buy-something team mailing list archive

["Francis J. Lacoste" <francis.lacoste@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

On June 17, 2010, Julian Edwards wrote:
> Is everyone interested on the buy-something list yet?  I hate CC-ing this
> many people.
> 
> On Thursday 17 June 2010 15:50:58 Francis J. Lacoste wrote:
> > Is there still a need to maintain the list of "commercial" PPAs in
> > Launchpad? I mean, why not manage that information in the agent itself.
> > List of P3As that contain software for sale.
> > Why does Launchpad needs that info at all?
> 
> We decided a while ago that LP is the "registry" of apps since it already
> knows all about them.  It makes sense for us anyway as they will have (or
> potentially have) different characteristics to regular private PPAs and
> it's pointless re-implementing this in the agent.  Let's keep the agent
> simple!
> 

I'm suggesting that we might want to reconsider. The agent won't be simple, 
it's next extension for 11.04 will be to host ratings & reviews. That makes it 
even more the "Registry of App".

That's another way of saying we don't want App meta data in Launchpad. (We 
want Project metadata).

> > >  * return a list of existing subscriptions (these are sources.list
> > >  entries
> > > 
> > > in fact)
> > 
> > Even that one is probably not needed. What we need is a way for the agent
> > to query if a user is subscribed to a PPA and subscribe him if he's not.
> > From the point of view of the Agent, a user is an openid identifier.
> 
> This is absolutely needed in the case where a user fires up a brand new
> desktop and wants to know/install what they already paid for.
> 

The agent should have that list since it's the one who records all 
transactions.

> > The list of stuff you bought is managed in the Agent itself.
> 
> I think that is a bad idea since we already have all that data in Launchpad
> for free.
> 

The agent needs to hold that information. I'm advocating that it be the 
canonical source of that data (over Launchpad). Think of what happens if user 
buys an app, transaction is accepted, but the Agent fails to update the P3A 
subscription (because Launchpad is down for maintenance for example). It's 
important that the transaction is persisted in the Agent. (Or when we'll add 
the possibility to ask for refund later on?)


> > >  * return sources.list entry given a person and a PPA
> > 
> > For a given openid identifier and a PPA. The Agent shouldn't care about
> > persons. Launchpad needs to handle translation between openid identifiers
> > and its association with Person.
> > 
> > > Launchpad is also doing two new custom upload file types on software
> > > packages: meta-data and icons, which are pushed through to the
> > > repository area unmodified.  I'm happy for desktops to hit that
> > > directly as long as IS is okay too, since it's served from Apache,
> > > although the agent could use the webservice call to get the list of
> > > PPAs and then grab the meta-data itself - that's up to the people
> > > doing the agent.
> > 
> > It all depends if the Agent needs the metadata itself or not. If the flow
> > of information is:
> > 
> > 1- Sotware Centre asks Agent for list of P3As with stuff.
> > 2- Software Centre retrieves meta data from P3As.
> > 
> > Then I guess the answer is no.
> > 
> > If instead it's:
> > 
> > 1- Software Centre asks Agent for meta-data.
> > 
> > Then the answer is yes. And in that case, I'm questioning the need to
> > upload the meta-data to Soyuz anyway.
> 
> This was decided on a while ago and I've already implemented this (it's
> easy). Someone (mvo?) said that it's easier if we keep the data with the
> source package.  Soyuz isn't actually doing anything with the data, it's
> just publishing it unaltered in the archive.  But this has the advantage
> that in the future we'll be able to put that meta-data on the PPA pages in
> Launchpad if we want.
> 

Right, in my other reply to Michael I kind of acknowledge that since it's 
required for the other spec (Opening the flood gates) where a PPA will contain 
new apps metadata.

So the remaining point of contention are:

a) Whether Soyuz maintain a list of "Commercial" P3A. I argue for maintaining 
that list in the Agent itself.

b) Whether Soyuz or the Agent is the canonical source of transactions. I also 
argue for this to live in the agent who has the responsibility to make sure 
that Soyuz P3A subscriptions are up to date with regards to that list.


-- 
Francis J. Lacoste
francis.lacoste@xxxxxxxxxxxxx

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