Bug#1007717: Draft resolution for "Native source package format with non-native version"

[Ian Jackson <ijackson@chiark.greenend.org.uk>]

Lucas Nussbaum writes ("Re: Bug#1007717: Draft resolution for "Native source package format with non-native version""):
> If it was possible to use 3.0 (native) with non-native revisions, would
> there be remaining circumstances where 1.0-with-diff is the best choice?

Yes, unfortunately.

If you have a package whose orig source code is large, and the delta
is representable with 1.0-with-diff (which is quite likely), then you
don't want to be reuploading the whole tarball each time.  That's
wasteful of everyone's bandwidth and disk space.

So you want a representation that offers delta compression.  That is
offered by the non-native formats.  The non-native formats supported
by the archive are 1.0-with-diff and "3.0 (quilt)".  The latter has
the problem with debian/patches/ living inside the source tree, which
is quite undesirable especially for "git-first workflows" (as the
draft text puts it).

> If not, maybe the fact that this is the blocking issue should be made
> explicit in (4)?

   4. We believe that there are indeed circumstances in which
      1.0-with-diff is the best choice for a particular source package,
      including, but not limited to, git-first packaging workflows.
 +    This is because there is currently no other source format which avoids
 +    reuploading the whole source (including upstream) for each upload,
 +    and also avoids having to maintain debian/patches/ inside the
 +    package tree.

Or something.

> That would be a way to state: "either dpkg maints refuses to support 3.0
> (native) with non-native revs, and 1.0-with-diff must not be considered
> deprecated; or dpkg maints supports it, and it might be possible to
> deprecate 1.0".

I would love for there to be something like 3.0-with-git-diff.  Indeed,
I filed this wishlist bug to ask if contribution would be welcome:
  https://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/bugreport.cgi?bug=1007781
but have not had any response.

The code in dpkg-source for 1.0-with-diff is quite crusty particularly
in respect of the implied behaviour wrt scanning your ".." for stuff.
The *format* of 1.0-with-diff is quite reasonable, but it lacks
support more kinds of delta.  That could be done as an extension to
1.0-with-diff, but I doubt that would be a popular direction.

Ian.

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