Re: [DEP 12] Relation with DEP 11.

[Charles Plessy <plessy@debian.org>]

Hello, DEP 11 drivers,

I would be intersted in discussing the relationship between DEP 11 and DEP 12,
see below for the long story.

Have a nice day,

-- Charles

Le Sat, Jan 05, 2013 at 05:16:38PM +0900, Charles Plessy a écrit :
> Dear DEP 11 drivers and everybody,
> 
> in the course of the discussion about DEP 12, which is about storing upstream
> metadata on file per source package, formatted in YAML, it was asked the
> relationship between our projects and the possibilities of convergence.
> 
> Personally, I am in favor of convergence if it is practical, that is, if it
> does not postpone the achievement of our goals by setting the bar too high.
> 
> I note a couple of key differences between DEP 11 and DEP 12, and would be
> interested in hearing your opinion about.
> 
>  - DEP 11 targets binary packages, and DEP 12 targets source packages.  For DEP
>    12, recording the information per binary packages would create a lot of
>    duplication.  One solution would be to use the Debian source package control
>    file (debian/control), with the fields in the binary package paragraphs taking
>    precedence over the fields in the header paragraph.  However, following
>    that way would strongly change what a source package control file looks like,
>    and I am afraid that it would take a long time to reach a consensus.
> 
>  - DEP 11 is mostly about the production of a single archive-wide file, while
>    DEP 12 is about the production of one file per source package (which is used
>    to feed the Ultimate Debian Database).  It would be straightforward for
>    volunteers to take upstream metadata and inject it either the ComponentMetadata
>    file proposed by DEP 11 or in another file.  Given that DEP 12 is only about
>    the format of the metadata, I do not see a conflict here.
> 
>  - DEP 11 looks mostly relevant for binary packages shipping Desktop
>    applications, while DEP 12 is relevant to all non-native packages.  It is
>    still very unclear to me what will be the source of the data in DEP 11.  Will
>    it be the FreeDesktop Desktop Entry files found in the upstream sources ?  If
>    it is the case, we would have different data flows, as for DEP 12, most
>    upstream sources do not contain files with the metadata, which justifies the
>    creation of an entirely new file, while in the case of DEP 11, the best way to
>    update the metadata would be to send patches upstream.
> 
> Have a nice week-end,
> 
> -- 
> Charles Plessy
> Tsurumi, Kanagawa, Japan