its not just his impression. I have heard it mentioned
in several news sites and forums that fedora extras
might not be reliable because random people will play
with it. It might be a good idea to document how the
process work in detail so I can point it to them the
next time this FUD comes up anywhere
well it depends on what you mean by 'play with it'.
Fedora Extras allows people who are sponsored as packagers to add
packages into the repository. They submit a src.rpm earlier on, normally
some folks check through it to look for crack or legal problems. Then
the packager checks it into cvs and a build request is made. The
packages are built by the buildsystem and then pushed out to the
repository.
wash, rinse, repeat.
They're all built in a known environment, but the packagers can be from
all over the world.
Does that make sense?
all sorts of extras information here:
http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Extras
-sv