff that you need to get the system working; by the time you get to the last disc, we're talking about some pretty obscure stuff that only has 3 users (2 of them are the devs and the 3rd is the guy making the package).

      This is already a pretty reasonable distibution of files on the first 2 discs (the installer, OTOH still needs a lot of work; the new installer is a bit nicer than the old one but it doesn't really work all the time & there's some inconsistancies in it (like when you're partitioning drives, the drive labels in fdisk aren't the same as the names you see when you're assigning mountpoints to drives (which isn't even able to recognize swap devices as such & call them swap by default))) but it could always be perfected a bit. I have to wonder why they can't extract this from the logs on the mirrors tho...

      • Re:This is a really good idea (Score:5, Informative)

        by Penguinshit ( 591885 ) on Friday March 19, 2004 @08:56PM (#8617180) Homepage Journal

        Actually, the best way is to just use Disc 1, get the base installation, and then do the rest via network (assuming you're on broadband - I shudder to think what an installation would be like over dialup).

        This way you get the latest "stable" (oxymoron, I know) and all of the security updates as well.

        I install Debian this way all the time (well, every time I'm doing a fresh installation).
        • One time I was planning on doing a network install, after installing the first cd, over dial-up. Unfortunantly I could not get the modem driver to work no matter what. On second though maybe it was for the better.
        • Actually, the best way is to just use Disc 1, get the base installation, and then do the rest via network (assuming you're on broadband - I shudder to think what an installation would be like over dialup).

          Where I work [netmar.com], we have a local 100Mbit Debian stable mirror. When ever we install debian on a customer's machine, or one of our own, we obviously set the apt-sources to use the local. It's usually faster than installing off of multiple CD's (all I've ever seen is debian CD1, I wasn't even aware that th
          • I have a Debian server rented at a hosting company that gets 30Mbps actual throughput to various Debian mirrors and other download sites. Who needs a local mirror, all you need are fat pipes! ;)

        • Re:This is a really good idea (Score:5, Informative)

          by lspd ( 566786 ) on Friday March 19, 2004 @10:38PM (#8617850) Journal
          Actually, the best way is to just use Disc 1, get the base installation, and then do the rest via network (assuming you're on broadband - I shudder to think what an installation would be like over dialup).

          When you can get a DVD+-R to work in another computer, the DVD's (1 for stable, 2 for testing or unstable) are quite nice. If you have hard-drive space to burn you can also grab the ISO's and mount them using loopback devices.

    • Re:This is a really good idea (Score:5, Funny)

      by C10H14N2 ( 640033 ) on Friday March 19, 2004 @08:52PM (#8617133)
      It's pretty easy. 90% of the packages are installed by less, usually FAR less, than half the users. Although, I must admit I found it humorous that the package tracking the usage was installed by less than the total number of users ostensibly reporting.

      WTF?
    • My only issue is:

      The part-timers or learners may have chosen a "default" install, which installs packages that never gets used but are included for "posterity" sake.

      Unless I'm wrong (and please correct me), one of the packages that gets installed by default in all redhat/fedora (where most people start from) seems to be "isdn-utils". And (again, unless I'm wrong), there really is no need for them to be in any default install these days, nor on the 1st CD of anything.
      • That is why I always chose custom for redhat and fedora. Even as a newbie, I was concerned about installing "the wrong thing".

        I'm now playing with mepis, a debian based distro and it installs ADSL/PPPOE on a laptop that only has a wireless Nic.

        I find it amazing that it can see through two routers and figure out that we connect via DSL, but not know that PPOE is not an option on my business lines!

        Other than that, mepis is a great learner system.

    • Bad idea. Reasons:

      • Debian users might not be representative of Linux users. Certainly not newbies.
      • The most popular packages are the ones you don't really have a choice about. (For example, tar.)
      • For a newbie, the vast majority of packages are ones that even if you install, you'll never use directly in the way you think of using a program on Windows. (For example, ncurses.)
      • Where choices do exist, many people will use an older package out of familiarity and habit. (For example, some people swear that thei
      • Debian users might not be representative of Linux users. Certainly not newbies.

        but they're representative of debian users. and this is a poll to determine the needs of debian users. newbies....well, they shouldn't be installing debian by themselves until debian decides that a GUI installer might not be a bad thing. I'm guessing it'll get into stable by 2011. Maybe.

      • Good idea reasons... (Score:5, Interesting)

        by msimm ( 580077 ) on Saturday March 20, 2004 @02:38AM (#8619219) Homepage
        I agree with the above poster, but why this needs to catch on:

        1) We currently have a 0 feedback model for most distro (said distros forum and Slashdot aside).
        2) It WILL tell the developers of a distro a bit about how their distro is being used (lots of data, the deeper they dig the more they learn).
        3) Other distros need to see this as a *requirement*. Popularity-popusmearity, this is customer feed-back! Guess how many times I've been asked how I use my favorite flavor of Linux over the past 5 years?

        I think Debian has hit a little bit of gold here and I hope to see it expand to other distros. These guys work hard to write 100's of useful apps and compile them into a useful operating environment, more information can only help that process so I'm into it.
    • I think that is a Bad Idea(tm). vi/emacs,cli nmap and mpg321 are not what newbies want, they want KWrite, nmapfe and XMMS. Just because more experienced users prefer them, doesn't mean they are the best introduction to a newbie,not by a long shot.

  • 13 CD's!? (Score:2, Insightful)

    by Anonymous Coward
    Why not just make 2 DVD's?

    • Re:13 CD's!? (Score:2, Funny)

      by byolinux ( 535260 )
      I don't have a DVD ROM drive you insensitive clod!

    • Re:13 CD's!? (Score:5, Insightful)

      by tloh ( 451585 ) on Friday March 19, 2004 @08:48PM (#8617070)
      There are many boxes, particularly older hardware, which does not have a DVD-ROM drive.

    • Re:13 CD's!? (Score:4, Informative)

      by raindown ( 234236 ) on Friday March 19, 2004 @08:51PM (#8617122)
      I asked myself this question when buying Unreal Tournament 2004 the other day and when the employee of the store told me they didn't receive any of the Special Edition DVD version. I was kind of baffled as to why they didn't make it a DVD only release, but it kind of makes sense to me.. It's not entirely safe to assume that that many people have DVD-ROMs, at least from a manufacturing perspective. I think that when you register the game you can send your system specs in thus allowing th company to know... Sorry for getting kind of off-topic but the same concept stands true in this case I think. Think of how many people have cd-burners compared to dvd-burners? Probably a big ratio.. so it makes more sense to put everything on a format that almost everyone has access to. (Note: ALMOST)
      • In danger of straying further off-topic:

        What PC with the horsepower to handle Unreal Tournament 2004 doesn't have a DVD drive?

        They are so cheap now, and come standard with most machines.

        Now, to bring it back on topic, I want that Knoppix DVD! It's my favorite install of Debian!

        • Re:13 CD's!? (Score:2, Interesting)

          by tepples ( 727027 )

          [DVD-ROM drives] are so cheap now

          My grandma's computer has a CD-RW and does not have a second front-accessible drive bay to add a DVD-ROM. New cases for Dell motherboards are not necessarily "so cheap now."

        • I got tired of Windows crashing in the middle of playing back a movie on my computer, so when my sister's DVD drive broke I pulled mine and gave it to her. So my high end Athlon system just has a CD-RW. I haven't missed the DVD drive either.

          However, if I wanted to play UT2004, I wouldn't have a problem spending $30-$40 to get a DVD drive.
    • Hey, it beats the hell out the 40(!) floppies that came with the Video Toaster back in ninteeeee....four? And the install required all of them. I suppose I'll never realize how lucky I was that all those disks survived five installs, when now, I see disks that don't live more than six months(high humidity down here) or five or six read/writes.
      • I know the toaster was out in about 1991 - 1992. The newly created Collge TV station/club bought one. S-VHS decks, an Amiga, IIRC, and Video Toaster. :)

        What was that girls name that did the cartwheels for the wipes? Can't remember, but they named the wipe after her. [1]

        [1] not to be confused with the Chem lab where you dried your glassware with 'Kim-wipes'. Heh.
    • I'd say "make both."

      A lot (most?) server boxes don't have DVD drives either.
      • Most of the Dell and IBM Xseries servers I've installed in the last couple years have had DVD drives in them, when even a slimline DVD drive costs only $50 there really is no reason not to include them.
        • Well, that's good news. It's been my experience that although companies may spend ten or twenty large on a server, they often won't opt for the extra $30 for a DVD drive when there's no immediate need.

          If they come standard, however, then that's a Good Thing.

          Personally I just can't believe that DVD drives aren't absolute standard these days. I guess it's because there's so many CDR drives and not so many DVDR drives. Sure, a DVD reader will read both but the majority of people only read CD's... same o

    • Re:13 CD's!? (Score:2, Informative)

      by gabebear ( 251933 )
      I think Debian is still the only OS you can download DVDs [ftp.fsn.hu] for.

      You have to use jigdo [atterer.net], and you can't use Windows to download the image, but it's there.

    • I've burned Debian Woody DVDs using DVD+R, DVD-R and DVD+RW, and the compatability seems to be very bad with older DVD drives. Hopefully one of the Linux magazines will put out the 2 DVD set for Sarge once it's released. DVD recordables just don't cut it and CD sets are getting too large.
    • SuSE Linux has been released on DVD, then on 2 DVDs and the 9.0 version is on a double-sided DVD.

  • It's a failure. (Score:5, Informative)

    by Mr. Darl McBride ( 704524 ) on Friday March 19, 2004 @08:47PM (#8617065)
    I hate to point it out, but the first kernel-image is in 2794th place [debian.org].

    • Re:It's a failure. (Score:3, Informative)

      by arduous ( 91558 )
      By default, Debian doesn't install a package for the kernel, just the kernel itself. Many people leave it with the default kernel that it is installed, local root expoits and all.

      Those who do update the kernel, again probably bypass the debian packages and roll their own kernel to suit their needs.

      Then there is the third group of people will just "apt-get install kernel-image-2.4.18-1-686", and let the magic happen.

      However, everyone (almost) has the adduser package installed.

    • Re:It's a failure. (Score:3, Informative)

      by qtp ( 461286 )
      That's because there are several different kernel-image packages tailored for different purposes (archetecture, processor-type, special use, etc), plus many Debian people build their own custom kernel-image packages using the kernel-package package (251st place).

  • And this (Score:5, Funny)

    by JoeBaldwin ( 727345 ) on Friday March 19, 2004 @08:48PM (#8617075) Homepage Journal
    Is when using Debian to install gnaughty [sf.net] bites you in the ass.

  • I just installed with the Beta 3 installer (Score:5, Informative)

    by cyber_rigger ( 527103 ) on Friday March 19, 2004 @08:49PM (#8617082) Homepage Journal


    The automatic hardware detection is nice.

    http://www.debian.org/devel/debian-installer/ [debian.org]

  • Someone has to say it.. (Score:5, Funny)

    by 3DKnight ( 589972 ) on Friday March 19, 2004 @08:50PM (#8617098)
    I would still go with Popcorn.. at least their kernels taste better!

    oh, i kill me...
  • they should just do a slashdot poll

  • I don't trust it. (Score:5, Funny)

    by Mr. Darl McBride ( 704524 ) on Friday March 19, 2004 @08:53PM (#8617136)
    The results are rigged [debian.org]!!!

    emacs: (emacsen-common) -- 317th place
    vi: (nvi) -- 208th place

    I'd sooner believe we awarded Bush the popular vote!

    • So darl... Any allegations of SCO code being in "adduser"?

    • #rank name . , . , . inst vote old recent no-files
      208 . nvi . . , . . ,1817 597. 1125 95. . 0
      317 . emacsen-common.1558 996. 255 .54. . 253
      odumblamenessfilteroooo ---^

      Yes, vi gets more installations, but approximately 2/3 of them are marked as old.

      Only 1/3 of the people, or 597 people actually use vi.

      For emacs, a mere 1/6 of them are old and 2/3 of the people, or 996 people use it.

  • I had assumed this was being done all along. How are debian packages currently organized in the install set hierarchy? By the way, are there any other front-ends to apt-get in the spirit of Synaptic? Synaptic is a nice program, but seems to be still very buggy.

  • Partial list of most popular apps... (Score:5, Funny)

    by cliffiecee ( 136220 ) on Friday March 19, 2004 @08:59PM (#8617219) Homepage Journal
    gawk
    talk
    date
    wine
    grep
    unzip
    strip
    touch
    finger
    mount
    fsck
    more
    yes
    eject
    umount
    sl eep

    (Stop groaning. Someone had to do it.)

  • Let the flames start (Score:3, Interesting)

    by r00zky ( 622648 ) on Friday March 19, 2004 @09:01PM (#8617240)
    Current popularity rankings:

    vi (287) beats emacs (317) :)
    gnome (333) beats kde (586) :(
    linux (251) beats hurd (13608) :o
    lynx (281) beats mozilla (378) :????

  • popularity contest package (Score:4, Insightful)

    by MrWim ( 760798 ) on Friday March 19, 2004 @09:01PM (#8617247)
    The package popularity-contest is 42nd on the list with 18 less installs than the top packages, so how did these 18 people submit thier scores to the popularity contest?
  • Great.... just when the novelty of not having to create 20 floppies to install debian began to wear off...

    But, honestly, why can't we use a system like was used in the latter days of the debian floppy installer? The 20 floppies contained a base-install with everything necessary to connect to the internet and download the rest of the system, which was a LOT less than the normal ISO image. This was a godsend for anybody on 56k.

  • vi/vim vs. emacs (Score:5, Interesting)

    by Peaker ( 72084 ) <gnupeaker @ y a h oo.com> on Friday March 19, 2004 @09:26PM (#8617462) Homepage
    When comparing the popularity of the two, do not forget that vi is fairly standard and that vim is fairly small.

    This means that whoever uses emacs should have no problem also installing vi/vim, while those who use vi/vim wouldn't typically install emacs/xemacs, which are much larger.

  • Security... (Score:4, Insightful)

    by dysprosia ( 661648 ) on Friday March 19, 2004 @09:27PM (#8617469)
    Since it's using e-mail (don't know about encryption or methods of encoding), wouldn't it be rather simple to pervert the statistics in order to promote some software? A mass-mailing would be obvious, but if it's done properly it may look convincing...
    • That's exactly what I was thinking. I could easily make a subnet of "virtual" installations and prevert the stats.

      However, I think there is little reason to. It doesn't actually promote a piece of software -- getting your piece on the first disk would just mean that more people whould have to use the 2d disk, not that more people would see or install your software.

      Essentially, this is a cooperative effort -- the installers don't want to download stuff they don't need, the distributors don't want to get

  • Slightly OT (Score:4, Informative)

    by Trashman ( 3003 ) on Friday March 19, 2004 @09:31PM (#8617505)
    In case people are reading this and think it's cool and want to try Debian out. I suggest they read this [linuxmafia.com] page before they go looking for ISO's to burn.

    The Official Debian installer is one the things people heavily judge the distro by.

  • Will Debian actually release a new STABLE? (Score:3, Insightful)

    by MickLinux ( 579158 ) on Friday March 19, 2004 @09:34PM (#8617525) Journal
    I was waiting for a new Stable version after Woody, I guess, 2 years ago. Eventually, I sortof gave up.

    This article seems to imply that such a release is actually going to happen.

    Is it?

    • Re:Will Debian actually release a new STABLE? (Score:5, Informative)

      by bfree ( 113420 ) on Friday March 19, 2004 @10:15PM (#8617726)

      Debian will release the next STABLE version when it's ready, always their answer. You can think of debian stable as having always done the sort of stuff RedHat, Mandrake and Suse are all looking to do now, build long term releases not "forcing" full system upgrades every few months. That all being said even Debian are hoping to speed up the release process, the next release will be the first release to come out of testing and is ironing out the kinks in that system. Also, it is moving rapidly towards a release. Debian-installer is now usable (for certain values of usable) on 6 platforms and the release critical bugs [debian.org] are dropping down to where a release should be quickly achievable (once all the main pieces are in place). I would be surprised if debian doesn't release before the Autumn (I'd guess June/July).

      As the other reply to your post pointed out though, if stable doesn't do you testing (or even unstable) should do it!

    • Well, not quite 2 years ago, but close. July 19th, 2002.

      I also use four different methods for getting stuff that's not in stable (or ancient on stable) into my systems:

      1) debian source packages
      2) Source - like, source source. :)
      3) backports.org
      4) version pinning (which I do less of now that I do (3) above.

      HTH

  • I vote no! (Score:4, Insightful)

    by UrGeek ( 577204 ) on Friday March 19, 2004 @09:38PM (#8617547)
    Bad idea. Doing the most popular thang is far and different from doing the right thang in many case. As Robert Plant put it, "I am not a prisoner of your hit parade". DESIGN NOT POLLING!
  • w00t! I beat out 9wm! Go me!

  • Some questions and a suggestion. (Score:3, Interesting)

    by eddy ( 18759 ) on Friday March 19, 2004 @10:06PM (#8617677) Homepage Journal

    Will I get a CC of what is sent out?

    Also, wouldn't it be a good idea to ask the user on installation of popcon if this is a "desktop-" or "server-type" install of debian, and tag the data with that? That way we could have (beyond split statistics) jigdo/people compiling well composed CDs for those two different purposes. I'm guessing the software layout could be significantly different.

    I guess you could infer the type from the data itself, but...

    And no, I haven't RTFM. Yet.

  • Architectures: "Unknown" Holds #2 (Score:3, Insightful)

    by cmholm ( 69081 ) <cmholm@mauihol m . o rg> on Friday March 19, 2004 @10:32PM (#8617817) Homepage Journal
    I'm one of the small number of folks running Debian on an old Powermac, so I'm glad for the log scale on the architectures plot to help pull "my" group out of the noise. It bothers me that a very large fraction come up as architecture "unknown". I don't see a "--mind-your-own-damn-business" flag in the manpage, so what's with that?

  • Haw about this? (Score:2, Interesting)

    by melted ( 227442 )
    Simply put these 13 CDs on 2 DVDs and get over it. For whiners who are still on modem links there's always network install.
  • I find it funny that people think this is a great idea, but if Microsoft did 1/10th of what they're doing everyone would freak. People go nuts about windows registration sending a serial number. This article would have fallen under YRO also. But I know the response, at least you guys would have the source to Popcon and know what it transmits, but how many people are going to go sifting through that? Not meant to troll, just pointing out some bias.

    (Modding this down hurts my feelings)

    • I find it funny that people think this is a great idea, but if Microsoft did 1/10th of what they're doing everyone would freak. People go nuts ... This article would have fallen under YRO also. ...pointing out some bias.

      Points to remember, before you starting crying 'Bias':

      • Microsoft might not even tell you they are doing this, but they do tell you.
      • Microsoft might put it in some obscure corner of EULA and say that you have been told.
      • Microsoft might make it a violation of EULA, DMCA, Patriot Act, Whatev
    • Ever hear the word before? No-one is required tio install this package in order to use Debian, get support from the mailing list, or to upgrade thier software.

      This is not registration, it is not collecting personal, financial, addressbook, or browsing habit data. It's counting the software that you have installed, how often that package is used and how often it was upgraded.

      Microsoft does collect this sort of data from their customers, and more.

      They don't ask you if you want to participate. Whether or

  • I feel like (Score:2, Insightful)

    by Tsiangkun ( 746511 )
    if microsoft said they were bundling a software tracking system to their products people would flip out. I think people would be right to get upset at someone else telling you what you are going to be sharing. This is a Linux dtstribution saying -->HERE-- is a program that might let us track popular software installations. . . Install it if you want to. That 'if you want to' part is what makes this acceptable to me. --Tsiangkun
  • > determine how things get arranged on the 13 CDs of the upcoming Debian stable release

    Why not just make a DVD image? I know not all people have DVDs but it would be cool as an alternative. It will also be nice if they distributed their ISOs via BitTotrrent.

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