Re: Proposal: Differentiate products more clearly (Cycle 01)

[pinoaffe]

Hello!

Luis Felipe <sirgazil@zoho.com> writes:
> El 12/10/23 a las 20:30, pinoaffe escribió:
>> I think it's important to clarify what Guix is (and I really like your
>> mockups/some of the concrete proposed changes), but I don't quite agree
>> with the idea behind your proposal.
>>
>> I think it would be more useful to produce and maintain a clear list of
>> what guix can do than to bifurcate guix into a package manager and an
>> operating system, especially since many of the aspects of Guix don't
>> cleanly fall in either of those two categories.
>
> In this proposal, that clear list of what Guix can do would be the
> feature list, linked early in the home page, right after Guix's
> definition. The features list already exists in the manual, but I
> think it could provide more information.
>
> Regarding the separation of both products, as I see it, it already
> exists, it is just that it is not that clear. There are separate
> downloads for both products and the manual, for example, has specific
> sections for the package manager and the operating system.

It kind-of exists, but it kind-of doesn't either - guix and guix system
are developed as one joint project, you interact with both through a
common interface, there is no clear division between what is part of
what, etc
>
> Now, I do agree that "package manager" and "operating system" don't
> quite make potential users picture the whole range of features
> provided by Guix... Would you still disagree with the differentiation
> of both products if the definition of Guix changed from "package
> manager" to, say, "a tool for reproducible deployment at every level
> of scale", as Ricardo suggest
> (https://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/guix-devel/2023-10/msg00142.html)?
> Or something along those lines?

I personally really like that definition, though "guix system" could
also fall under that definition, so that may be an issue or a benefit
depending on your point of view :)

[omitted]

> I may be misreading you, but I think your points are in line with the
> idea of changing the definition of Guix to better communicate its many
> other features, instead of simply calling it a "package manager".

My points are very much in line with that, my opposition is solely with
categorizing Guix/Guix System into a package manager and an operating
system

> If I read you correctly, I think having an additional presentation and
> definition for the Guix System (the OS), as suggested in this
> proposal, would not conflict with a possible change to Guix's
> definition.

Yeah, I really support that

[omitted]

Kind regards,
pinoaffe