Re: [PATCH 0/3] Advertise OS version

[Usman Akinyemi <usmanakinyemi202@gmail.com>]

On Mon, Dec 9, 2024 at 10:04 PM <rsbecker@nexbridge.com> wrote:
>
> On December 9, 2024 11:15 AM, Usman Akinyemi wrote:
> >Thank you to everyone who participated in this discussion. I am Usman Akinyemi,
> >one of the two selected Outreachy interns. I have been selected to work on the
> >project “Finish adding an 'os-version'
> >capability to Git protocol v2,” which involves implementing the features discussed in
> >this thread.
> >
> >You can find the full discussion about my proposal for this project
> >here: https://public-inbox.org/git/CAPSxiM_rvt-tkQjHYmYNv-
> >Wyr0=X4+123dt=vZKtc++PGRjQMQ@mail.gmail.com/
> >
> >In summary, this is an outline of my proposal and what I plan to implement, which
> >has been influenced by the discussion in this thread:
> >
> >- Send only the OS name by default while allowing a knob (custom
> >configuration) to specify other information (e.g., version details) and disable
> >sending OS names and any other information entirely.
> >
> >After discussing with my mentor, @Christian, we think that adding this as a new
> >capability (os-version) is a better option compared to appending it to the user-
> >agent. This ensures that we do not disrupt people's scripts that collect statistics
> >from the user-agent or perform other actions.
> >
> >Intentions of implementing this project:
> >- For statistical purposes.
> >- Most importantly, for security and debugging purposes. This will allow servers to
> >instruct users to upgrade or perform specific debugging actions when necessary.
> >
> >For example:-
> >A server seeing that a client is using an old Git version that has security issues on
> >one platform, like MacOS, could check if the user is indeed running MacOS before
> >sending it a message to upgrade.
> >
> >Also a server seeing a client that could benefit from an upgrade, for example for
> >performance reasons, could better customize the message it sends to the client to
> >nudge it to upgrade. If the client is on Windows for example the server could send it
> >a link to https://gitforwindows.org/ as part of the message.
> >
> >Please, if anyone has any suggestion or addition or concerns that might, kindly add.
> >Thank you very much.
>
Hello Randall,

> Is this build-time or runtime? If run-time, please make sure the code is portable or provides
> hooks so that non-linux systems can contribute content.
>
Thanks for pointing this out.

Yeah, the aim is to have it at runtime and to have hooks that can be
used by non-linux systems.

Thank you.
Usman.
> Thanks,
> Randall
>
> --
> Brief whoami: NonStop&UNIX developer since approximately
> UNIX(421664400)
> NonStop(211288444200000000)
> -- In real life, I talk too much.
>
>
>