Some more comments
Andreas Barth <aba@not.so.argh.org> writes:
> Unless proven otherwise, I tend to the following conclusions:
>
> 1. The ftp-masters removed ia32-libs-tools with the following message
> from the archive "RoThe Project; Most idiotic breakage ever.". About
> 45 mintes later (and not linked) they sent out this mail to
> debian-devel http://lists.debian.org/debian-devel/2009/07/msg00060.html
>
> 2. The tech ctte was asked by Goswin to overrule the ftp-maintainer
> decision to remove ia32-libs-tools.
>
> 3. After careful review, the transition plan to multiarch from Goswin
> that includes usage of this tool doesn't seem to have broad support.
>
> 4. However, the implementation plan for multiarch from Steve has broad
> support, with buy-in of key maintainers.
>
> 5. Steve is driving that implementation plan for some time, and he
> explicitly disagrees (with stated reasons) with the presence of
> ia32-libs-tools in the archive.
>
> 6. The way the decision of removal was communicated to Goswin seems
> suboptimal to me. This however doesn't make the decision wrong.
>
> 7. Considering all these facts, I would recommend the tech ctte
> to refuse to overrule the ftp-masters.
>
>
>
> Comments?
Can I assume that ftp-master will remove dpkg-cross from the archive
as well for exactly the same reasons?
Dpkg-cross is essentially the same as ia32-libs-tools. It downloads
packages from different architectures (with apt-cross), unpacks the
deb, moves libraries and include files around, removes unwanted files,
processes the DEBIAN/control file changing names to
<package>-<arch>-cross and packs it all back into a deb for
installation.
The only functional difference between ia32-libs-tools and dpkg-cross
is the target audience and therefore special cases handled in the
conversion. ia32-libs-tools targets running binaries from other
architectures while dpkg-cross targets compiling for other
architectures.
I'm not aware that dpkg-cross has "buy-in" from maintainers or that
they have a broadly supported multiarch plan (or plan at all). All of
Steves reasons apply to dpkg-cross just as well as to ia32-libs-tools.
The long term plans for ia32-libs-tools actually included trying to
merge with dpkg-cross because of the huge similarity of what they both
do.
So will both packages be judged by the same standard or is there more
going on?
MfG
Goswin
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