Re: download.ceph.com repository changes

[Sage Weil <sage-BnTBU8nroG7k1uMJSBkQmQ@public.gmane.org>]

On Tue, 24 Jul 2018, Alfredo Deza wrote:
> Hi all,
> 
> After the 12.2.6 release went out, we've been thinking on better ways
> to remove a version from our repositories to prevent users from
> upgrading/installing a known bad release.
> 
> The way our repos are structured today means every single version of
> the release is included in the repository. That is, for Luminous,
> every 12.x.x version of the binaries is in the same repo. This is true
> for both RPM and DEB repositories.
> 
> However, the DEB repos don't allow pinning to a given version because
> our tooling (namely reprepro) doesn't construct the repositories in a
> way that this is allowed. For RPM repos this is fine, and version
> pinning works.
> 
> To remove a bad version we have to proposals (and would like to hear
> ideas on other possibilities), one that would involve symlinks and the
> other one which purges the known bad version from our repos.
> 
> *Symlinking*
> When releasing we would have a "previous" and "latest" symlink that
> would get updated as versions move forward. It would require
> separation of versions at the URL level (all versions would no longer
> be available in one repo).
> 
> The URL structure would then look like:
> 
>     debian/luminous/12.2.3/
>     debian/luminous/previous/  (points to 12.2.5)
>     debian/luminous/latest/   (points to 12.2.7)
> 
> Caveats: the url structure would change from debian-luminous/ to
> prevent breakage, and the versions would be split. For RPMs it would
> mean a regression if someone is used to pinning, for example pinning
> to 12.2.2 wouldn't be possible using the same url.
> 
> Pros: Faster release times, less need to move packages around, and
> easier to remove a bad version

I think the core question is: how many users use or depend on the 
version-pinning features with RPMs.  The symlinking path is easy to 
implement but breaks that ability... you have to change the repo URL to 
pin to a release.

(Nobody is doing version pinning with debs because our reprepro repos 
don't support it.)

In the future we can always move to the multi-version repos and maintain 
the per-version repos in parallel, right?

Thanks!
sage



> 
> 
> *Single version removal*
> Our tooling would need to go and remove the known bad version from the
> repository, which would require to rebuild the repository again, so
> that the metadata is updated with the difference in the binaries.
> 
> Caveats: time intensive process, almost like cutting a new release
> which takes about a day (and sometimes longer). Error prone since the
> process wouldn't be the same (one off, just when a version needs to be
> removed)
> 
> Pros: all urls for download.ceph.com and its structure are kept the same.
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