Re: Slink to potato upgrade

[Kevin Dalley <kevin@seti-inst.edu>]

Robert Woodcock <rcw@debian.org> writes:


> Furthermore, those problem applications will most likely *not* compile
> against glibc2.1 until they are fixed (and would then work on glibc 2.1
> if recompiled against glibc 2.0).
> 
> Recompiles DO NOT fix these apps.

All the more reason to provide support for continuing to run these
applications with old libraries.  It is technically easy to do so.

Whether the application is written "correctly" or not, if the
application has enough users, and was supported, however
inadvertently, under the old libraries, users will have problems with
the libraries.  Moral superiority doesn't fix the user's broken
software.

First we should make a decision as to whether glibc2.1 *should* be a
separate soname.  If so, then we should talk to the rest of the Linux
community and decide how to resolve the issue.

You seem to prefer a sounding dichotomy:

1.  Break many users code when they upgrade to potato.

2.  Create binary incompatibility with other Linux distributions.

Neither of these options is good.

If Debian were the only distribution to use new sonames, that would be 
an area for criticism.  However, if no distribution uses new sonames,
and many applications fail, Linux as a whole will be mocked be users
and non-users.  Moral superiority is fine.  Usability is essential.

-- 
Kevin Dalley
SETI Institute
kevin@seti.org