[arch-releng] Things beyond 2009.01/02

[Aaron Griffin]

On Sun, Feb 1, 2009 at 10:52 AM, Gerhard Brauer <gerbra at archlinux.de> wrote:
> a) Number of different ISOs/Images:

While you are pro-isolinux, I am pro-grub. I think isolinux is crap
and is very inflexible, whereas grub allows us to do much more. For
the record, there is hardware that isolinux images fail on too.

Regarding our sheer number of ISOs, I would prefer reducing it by
providing only ONE iso (the current 'ftp' ISO) and providing
additional images that just contain packages. We'd need some
functionality in the installer to swap out disks, though.

That cuts our images in half. Even if that's the only change we make, it's huge.

1 usb image, 1 iso image, for each arch = 4 images
2 isolinux images
= 6 basic images

1 package iso image, 1 package iso
= 2 package sets
---
8 images

Additionally, releasing dual arch ISOs would be a good idea, but it
effectively doubles the size of the images. I would prefer releasing
only an i686 ISO, and giving it the ability to install an x86_64
system *if* the hardware supports it. I've been thinking about this a
little and have some ideas going forward.

This would shrink the above down to 3 basic images, and 2 images that
contain packages.

> b) Release "branding"
I don't like branding each release. It's a focus on marketing and not
on technical pursuits. If we're telling people to use the new ISO
because it has a better name, and not because it was actually
improved, then we've failed.

> c) Installer switch
Yes, after this is out, we should officially deprecate the
archlinux-installer in favor of AIF.

> d) Accessibility support on install mediums
I would love to be able to support this on our normal install mediums,
but I wonder if adding additional features that require things enabled
is going to make it difficult. i.e. if a grub param needs to be added
to start espeakup (or whatever it's called), is this going to be
HARDER for a blind user?

> e) Testing and documentation
> IMHO we should document such things as archiso's work-flow, HowTo for
> ISO/image building and releasing steps. Also things like torrent setup
> etc.

I plan on adding information of this sort to the archiso docs, and
including that in the git repo. Keep in mind that I will be releasing
an archiso 1.0 package once we get this ISO out the door.