Re: ITP (really ITrP): bigbrother
"J. Currey" wrote:
>
> On Sun, Jul 30, 2000 at 02:35:02AM -0700, Seth Cohn wrote:
> > With the permission of Stephane Bortzmeyer, the current maintainer,
> > I am going to repackage bigbrother (aka Big Brother) with a more current
> > version.
> >
> > The version in potato (and woody) is 1.09c, the current version is 1.4h.
> > Doesn't seem like much, but it's a huge difference, with many many many
> > changes, at least a good years' worth (1.1, 1.2, 1.3, 1.4) . Outstanding
> > bugreports exist that are over a year old, and most if not all are due to
> > having such a old and broken version packaged. The current package
> > doesn't work on correctly on install either (according to one bugreport)
>
> The older versions had a more liberal license. I stopped using big
> brother as their license became appropriate of "big brother" ;).
>
> > For those wondering why I'm taking a non-free package, and not working on
> > one of the free alternatives: simply, BB works, and is pretty free in
> > practice, if not in license, and is very well supported (for free). I plan
> > on packaging many truly free things also, but having just installed a
> > fresh Debian system for a box at work, and discovering the ancient age of
> > bigbrother in the packages, I was aghast.
> >
>
> Yes, I was wondering why.
> Since, as you say, there are other 'free' packages that provide the same
> functionality you might consider putting time into enhancing them in stead,
> although IMO the ones I use surpassed 'big brother' some time ago.
> Many could use an easier method of configuration, cricket for example.
>
> > It is old packages like this that give Debian a bad name. Personally, I'd
> > recommend removing bigbrother from potato, rather than having an old
> > broken version floating around on it. One upstream version behind, fine,
> > even 2... but to be a year behind and still be in potato doesn't feel
> > right to me.
>
> I recommend removing bigbrother from woody.
A friend of mine recently emailed me that there is a Big Sister
workalike for Big Brother that is GPL.
jpb
--
Joe Block <jpb@creol.ucf.edu>
CREOL System Administrator
Social graces are the packet headers of everyday life.
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