Fedora Workstation 42 Cleared To Offer Opt-In Metrics Reporting

Following up on the previously noted proposal around Fedora Workstation 42 looking at adding opt-in user metrics, the Fedora Engineering and Steering Committee (FESCo) has now granted approval for this somewhat controversial feature.

FESCo has granted approval for Fedora Workstation 42 offering opt-in anonymous user information reporting around system settings, hardware information, and desktop usage patterns. As previously explained, the proposal aims to collect more real-world representative information about Fedora Workstation use that would help developers focus their efforts moving forward and help with data/use-case discovery and analysis. Collected would be system hardware information, various system settings, desktop usage patterns like what apps are used and how often system settings are accessed, performance details like disk and memory use, and then any evidence of problems. In looking for problems, details like the number of system crashes, OOM events, and app crashes would be collected.

The usage reporting is strictly opt-in and care will be taken to not collect identifying personal details, including IP addresses. Efforts will b e taken to prevent user fingerprinting too.

Per this FESCo ticket, with six votes in favor of the change and no votes against, FESCo has cleared this feature for Fedora Workstation 42 due out in early 2025.

This week FESCo also approved the plans for retiring Python 2.7 from Fedora 41 and thus only offering Python 3 packages. That change though is still contingent upon GIMP 3.0 being released in time for Fedora 41 so that remaining Python 2 dependency can be dropped.