Re: git hook error

[Leo Famulari <leo@famulari.name>]

On Tue, Dec 28, 2021 at 11:31:10PM +0100, Ricardo Wurmus wrote:
> The motivation for that is not found in just one big problem.  It’s a
> small trickle of minor annoyances:
> 
> - Savannah’s uptime isn’t quite as high as we’d like

Okay. I wonder if we could actually do a better job, or if anybody who
hosts a comparable repo does.

Our own record with the build farm and the record of major hosts like
Github are both somewhat discouraging. And if we could only hope for an
equivalent uptime to Savannah, it doesn't seem worth it to shoulder this
work ourselves.

> - we can’t have server-side checks to prevent pushing bad commits
> - we can’t have server-side hooks to better integrate with the build farm
> - we can’t have per-branch rules (e.g. to allow contributors to push to
>   some but not all branches)

We do actually have a server-side hook in place to prevent pushing
unsigned commits. And if we wanted to add more tooling, the Savannah
admin(s) would help us.

Now, if we just wanted more control and visibility into the
infrastructure, that's a reason, but again, I wonder if it's worth the
effort. In terms of infrastructure maintenance, we already seem to be
stretched thin.

My opinion is that, in order to consider hosting our own Git server, we
should wait until people are using declarative Guix configuration to
operate reliable, performant, and public Git servers that would meet our
needs. That is, the Guix project needs to grow this capability without
the heroic effort of a single volunteer. Because that's what we have now
with Savannah, more or less, and we don't have to work for it. Maybe
this has already been achieved, I don't know.