Make the Debian CDs Better by Installing popcon

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."

Comments

Re:This is a really good idea

[byolinux]

Just make sure you install gnome and emacs. Someone is bound to say KDE and vi, but real people who actually want to work, I feel KDE is too much like eye candy.

Gnome 2.6 is where it's at.

emacs is the editor for the GNU generation. Real work gets done in it, though I guess it can be bulky if you just wanna edit a .conf

Let the flames start

[r00zky]

Current popularity rankings:

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

vi/vim vs. emacs

[Peaker]

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.

Re:This is a really good idea

[Imperator]

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 their lives have improved dramatically since they stopped using vixie-cron, but I still use it over the alternatives.)

I encourage you to install Linux, and Debian is a fine distribution for you if you're interested in learning. But don't look at package popularity. If you need help choosing between different packages that do the same thing, there are better places to look.

Re:If this were TIVO

[fliplap]

Debian is free. I pay for the hardware. They give me free software, source code, documentation and updates, services and they don't even profit from the hardware

If I could send anonymous view habits to Tivo in exchange for free service I WOULD.

Re:This is a really good idea

[fracex]

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.

Some questions and a suggestion.

[eddy]

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.

Re:13 CD's!?

[tepples]

[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."

Haw about this?

[melted]

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.

Re:This is a really good idea

[alienmole]

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! ;)

Comment removed

[account_deleted]

Comment removed based on user account deletion

Good idea reasons...

[msimm]

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.

Re:This is a really good idea

[deinol]

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
wuftp
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 that it is installed?