GSoC 2019 [Collect build statistics]

[Mojca Miklavec]

Hi,

On Fri, 8 Mar 2019 at 17:12, Craig Treleaven wrote:
>
> Have you seen the following wiki page?
>
> https://trac.macports.org/wiki/StatisticsIdeas
>
> There are some deficiencies in the current data collected.  A key issue is whether a port was requested or installed as a dependency.  That then leads to the need for a versioned API.  Other data elements need a re-think.

In any case I would say that there are way more deficiencies on the
server side than on the client side. Yes, we need to improve the
format based on the need, but even if we start from the existing data
that's currently being sent there's a lot we could do better on the
server.

> My interpretation is that some key MacPorts people had privacy concerns related to collecting such information.  As such, there was no appetite to strongly encourage users to participate in submitting the data.  In crude terms, the “opt-out” v. “opt-in” question.  I don’t know if that is now changed or not.

Just to make it clear: I don't think that opt-in vs. opt-out is
relevant to the implementation of the project in any way. This is a
completely independent decision. I would say that we need to do better
advertisement in any case, but so far it did not make much sense since
the current statistics page is not as useful.

> I fall firmly on the side that it is fair to ask users for such data as it helps us to understand how MacPorts is used.  That can then guide us, as MacPorts contributors, into where to channel our available time.  I note that Homebrew collects such information and there does not seem to be much resistance, if any.  I think relying on opt-in would mean poor data quality and that implementing such a collection and reporting system is largely a waste of time.  IMHO.

We may reconsider the decision later, but there's currently no need to
change anything right now. The part which works on the user's side
might need some minor tweaks, but it's basically working. I would say
that we first need to get a solid solution, and potentially continue
the discussion in a completely independent thread.

> PS My mail archive show me that we’ve been talking about such a facility for more than 5 years!

It was initially a GSOC 2011 project which got abandoned after the
GSOC was over and written in a framework that nobody from the core
team had experience with. So it could have been nearly 8 years :)
Quite some while after GSOC Clemens has managed to get it into a state
that could run on his server, but then we collected the list of all
the things that were wrong, which nobody ever fixed.

Mojca