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Package: tech-ctte
Ok, this is an attemtp to statuate on the problematic which has been opposing
me and the d-i team on the subject of the commit access to the d-i repository.
The decision to remove my svn commit access was done in order to solve a
social problem, and lacks any technical reasoning, and furthermore, this
decision causes technical hurdles and problems, and this issue is thus of the
ressort of the technical committee.
The svn commit acces to a project under the debian umbrella, is there to keep
the history of the changes of the work done on a given project, and to also
serve as an incremental backup of ones work. This is particularly true for a
non-distributed repository like subversion.
Furthermore, the subversion repository is used as communication between the
different members of a project, and in cases like d-i, it is the prefered form
of modification for the code base included in it. Notice this 'prefered form
of modification', which has some serious implications with regard to GPLed
code.
Given these facts, and the fact that i am the original author of at least two
packages inside the d-i svn repository (nobootloader and prep-installer),
co-maintainer of another one (partman-prep), as well as of various bits of
code inside the d-i build code-base. I am not only the original author of
those, but am also still interested in working on those areas of d-i, and i
know that nobody will show interest in them in the near future.
As thus, i claim that the removal of my d-i svn commit access, which was done
solely for social, is to the detriment to the technical quality of debian,
especially given the etch release schedule.
The proposed solutions are either to restore my svn commit access, or remove
those parts of d-i on which i have a copyright on, and am interested in doing
work on, from the d-i svn repo, and moved to a more neutral repository. This
second solution is not in the best interest of debian though.
So, the thing that the technical comitte has to statuate on, is twofold.
1) is there a technical reason for my svn commit right to d-i to be removed,
and does this reasons count morez than the technical harm done ?
2) isi t acceptable for someone with power over a given project, especially
one as important to debian as d-i, to take such decision with negative
technical effect in order to solve social problems ? And should it not be
better to try to solve social problems with social ways, instead of abusing
the technical power enthrusted by the project as a whole ?
I will not make the mistake of my previous invocation of the technical
committee, and will let you alone. I would appreciate to be CCed on the
discussion, so it happens in a transparent and open way, but will only reply
to it if you ask me a question directly, so please do so if you expect a
reply.
I leave you now to discuss this, and hope you will not be overshadowed by the
social aspects of this problem, and work for the best of debian and our users
in mind.
Friendly,
Sven Luther
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