Subject: [bug#76503] [GCD] Migrating repositories, issues, and patches to Codeberg

From: Ludovic Courtès <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 25 Mar 2025 09:46:55 +0100

Hi Simon,

Simon Tournier <[email-masked]> skribis:

>>>   1. Drop the section of « Issue Tracker Migration Path ».
>>
>> To be clear, are you suggesting to not use Codeberg for bug reports at
>> all?
>
> To be clear, yes.

OK.  So postponing bug/issue tracker migration to Jan. 2026 as the GCD
now states (based on what you proposed¹) doesn’t address your concerns?
Or perhaps I misinterpreted your proposal?

¹ https://issues.guix.gnu.org/76503#115-lineno87

>> We could change it to “Migrating repositories and patches to Codeberg”;
>> that has less appeal to me, because I’m confident that (1) this would
>> lead to confusion, and (2) we’d miss out on cross-referencing and other
>> niceties.
>
> Cross-referencing fully locked in the Codeberg web-interface, right?
>
> Which niceties do you speak about?

Off the top of my head:

  • notifications (subscribe/unsubscribe to individual issues, ping
    individual people or team);

  • automatically notify the right people on PRs via ‘CODEOWNERS’;

  • cross-referencing (see when someone refers to an issue/PR from
    another issue/PR/commit; close issues when a commit messages says
    so);

  • tagging, classification;

  • ability to use PR/issue templates to guide people and ease
    onboarding;

  • API access allowing bots to comment on PRs for instance (fresh from
    the oven: Cuirass now sends comments indivicating build status on
    PRs).

Many of these features may seem anecdotal, but IME they really help with
triage and with getting the attention of the right people, which I think
is critical for a project the size of Guix.

(All this information is available to all the user interfaces, not just
the web interface.)

> For instance, I cannot promote Free Software and advocate at length
> about user-autonomy.

[...]

> Because we have to be very clear: the migration from emails to Codeberg
> isn’t only the technical migration of the workflow.  It’s much deeper:
> it’s a “philosophical” migration.

As you know, I very much understand these issues, I know why I chose
Debbugs at a time when Git{Hub,Lab} were already popular; they are
discussed (on your request) in the GCD.  To me, it’s a compromise.

In an ideal world, we would self-host, which would address some of these
concerns.  It doesn’t seem viable at this point, but if/when somebody
steps up, this remains open.

>> We could also set up our own thing; I’ll inquire to see if there are
>> tools to do that for regular users.
>
> This is what I have in mind.  Please note I’m not considering this as
> blocking or something we must have on Day-1.

I did inquire on Mastodon: nobody came up with the ready-to-use tool to
do backup.  We could use the HTTP API, which exposes everything, to
approximate it, but it’d be an approximation.

>> On experience: collectively, we have experience with Codeberg and with
>> other forges; many of us frequently interact with this kind of forge.
>
> Who is the ’collective’?  How many of the current people with write
> access on Savannah have an account in Codeberg?  And how many concretely
> did at least one review (with comments) and merged a PR?

It’s a small but strictly-positive number.  But probably 100% of us have
experience with similar forges, many of us using them daily, that’s what
I meant; we cannot pretend that we’re all discovering this.

> Somehow, you developed a experience.  Who Deliberation members might
> report a minimal experience?

Not sure what you mean.

> It’s not to make the decision bigger than it is.  If I ask to the Ludo
> from one year ago (before investing time with Codeberg and propose to
> switch to the Guix-Science channel), do you want yo migrate?  What would
> have been your answer?  Probably the same as I am doing now: Euh, yes
> why not but hmm I am not sure, well I do not know.

You’re right: I’ve long been reluctant to forges of that kind, as I
wrote before.  It’s been a process for me: that of seeing the
unsustainable situation Guix is in, looking at other projects do it
(check out Nixpkgs or Brew or whatever!), getting first-hand experience
with GitLab and Codeberg and how it leads to a smooth and approachable
workflow.

I understand it’s hard to “transfer” experience, and that’s why I was
hoping active contributors would give it a try to at least get a taste
of it.

Thanks for your feedback,
Ludo’.