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Re: How to cope with patches sanely



Clint Adams <schizo@debian.org> writes:
> On Mon, Jan 28, 2008 at 05:37:03PM -0800, Russ Allbery wrote:

>> This work flow simply doesn't work with our current source package
>> format and a patch management system.  Requiring this to work *with the
>> current source package format* essentially means outlawing using patch
>> management systems to manage Debian packages.  That's why this proposal
>> is controversial.

> I agree with Lars that we should move toward requiring it to work.

What I'd like to see is a Debian source package format that supports
essentially quilt metadata -- in other words, a series file and a set of
patches.  It's a very minor addition to the current format, and I think
it's very close to the intention of wig&pen.

With that source package format, everyone using quilt or simple-patchsys
can trivially satisfy this requirement, and most uses of dpatch are
similarly trivial.  It doesn't provide all of the power of a git or bzr
package format, but it's a lot easier to implement and I would hope easier
to get consensus on.

I just don't know what's involved in finally deciding on something like
this and making it happen.  We've been having this discussion for years,
and so far we've not made a lot of forward progress.  :/

-- 
Russ Allbery (rra@debian.org)               <http://www.eyrie.org/~eagle/>


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