Re: new fields in debian/control
On Sun, 16 Jul 2000, Wichert Akkerman wrote:
> * Origin
> This lists the origin of a package. For all Debian packages this should
> be `Debian'.
This matches what is defined for the Release file..
> * Submit-Bugs-To
> An mailto URL to which bugs should be submitted. (It's a URL so
> we can support other types of BTSes at a later date if needed)
> * Submit-Bugs-Style
> Style in which submitted bugreports should be formatted. Currently
> the only option here is `debbugs'.
IMHO both these are badly named and should be merged into a single field
called 'BTS', or the longer 'Bug-Tracking-System'. This follows how all
other RFC-822-like systems work. The value of this field would be a URI,
eg:
BTS: debbugs://bugs.debian.org
BTS: bugzilla://bugs.mozilla.org
BTS: gnats://bugs.gnu.org
BTS: jitterbug://bugs.samba.org/bugs/
The scheme tag indicates the access scheme which must have well defined
semantics. debbugs means bugs are submitted to submit@address, lookup
for package bug lists is done with http://address/package, etc. jitterbug
would indicate web-submittal using the jitterbug system at
http://bugs.samba.org/bugs/. The double // is included because the URI
must always specify an internet host.
All schemes must have well defined automated access methods, preferably in
a written specification someplace. [this rules out jitterbug AFAIK]
It should also be made clear that the given BTS must be specifically for
tracking .debs, not a general BTS like Mozilla's - and more
importantly the BTS field for all debian distributed packages
must be set to out BTS and not upstream's for that package.
This field should also be included in the Release file, I will update the
Release file document when this is properly decided on..
Now, aside from that - it is not entirely clear to me that this is even
the best way to go. In fact, I think it may be quite harmfull.
Consider, if Corel distributes Debian + Their Junk they will want to get
bug reports for the whole thing not just their packages. Having them
rebuild all our stuff just to change those fields is not entirely good for
them - or us.
The same basic argument holds for all commercial users of Debian, they
will always want bug reports to go to their support staff, not ours.
It would be considerably better if there were some way for dpkg to be able
to store information from the Release file when installing a package, that
way things like the BTS are tied to the download location, not to the
person who created the .deb.
Jason
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