Dear Technical Committee members,
as you might imagine I got asked fairly often what is the status of
this issue. I've always made clear that any issue brought to the
tech-ctte is no DPL matter; the Constitution is very clear about that.
The only thing I could have done to help out a bit is trying some
informal mediation, not to leave out any potential solution.
I've indeed done a bit of that. I've spoken twice, with a delay of 6
months, with the Python maintainer face to face, trying to see whether
there was a possibility of an agreement on a new maintenance team which
would have made this bug moot (I'm sure that would have been made happy
also the tech-ctte :-P). I've also spoken, sometimes face to face and
sometimes in chat replying to "let's ask the DPL what's the status"
queries, to others people involved in this matter. Unfortunately,
nothing concrete has come out of that yet, most likely due to inability
on my side, more than to anything else.
On the bright side, I agree with others who have voiced their opinions
in this bug log that the situation is nowadays better than what it was
when this bug was reported. Not only we now have co-maintained
python*-defaults packages, but also (and more importantly) we now have
*discussions* on -python@lists.d.o on migration strategies and other
important topics. Those discussions include both Debian people and
upstream developers and might even hint future maintenance teams, which
is good. While it is true that the Python maintainer is not always
participating into them, it is also clear that he follows them and seems
to agree with where they are going.
Nevertheless, the big issue is undeniably still open: maintenance of the
main Python interpreter packages is still up to a single maintainer,
with no mutual trust and/or communication between him and (most of) the
rest of the Debian Python community.
Additionally, as DPL, I'm worried by seeing packages as important as the
Python interpreters maintained by a single person. Even if all other
surrounding issues were not there, that would be a bus-factor problem
worth fixing by itself. (I concede there are other similar situations
in the archive, but this is no excuse; they are just other problems to
be solved.)
All that said, one of the few remaining actions I can take on this issue
is to friendly ping the tech-ctte to actually decide on this issue, open
for 7 months now. I do think tech-ctte is a very useful device in Debian
and I want Debian to trust it as an efficient device; I would appreciate
if you can help me out toward this worthwhile goal.
If you think I can help in any other way, please let me know, I'll
gladly do whatever I can and/or I'm empowered to.
Thanks a lot for your work, you've all my sympathies for the decision
you're asked to make.
Cheers.
PS I appreciate Cc:-s to leader@d.o if you want to get my attention
--
Stefano Zacchiroli -o- PhD in Computer Science \ PostDoc @ Univ. Paris 7
zack@{upsilon.cc,pps.jussieu.fr,debian.org} -<>- http://upsilon.cc/zack/
Quando anche i santi ti voltano le spalle, | . |. I've fans everywhere
ti resta John Fante -- V. Caposella .......| ..: |.......... -- C. Adams
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