</para>
<para>
The main channel for Debian development is <literal>#debian-devel</literal>.
-It is a very active channel since usually over 150 people are always logged in.
+It is a very active channel; it will typically have a minimum of 150 people
+at any time of day.
It's a channel for people who work on Debian, it's not a support channel
(there's <literal>#debian</literal> for that). It is however open to anyone
who wants to lurk (and learn). Its topic is commonly full of interesting
If you need to use a Version Control System for any of your Debian work,
you can use one the existing repositories hosted on Alioth or you can
request a new project and ask for the VCS repository of your choice.
-Alioth supports CVS (alioth.debian.org), Subversion
+Alioth supports CVS (cvs.alioth.debian.org/cvs.debian.org), Subversion
(svn.debian.org), Arch (tla/baz, both on arch.debian.org), Bazaar
(bzr.debian.org), Darcs (darcs.debian.org), Mercurial (hg.debian.org) and Git
(git.debian.org). Checkout <ulink url="&url-alioth-pkg;" /> if you plan
to maintain packages in a VCS repository. See <xref linkend="alioth"/> for
information on the services provided by Alioth.
</para>
-<para>
-Historically, Debian first used <literal>cvs.debian.org</literal> to host
-CVS repositories. But that service is deprecated in favor of Alioth.
-Only a few projects are still using it.
-</para>
</section>
<section id="dchroot">
<title>The Debian archive</title>
<para>
The &debian-formal; distribution consists of a lot of packages
-(<filename>.deb</filename>'s, currently around
-&number-of-pkgs;) and a few additional files (such as
-documentation and installation disk images).
+(currently around &number-of-pkgs; source packages) and a few additional
+files (such as documentation and installation disk images).
</para>
<para>
Here is an example directory tree of a complete Debian archive:
<para>
Packages which do not conform to the DFSG are placed in the
<literal>non-free</literal> section. These packages are not considered as
-part of the Debian distribution, though we support their use, and we provide
+part of the Debian distribution, though we enable their use, and we provide
infrastructure (such as our bug-tracking system and mailing lists) for non-free
software packages.
</para>
<para>
In the first days, the Linux kernel was only available for Intel i386 (or
greater) platforms, and so was Debian. But as Linux became more and more
-popular, the kernel was ported to other architectures, too.
-</para>
-<para>
-The Linux 2.0 kernel supports Intel x86, DEC Alpha, SPARC, Motorola 680x0 (like
-Atari, Amiga and Macintoshes), MIPS, and PowerPC. The Linux 2.2 kernel
-supports even more architectures, including ARM and UltraSPARC. Since Linux
-supports these platforms, Debian decided that it should, too. Therefore,
-Debian has ports underway; in fact, we also have ports underway to non-Linux
-kernels. Aside from <literal>i386</literal> (our name for Intel x86), there
-is <literal>m68k</literal>, <literal>alpha</literal>,
-<literal>powerpc</literal>, <literal>sparc</literal>,
-<literal>hurd-i386</literal>, <literal>arm</literal>,
-<literal>ia64</literal>, <literal>hppa</literal>,
-<literal>s390</literal>, <literal>mips</literal>,
-<literal>mipsel</literal> and <literal>sh</literal> as of this writing.
+popular, the kernel was ported to other architectures and Debian started
+to support them. And as if supporting so much hardware was not enough,
+Debian decided to build some ports based on other Unix kernels, like
+<literal>hurd</literal> and <literal>kfreebsd</literal>.
</para>
<para>
-&debian-formal; 1.3 is only available as <literal>i386</literal>. Debian
+&debian-formal; 1.3 was only available as <literal>i386</literal>. Debian
2.0 shipped for <literal>i386</literal> and <literal>m68k</literal>
-architectures. Debian 2.1 ships for the <literal>i386</literal>,
+architectures. Debian 2.1 shipped for the <literal>i386</literal>,
<literal>m68k</literal>, <literal>alpha</literal>, and
-<literal>sparc</literal> architectures. Debian 2.2 added support for the
-<literal>powerpc</literal> and <literal>arm</literal> architectures.
-Debian 3.0 added support of five new architectures: <literal>ia64</literal>,
-<literal>hppa</literal>, <literal>s390</literal>, <literal>mips</literal>
-and <literal>mipsel</literal>.
+<literal>sparc</literal> architectures. Since then Debian has grown hugely.
+Debian 5 supports a total of twelve architectures: <literal>alpha</literal>,
+<literal>amd64</literal>, <literal>arm</literal>,
+<literal>armel</literal>, <literal>hppa</literal>,
+<literal>i386</literal>, <literal>ia64</literal>, <literal>mips</literal>,
+<literal>mipsel</literal>, <literal>powerpc</literal>,
+<literal>s390</literal>, <literal>sparc</literal>.
</para>
<para>
Information for developers and users about the specific ports are available at
</listitem>
</varlistentry>
<varlistentry>
+<term><literal>buildd</literal></term>
+<listitem>
+<para>
+Build failures notifications sent by the network of build daemons, they contain
+a pointer to the build logs for analysis.
+</para>
+</listitem>
+</varlistentry>
+<varlistentry>
<term><literal>default</literal></term>
<listitem>
<para>
</listitem>
<listitem>
<para>
+<literal>buildd</literal>: build failures notifications from build daemons
+</para>
+</listitem>
+<listitem>
+<para>
<literal>default</literal>: all the other mails (those which aren't automatic)
</para>
</listitem>
have to make sure it sends a copy of those mails to
<literal><replaceable>sourcepackage</replaceable>_cvs@&pts-host;</literal>.
Only the people who accept the <literal>cvs</literal> keyword will receive
-these notifications. Note that the mail need to be sent from a
+these notifications. Note that the mail needs to be sent from a
<literal>debian.org</literal> machine, otherwise you'll have to add
the <literal>X-PTS-Approved: 1</literal> header.
</para>
</section>
<section id="alioth">
-<title>Debian's GForge installation: Alioth</title>
+<title>Debian's FusionForge installation: Alioth</title>
<para>
Alioth is a Debian service based on a slightly modified version of the
-GForge software (which evolved from SourceForge). This software offers
+FusionForge software (which evolved from SourceForge and GForge). This software offers
developers access to easy-to-use tools such as bug trackers, patch
manager, project/task managers, file hosting services, mailing lists, CVS
repositories etc. All these tools are managed via a web interface.
~ianmdlvl / developers-reference.git / blobdiff