Moving a git layout from debian-only to debian+upstream
... and live happily with git-buildpackage
Let's say you have a
git
repository you have used thus far to maintain only the Debian part
of some package (i.e. no upstream sources on sight).
OK, you're right, that would be quite an uncommon
scenario for a git repository. In fact the truth is that you are in
such a situation because the git repo was obtained converting from
a subversion repo which was using the mergeWithUpstream
stuff of svn-buildpackage.
Now that you have git's space efficiency you want to change
this, import upstream sources, and possibly adhere to a branch
layout which is compatible with
git-buildpackage
(which is very simple in its minimal requirements: an
upstream
branch containing just upstream sources and a
master
branch containing a debianized source tree).
Out of the box
git-import-orig won't work since don't
have the upstream branch. Creating it branching from master (or
somewhere else) won't work either unfortunately. Indeed after
branching you will need to remove the
debian/ dir from
upstream and when you will merge upstream with master you will be
merging the removal as well, bad idea.
By myself I've found some horrifying solutions involving
using git-filter-branch on the upstream branch merged
from master and then squashing all the history of that branch with
git-rebase, but they are so horrible that I won't
mention them here more than this.
The nice solution came from a hint by madduck on the
creation of branches without ancestry. Here is the complete
recipe (assumed to be run from the master branch of the repo,
before creating any upstream branch):
$ git-symbolic-ref HEAD refs/heads/upstream
$ git rm --cached -r .
$ git commit --allow-empty -m 'initial upstream branch'
$ git checkout -f master
$ git merge upstream
$ git-import-orig --no-dch ../foo_1.2.3.orig.tar.gz
In short: you should create an
upstream branch without any ancestry, in it you should create
an empty commit, then merge it (vacuously) in master, and now
you're ready to call
git-import-orig to the rescue.
Feature request on
git-buildpackage
to support this out of the box is on the go:
bug #471560.
Installing Debian on your Eee PC is even easier now, as the option to install over wireless is now present in our custom debian-installer image. Also, the new installer automates installation of many more things than prior releases, so wireless, acpi hotkeys and suspend all ‘just work’ out of the box.
Two barriers remain to including wireless support for the Eee in Debian main. The first is the lack of wireless support in the official d-i installer. The second is the dependency on the non-free madwifi driver. I have no illusions about this being ready for Lenny, but I hope in Lenny + 1 this will be realized.
The good news is that Nick Kossifidis is working on getting support for the Eee into ath5k. For patches, see: http://kernel.org/pub/linux/kernel/people/mickflemm.
I have created a stub page FreeYourEee in our wiki about making a completely DFSG free install of Debian on the Eee. I encourage anyone going this route to contribute.
Are you rebasing or merging? seems to be the 64 thousand
dollar question over in 
In my 
Obviously any human being can recognize satire. There is obvious motivation on behalf of SCO’s PR department (correct me if I am wrong on where this comment originated; I did just some basic Google lookups, and also, this is a PR tactic known as “dead agenting”) to ignore the fact that this was clearly a satirical review. I would say, “perhaps SCO doesn’t understand why it is criticized,” but I believe it is obvious that they know why people are being critical and satirical of their company and their efforts.
I would like for everyone to think, for a moment, about how things could be if SCO didn’t take the litigious strategy that they have taken over the past 6 years. SCO UnixWare could have remained a successful product, and could have in reality become a major asset to the open source world. SCO could have been the good guys here, but instead they chose a path of litigation instead of innovation.
In the Open Source and Free Software world, innovation is what is seen as important. Companies may be in some sense rival to each other, but when it comes down to it, everyone appreciates and respects the work that everyone else contributes to the ecosystem. When people do not contribute in a positive way, or worse, betray their peers like SCO has done, it opens them up for criticism.
As I see the situation, I think that SCO’s current tactics as a company represent those of someone who is paranoid. People who are paranoid attack first, instead of defend their position. So, while I am sure this is a pointless question, I believe it must be asked anyway: “What would SCO UnixWare have been like if they did not take a litigious strategy against Linux users?”
If you look at it like this, it doesn’t really matter if we’re right, or SCO is right on who has the basic cases (well, it does, but we all know how that’s going to come out anyway).
Why does SCO keep pursuing a strategy of litigation when the feasibility of this strategy is at best, unknown? To some extent, I think it is now a matter of morale. After all, it’s bad if you have to admit that the strategy you have taken for the last six years, was wrong. In some ways, you could say that SCO’s current strategy is cult-like.
Furthermore, if any SCO people are interested in doing an interview about this whole matter, I encourage you to comment back, and I’ll be happy to publicize SCO’s viewpoint of this. It’s only fair.
I’ve been using an EEE PC since december, and people keep asking me if they should buy one. So here are some things you should know before making a decision.
Screen
The screen is small, but that’s OK. I couldn’t find many applications that didn’t work in 800×480. And for the remaining ones, you can usually use hacks such as running the app in a larger virtual desktop. Not ideal, but it works. Regarding usability, it’s not a too big problem. Jut expect to use many apps maximized, and use scrolling and virtual desktops a lot. (Important note: Xmoto doesn’t work!!)
Keyboard
The keyboard is probably a bigger problem than the screen (I hadn’t expected it to be a so big problem before buying the laptop). Every other keyboard seems to have HUGE keys after typing on the EEE PC keyboard. But with some training, you can type quite fast, even if probably not as fast as with a full size keyboard. The layout of the “special” keys is quite good (esp. the PgUp/Down, Home and End keys on the arrows. I should remap my other keyboard like that).
Battery, power consumption
One big problem with the EEE PC is that it consumes a lot of power while sleeping (using suspend to RAM). If you leave it sleeping for more than a few hours, expect the battery to be empty. That really sucks, especially since suspend to disk isn’t really a good option on such a device. Another problem related to power is that charging the battery is quite slow.
SDHC card reader
If you want to expand the storage capacity of your EEE PC with the SDHC port, choose your SDHC card carefully. There are only a few cards that work. The other ones will cause write error (they will work in read-only mode, so I’m using an external card reader to write, which sucks). A list of supported cards is available in the EEE PC manual.
Random Q&A
Q: I don’t have a laptop. Should I buy it?
A: If you want to do a lot of real work on it, it’s probably not a very good idea. There are faster (but bigger) laptops at around 450-500 EUR. They are probably a much better option. The EEE PC is perfect as a the second laptop you only bring to places where you want to stay connected, read email and surf on the web (like conferences and meetings).
Q: Does the VGA output works well?
A: Yes. And it uses an Intel video card which works like a charm with xrandr. I already gave several presentations and classes using it. The laptop can output 1280×1024 (maybe 1600×1200, not sure). The only problem is that you will only have the top-left part of your slides on the laptop’s screen, because of the smaller resolution there. Annoying if you plan to read your slides.
In dutch we would say 
NMs, I’ve just realized who’s gonna help you. Her name is Morgan le Fay.
Still putting most all of my brain and time in to trying to graduate. This has left me shockingly little time for things like working on Debian.
While working on an stlport4.6 still not done ldbl128 transition (
2. Debian:
3. And Friends (and gifts!!)
* Thanks to all 
My partner 