Hi, last week I experimented with using Gemini to take meeting notes
(in addition to the normal human-generated meeting minutes). Here they
are, with a few minor corrections ("FlatHub" -> "Flathub", and
"composers" or "Compositors" -> "compose" or "composes"). I think this
gives a better review of the meeting than our usual notetaking,
although some of the wording in the summary is a bit awkward.
We started taking notes with Gemini halfway through this meeting, after
the "Ship preinstalled apps as Flatpaks" discussion.
May 6, 2025
Meeting May 6, 2025 at 08:57 CDT
Meeting records Transcript
Summary
Timothée Ravier proposed a shift to selectively include Fedora
flatpaks on atomic desktops, prioritizing a smaller, well-maintained
set, which Yaakov Selkowitz strongly opposed, advocating for
prioritizing all Fedora content over Flathub. Participants including
Michael Catanzaro, Sebastian Wick, and Timothée Ravier discussed user
preferences, Flathub's role, resource allocation, collaboration, and
the challenges of filtering Flathub content. Matthias Clasen reported
on a GTK update for handling uninstalled help documentation, and Neal
Gompa (Conan Kudo) discussed the likely approval of the Wayland-only
GNOME change proposal and an XWayland bug fix, also announcing a new
open-source compose tool.
Details
Proposal to Filter Fedora Flatpaks
Timothée Ravier introduced a change proposal to shift from including
all Fedora flatpaks by default on atomic desktops to a more selective
approach. The rationale behind this proposal is to address current
issues with Fedora flatpaks and align with community feedback to
prioritize a smaller set of well-maintained packages. The intention is
to begin with a limited, reliable set and expand as needed for
applications better suited as Fedora flatpaks.
Opposition to Prioritizing Flathub
Yaakov Selkowitz strongly opposed the proposal, arguing that Fedora
should prioritize its own content. They stated that on atomic desktops,
flatpaks are the primary way to add applications, and this proposal
would place Flathub before Fedora, which they believe is incorrect and
against Fedora's principles. Yaakov Selkowitz emphasized that if there
are problems with Fedora flatpaks, the solution is to fix them, not to
favor third-party content like Flathub, which doesn't necessarily meet
Fedora's standards.
User Preference and Fedora's Role
Michael Catanzaro acknowledged Yaakov Selkowitz's desire to prioritize
Fedora content but suggested that a large number of users prefer
Flathub content. They raised concerns about the supply chain security
of some Flathub applications, noting that they are not always built
from source, which poses a significant problem. Despite this, Michael
Catanzaro viewed Timothée Ravier's proposal as a reasonable
compromise, though they cautioned against implementing it before
addressing the build-from-source issue with Flathub.
Resources and Collaboration with Flathub
Sebastian Wick argued for implementing the change sooner rather than
later, suggesting that preferring Flathub might encourage more
resources to be directed towards its improvement. They emphasized the
need for collaboration between Fedora and Flathub, viewing a "them
versus us" mentality as unhelpful in achieving the shared goal of
better application distribution. Sebastian Wick proposed creating a
filter for Flathub applications based on Fedora's requirements.
Concerns about Filtering Flathub Content
Timothée Ravier raised practical challenges in filtering Flathub,
particularly in distinguishing between correctly packaged open-source
applications, those with some pre-built binaries, and proprietary ones.
Michael Catanzaro echoed these concerns, emphasizing the need to be
stricter about accepting applications with pre-built binaries of
unknown provenance.
Next Steps for the Change Proposal
Timothée Ravier indicated that the change proposal had not yet been
formally announced or submitted to FESCO. They planned to have further
discussions, including at the KDE contributor conference (KDC) and
their talk at Flock, and encouraged those in support to add their names
to the proposal. The target for implementation is Fedora 43, with the
announcement likely occurring by the end of June or early July.
GTK Help API Update
Matthias Clasen reported on progress regarding handling uninstalled
help documentation (Yelp) in application UIs. A GTK merge request has
been implemented to add a new API that uses the portal to query whether
help is supported. This allows applications to disable help-related UI
elements if Yelp is not installed, although applications need to adopt
the new API.
Wayland-Only GNOME Change Proposal
Neal Gompa (Conan Kudo) provided an update on the Wayland-only GNOME
change proposal submitted to FESCO. While there was one dissenting vote
based on aligning with upstream, Neal Gompa (Conan Kudo) expects the
proposal to pass, especially given the strong upstream momentum towards
removing the X11 session in GNOME 49. They argued that Fedora should
not ship a desktop session with bugs that upstream developers are
unwilling or unable to fix.
GNOME Session X11 Support Issue
Neal Gompa (Conan Kudo) also mentioned a bug report regarding broken
XWayland support in GNOME Session 48. This issue has been fixed
upstream and likely needs to be backported to the 48 branch.
New Open-Source Compose Tool
Neal Gompa (Conan Kudo) announced the public release of their new
open-source tool for creating composes from Fedora and CentOS content.
The tool has been submitted as a BOD update and is documented in a blog
post.
Suggested next steps
Matthias Clasen will investigate the possibility of Fedora having a
seat on a potential Flathub advisory board, leveraging Allan Day's
GNOME-side knowledge and exploring opportunities from the new GNOME ED.
The group will create a list of acceptance criteria for Flathub
applications and evaluate if current Flatpak filtering capabilities
support filtering based on those criteria.
Timothée Ravier will announce their change proposal by the end of June
and implement it by the end of July.
Neal Gompa (Conan Kudo) will backport the fix for the broken X11
support in GNOME session 48.
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