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Guix staff is building Icedove paired to the Thunderbird source code

eliotime3000 - over 3 years ago -

Actually, I was surprised with the arrival of IceCat in the development branch to the Parabola repos. However, in the Guix repository, exist a really interesting version of Icedove, which is mantained by the Guix staff and it's really interesting to read what do you think about this Guix fork.

http://guix.gnu.org/en/packages/icedove-78.6.0/


Replies (4)

Guix staff is building Icedove paired to the Thunderbird source code - bill-auger - over 3 years ago -

you would need to indicate what exactly is peculirarly
interesting about it; before anyone could respond with an
opinion

it is most likely that the guix icedove is not a fork, just as
parabola iceweasel and icedove are not forks - these are the
same software as mozilla, with only trivial modifications, or
none at all; but they are compiled in different build
configurations - there is a wiki article which clarifies that
misconception

https://wiki.parabola.nu/IceWeasel_History

gnuzilla for example, although it is maintained as a distinct
project (unlike the others), is nonetheless not a fork either
- gnuzilla, like the others, does not keep a working copy of
the source code; because it does not need to - the gnuzilla
project is a set of scripts and patches, which downloads the
software directly from mozilla and re-configures the build,
without modifying the software in any significant way

in order for some project to be a fork (even a "soft fork"), it
needs to maintain a significantly modified version of the software
- if the software is not significantly modified, there is no
reason to fork it - if the software is highly-configurable, it is
sufficient to maintain a set of patches; which can be applied to
the unmodified upstream sources, or merely a single build script
like PKGBUILDs and guix recipes

that is what gnuzilla does for icecat, what ungoogled does for
chromium, what debian did for iceweasel, and what parabola does
for iceweasel and icedove - the only information on that web
page you linked, is: "Rebranded Mozilla Thunderbird email client"
- parabola icedove fits that description too - so the guix icedove
appears to be the same kind of animal, which is explained in the
parabola wiki article

RE: Guix staff is building Icedove paired to the Thunderbird source code - oaken-source - over 3 years ago -

nevertheless, it's noteworthy that the guix icedove is 10 major versions ahead of the parabola icedove.
We should fix that :)

RE: Guix staff is building Icedove paired to the Thunderbird source code - bill-auger - over 3 years ago -

10 versions difference, but that accound=ts for only one major release - thunderbird has an LTS release cycle - it went from v68 to v78

https://www.thunderbird.net/en-US/thunderbird/releases/

there is a WIP PKGBUILD for icedove v78 - it needs the branding to be re-worked; but it is close to being ready

https://git.parabola.nu/abslibre.git/commit/?h=wip-2020-12-05-blender-icedove&id=0518d8a3a852e9a5b70746f56cda3f9619025186
or:

$ git cherry-pick 0518d8a3a852e9a5b70746f56cda3f9619025186 

RE: Guix staff is building Icedove paired to the Thunderbird source code - eliotime3000 - over 3 years ago -

Besides the fact that actually is a Thunderbird rebrand with some tweaks, the Enigmail add-on in Arch repos became a transition package since the arrival of the v78 branch.

Also, I recommend to spread the transition of Icedove 78 for those people that has been working with the Enigmail add-on.

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