Bug#706605: ITP: macfanctld -- Fan control daemon for Apple MacBook computers

[Thibaut Paumard]

Package: wnpp
Severity: wishlist
Owner: Thibaut Paumard <thi...@debian.org>

* Package name : macfanctld
Version : 0.6
Upstream Author : Mikael Strom <mik...@sesamiq.com>
* URL : https://github.com/MikaelStrom/macfanctld
* License : GPL
Programming Lang: C
Description : Fan control daemon for Apple MacBook computers

This deamon reads the temperature sensors in an Apple Macbook (or Macbook Pro)
computer and throttles the fans accordingly to keep the temperature within
configurable limits.


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[Pau Garcia i Quiles]

On Thu, May 2, 2013 at 11:34 AM, Thibaut Paumard <thi...@debian.org> wrote:

Package: wnpp
Severity: wishlist
Owner: Thibaut Paumard <thi...@debian.org>

* Package name    : macfanctld
  Version         : 0.6
  Upstream Author : Mikael Strom <mik...@sesamiq.com>
* URL             : https://github.com/MikaelStrom/macfanctld
* License         : GPL
  Programming Lang: C
  Description     : Fan control daemon for Apple MacBook computers

This deamon reads the temperature sensors in an Apple Macbook (or Macbook Pro)
computer and throttles the fans accordingly to keep the temperature within
configurable limits.

Upstream provides packages for Ubuntu in the MacTel PPA:

https://launchpad.net/~mactel-support/+archive/ppa

Will this be a different packaging or are you essentially sponsoring upstream's?

--
Pau Garcia i Quiles
http://www.elpauer.org
(Due to my workload, I may need 10 days to answer)

[Jérémy Lal]

On 02/05/2013 11:34, Thibaut Paumard wrote:
> Package: wnpp
> Severity: wishlist
> Owner: Thibaut Paumard <thi...@debian.org>
>
> * Package name : macfanctld
> Version : 0.6
> Upstream Author : Mikael Strom <mik...@sesamiq.com>
> * URL : https://github.com/MikaelStrom/macfanctld
> * License : GPL
> Programming Lang: C
> Description : Fan control daemon for Apple MacBook computers
>
> This deamon reads the temperature sensors in an Apple Macbook (or Macbook Pro)
> computer and throttles the fans accordingly to keep the temperature within
> configurable limits.

I'm using a slightly patched (attached) "fancontrol" to control my iMac12,2 fans,
and it works perfectly (with the attached config).
Wouldn't that be enough here too ?

J�r�my.

[Thibaut Paumard]

Hi,

On 02/05/2013 11:45, Pau Garcia i Quiles wrote:
>
> * Package name : macfanctld

> Description : Fan control daemon for Apple MacBook computers
>
> This deamon reads the temperature sensors in an Apple Macbook (or
> Macbook Pro)
> computer and throttles the fans accordingly to keep the temperature
> within
> configurable limits.
>
>
> Upstream provides packages for Ubuntu in the MacTel PPA:
>
> https://launchpad.net/~mactel-support/+archive/ppa

Yes, that's the package I've been using for some time :-)

> Will this be a different packaging or are you essentially sponsoring
> upstream's?

I intend on coordinating with them (first contact mail sent). I'll start
from their package, make it Debian policy compliant if it's not already,
and see with them what works best between basically the two options you
suggest. There should be no technical reason to keep two distinct
packages in the end.

Kind regards, Thibaut.

[Paul Wise]

On Thu, May 2, 2013 at 5:34 PM, Thibaut Paumard wrote:

> Description : Fan control daemon for Apple MacBook computers

Sounds similar to thinkfan for Thinkpads, some questions:

Isn't the kernel supposed to be responsible for fan control and
temperature management?

If not, can we get a generic daemon that works for all laptops?

Would be nice if d-i could install and configure that daemon.

--
bye,
pabs

http://wiki.debian.org/PaulWise

[Jonas Smedegaard]

Quoting Thibaut Paumard (2013-05-02 11:34:10)

> Package: wnpp
> Severity: wishlist
> Owner: Thibaut Paumard <thi...@debian.org>
>
> * Package name : macfanctld
> Version : 0.6
> Upstream Author : Mikael Strom <mik...@sesamiq.com>
> * URL : https://github.com/MikaelStrom/macfanctld
> * License : GPL
> Programming Lang: C
> Description : Fan control daemon for Apple MacBook computers
>
> This deamon reads the temperature sensors in an Apple Macbook (or Macbook Pro)
> computer and throttles the fans accordingly to keep the temperature within
> configurable limits.

How is it different from the already packaged fancontrol?

Perhaps better to instead improve fancontrol to cover specifics of Apple
hardware (and thinkpad hardware as well, now Paul Wise brings that up)?


- Jonas

--
* Jonas Smedegaard - idealist & Internet-arkitekt
* Tlf.: +45 40843136 Website: http://dr.jones.dk/

[x] quote me freely [ ] ask before reusing [ ] keep private

[Mikael Strom]

Hi,

a little background on macfancltd;

Most PC's don't need software fan-controls at all, because BIOS/EFI handles that in firmware. 'Officially', the MacBook Pro should be fine w/o as well as the EFI has fan-control in firmware. However, both OS X and Linux users find the temperature in the aluminum unibody design to be higher than what feels comfortable, in particular when working over normal room temperature (I live in the Philippines, and right now it's 34C in my kitchen where i write this). So a few years ago I wrote macfanctld which apparently have helped some users. 

Should the kernel handle this? No, i don't think so, because that is over-riding the BIOS/EFI firmware in most cases. Is there a need for fan-control software? Yes, because some PC have badly designed fan-control algorithms. So my $0.02 is that utilities like macfancltd have a place, perhaps also in Debian.

I'm more than happy to help out, and hopefully i can learn more on Debian packaging from you "made" guys ;)

Questions:

- How will this affect the speed at which Ubuntu users can get updates?

- Should we keep macfanctld in launchpad/mactel repo? Or is there a smarter way if Debian package it?

- Is there any way you can mentor me in the process, so i can learn Debian packaging? 

Best regards,
Mikael Ström

[Thibaut Paumard]

Hi,

I include below an answer from upstream, who only replied to the bug report:

On 02/05/2013 13:04, Paul Wise wrote:
> On Thu, May 2, 2013 at 5:34 PM, Thibaut Paumard wrote:
>
>> Description : Fan control daemon for Apple MacBook computers
>
> Sounds similar to thinkfan for Thinkpads, some questions:
>
> Isn't the kernel supposed to be responsible for fan control and
> temperature management?
>
> If not, can we get a generic daemon that works for all laptops?
>
> Would be nice if d-i could install and configure that daemon.
>



From: Mikael Strom <mik...@sesamiq.com>
To: 706...@bugs.debian.org
Subject: Re: Bug#706605: ITP: macfanctld -- Fan control daemon for Apple
MacBook computers

[Thibaut Paumard]

Dear Paul,

On 02/05/2013 13:04, Paul Wise wrote:

> On Thu, May 2, 2013 at 5:34 PM, Thibaut Paumard wrote:
>
>> Description : Fan control daemon for Apple MacBook computers
>
> Sounds similar to thinkfan for Thinkpads, some questions:

> [...] can we get a generic daemon that works for all laptops?

>
> Would be nice if d-i could install and configure that daemon.
>

This would be ideal indeed. That would be wonderful if fancontrol would
work on as much hardware as possible and configure itself depending on
hardware. The upstream developers probably need to e-sit together and talk.

For the time being, macfanctld works wonderfully on Macbooks. You can
customize it, but you don't have to: just install it and the average
sensor temperature drops from ~80C to ~50C. So I'm rather inclined to
upload it, until a more generic solution is implemented.

Kind regards, Thibaut.


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[Thibaut Paumard]

On 02/05/2013 15:12, Mikael Strom wrote:
> Questions:
> - How will this affect the speed at which Ubuntu users can get updates?
> - Should we keep macfanctld in launchpad/mactel repo? Or is there a
> smarter way if Debian package it?
> - Is there any way you can mentor me in the process, so i can learn
> Debian packaging?
>

Yes Mikael, I will walk you through the process if you feel like
investing the effort it takes. Generally speaking, most packages are
just synced by Ubuntu from the Debian repository every few months, so
that the simplest workflow is to just upload in Debian. Of course you
are free to keep a separate Ubuntu version or a PPA. Bear in mind that
all the Debian derivatives, not just Ubuntu, benefit from packages
uploaded in Debian.

I'll be out of town next week, but we can exchange some e-mails when I
am back. In the meantime, feel free to have a look at the Debian
Developer's corner: http://www.debian.org/devel/

The three most important technical documents are (in order of increasing
difficulty, probably...)
http://www.debian.org/doc/manuals/maint-guide/
http://www.debian.org/doc/manuals/developers-reference/
http://www.debian.org/doc/debian-policy/

The right mailing list for newbie packager questions is Debian Mentors
<debian-...@lists.debian.org>, but you can also ask me directly.

The two points I have noted already:
- the package does not include a LICENSE or COPYING file. In general,
it's not enough to include only the snippet in each source file. At
least our FTP masters may reject the package based on that.
- it would be best if the package was non-native (see:
http://wiki.debian.org/DebianMentorsFaq ).

Kind regards, Thibaut.


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[Pau Garcia i Quiles]

On Thu, May 2, 2013 at 6:02 PM, Thibaut Paumard <thi...@debian.org> wrote:

 

Questions:
- How will this affect the speed at which Ubuntu users can get updates?
- Should we keep macfanctld in launchpad/mactel repo? Or is there a smarter way if Debian package it?

What I do for Wt ( http://packages.debian.org/source/sid/witty ) is providing the latest version in Debian, which will later come to Ubuntu, but also I have:

- an Ubuntu PPA ( https://launchpad.net/~pgquiles/+archive/wt ) where I provide the latest version of Wt for all the versions of Ubuntu Canonical still supports (currently: 10.04, 12.04, 12.10 and 13.04)

- an OpenSuse Build Service repository ( http://redmine.webtoolkit.eu/projects/wt/wiki/Installing_Wt_on_Debian ) where I provide the latest version of Wt for the latest stable version of Debian

Users who want stability use the packages from the official Debian/Ubuntu repository.

Users who want to use the latest version use the packages from the Ubuntu PPA / OpenSuse Build Service

This model has been working very well for me for years and users are happy. Sadly, there are no Debian PPAs and I'm forced to use the OpenSuse Build Service, which I don't really like (no dput, censored main archive, etc).