Revision as of 16:24, 24 November 2010

HAL Removal

Summary

HAL is a behemoth, do-it-all, daemon to access hardware. It is now obsoleted by udisks (né DeviceKit-disks) and upower (né DeviceKit-power), as well as libudev for device discovery.

This feature tracks the removal of HAL in the Fedora Desktop spin.

Owner

Name: Bastien Nocera

email: bnocera@redhat.com

Current status

Targeted release: Fedora 41
Last updated: 2010-03-23
Percentage of completion: 80%

Detailed Description

Packages in the desktop spin:

Package name	Status	Bug reports or discussions
cheese	done
epiphany	done	Removed obsolete gnome-vfs2-devel dependency
evolution	done
evolution-data-server	done
gdm	done	~~upstream bug 572765~~, ~~fedora bug 567432~~
gnome-pilot	TODO	upstream bug 593936
gnome-power-manager	done?	~~upstream bug 593933~~
gnome-vfs2	WONTFIX	Applications should be removing their use of gnome-vfs2 and use gvfs instead. Direct gnome-vfs2 rdeps: dasher (DONE upstream) dia (DONE upstream, ~~upstream bug~~) glade3-libgladeui gnome-python2-applet gnome-python2-gnome gnome-python2-gnomevfs gnome-python2-libegg im-chooser inkscape (fedora bug 653516) libgnome (which is required by dia, glade3-libgladeui, gnome-python2-applet, gnome-python2-bonobo, gnome-python2-libegg, gnome-python2-gnome, gnote, libbonoboui, mousetweaks, planner) libgnomeui (which is required by gnome-applets) planner (DONE upstream) thunderbird xulrunner
gstreamer-plugins-good	done
gvfs	done	~~upstream bug 586410~~
gvfs-obexftp	done	~~upstream bug 586411~~ and upstream bug 511671
libfprint	done	Still requires hal-filesystem
libgpod	done
libmtp	done	libmtp-hal subpackage requires hal-info
pm-utils	done	~~fedora bug 636382~~
rhythmbox	done	~~upstream bug 604186~~ ~~fedora bug~~
shotwell	done
system-setup-keyboard	done	Used for keymap selection
xine-lib	done	dependency on gnome-vfs2 removed
xorg-x11-server-Xorg	done

Other packages outside the desktop spin:

Package name	Status	Bug reports or discussions
beldi	TODO
blueman	TODO	fedora bug 561019
camcardsync	TODO
exaile	TODO	upstream bug
exo	TODO
gimp	TODO	upstream bug
gnomad2	TODO
gnome-commander	TODO	Requires gnome-vfs2-smb upstream bug
gnome-device-manager	TODO
gparted	done	~~fedora bug 586377~~
gxine	TODO
halevt	TODO
hplip	done?	upstream bug
ifuse	TODO
k3b	done
kdebase-runtime	done
kdelibs	done
libconcord	TODO
librapi	TODO	Both librapi and python-rapi subpackages
libsynce	TODO
libvirt	done
lxsession	TODO	~~upstream bug~~
matahari	TODO
nut	TODO
odccm	TODO
ohm	TODO
ovirt-server	TODO	ovirt-server-installer subpackage requires hal
oxine	TODO
pcmanfm	TODO	Requires hal-storage-addon
pcsc-lite	TODO	Requires hal-libs
pmount	TODO
razertool	TODO
smolt	TODO	fedora bug 634883
synce-hal	TODO
synce-trayicon	TODO
Thunar	TODO	Requires hal-libs and hal-storage-addon
thunar-volman	TODO
xfburn	TODO
xfce4-cddrive-plugin	TODO
xfce4-power-manager	TODO
xfce4-volstatus-icon	TODO

Benefit to Fedora

Faster boot-up, and removal of obsoleted technology.

Scope

Loads of applications require HAL itself, or libhal. Applications should not rely on HAL, or libhal being available.

How To Test

Need to test:

yum remove hal-filesystem hal-libs
Check that nothing gets removed because it depends on hal
Check that applications that access hardware still work as before

User Experience

Faster boot-up
Possibly faster applications startup when switching from libhal to libgudev for device enumeration

Dependencies

See description

Contingency Plan

Still ship HAL. If the last thing that depends on hal is gnome-power-manager for the backlight support, we can stop running hal as a service at boot and make it dbus-activated instead.

Documentation

N/A

Release Notes

Fedora now does not ship with the HAL daemon, and libhal by default. If a specific application require libhal to function, please file a bug against it to be ported to the new technology.

Comments and Discussion

See Talk:Features/HALRemoval

@@ Line 100: / Line 100: @@
 |-
 | blueman || TODO || [https://bugzilla.redhat.com/show_bug.cgi?id=561019 fedora bug 561019]
+|-
+| camcardsync || TODO ||
 |-
 | exaile || TODO || [https://bugs.launchpad.net/exaile/+bug/625209 upstream bug]
+|-
+| exo || TODO ||
 |-
 | gimp || TODO || [https://bugzilla.gnome.org/show_bug.cgi?id=592364 upstream bug]
+|-
+| gnomad2 || TODO ||
 |-
 | gnome-commander || TODO || Requires gnome-vfs2-smb [https://bugzilla.gnome.org/show_bug.cgi?id=589069 upstream bug]
@@ Line 110: / Line 116: @@
 |-
 | gparted || done || <s>[https://bugzilla.redhat.com/show_bug.cgi?id=586377 fedora bug 586377]</s>
+|-
+| gxine || TODO ||
+|-
+| halevt || TODO ||
 |-
 | hplip || done? || [https://bugs.launchpad.net/hplip/+bug/401091 upstream bug]
@@ Line 122: / Line 132: @@
 |-
 | libconcord || TODO ||
+|-
+| librapi || TODO || Both librapi and python-rapi subpackages
+|-
+| libsynce || TODO ||
 |-
 | libvirt || done ||
@@ Line 130: / Line 144: @@
 |-
 | nut || TODO ||
+|-
+| odccm || TODO ||
+|-
+| ohm || TODO ||
 |-
 | ovirt-server || TODO || ovirt-server-installer subpackage requires hal
+|-
+| oxine || TODO ||
+|-
+| pcmanfm || TODO || Requires hal-storage-addon
 |-
 | pcsc-lite || TODO || Requires hal-libs
+|-
+| pmount || TODO ||
 |-
 | razertool || TODO ||
 |-
 | smolt || TODO || [https://bugzilla.redhat.com/show_bug.cgi?id=634883 fedora bug 634883]
+|-
+| synce-hal || TODO ||
+|-
+| synce-trayicon || TODO ||
 |-
 | Thunar || TODO || Requires hal-libs and hal-storage-addon
+|-
+| thunar-volman || TODO ||
+|-
+| xfburn || TODO ||
 |-
 | xfce4-cddrive-plugin || TODO ||

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