Re: Moving contrib and non-free of master.debian.org
On Tue, Jun 22, 1999 at 03:18:08PM -0700, Chris Waters did spake thusly:
> Shane King <thandor@donut.dhis.org> writes:
>
> > The pragmatic approach is just as hypocritical, if not more so. You've
> > basically said it's ok for debian to be pragmatic while telling the users
> > they should not be pragmatic and instead rely on only software which
> > conforms to the DFSG. That is hypocricy, pure and simple.
>
> Oh COME ON people! We already have the contrib and non-free in a
> separate tree. Moving it to a separate host will not make it ONE BIT
> harder to find or install. Claiming that this change will force users
> to rely on "only" DFSG-compliant software is sheer hyberbole! Buy a
> clue!
If mirrors choose not to mirror the new host, it WILL make it harder to
find and install.
It's not forcing users to do anything, it is sending a very bad message
though, at least in my opinion. Debian already doesn't allow these packages
into the "official" distribution. Now it's proposed that they must live on
some other host. The message being sent out is that these packages aren't
as desirable as the free ones. Which is all well and good, except for the
fact debian itself is making use of some of them!
If debian can't make do without them, then it IS hypocracy for debian to
suggest to its users that they should do without them too.
It's like the 40 cigarette a day smoker telling other people to quit - sure
he may be right, but the fact that he's not practicing what he preaches
tends to lesson the impact of his message.
- Shane King.
Reply to: