Re: Recent changes in dpkg
On Wed, May 26, 2010 at 10:34:32PM +0100, Neil Williams wrote:
> On Wed, 26 May 2010 22:59:25 +0200
> Iustin Pop <iusty@k1024.org> wrote:
>
> > On Wed, May 26, 2010 at 10:43:36PM +0200, Bernd Zeimetz wrote:
> > > On 05/24/2010 11:05 AM, Raphael Hertzog wrote:
> > > > * The plan concerning dpkg-source and the default source format
> > > > has been clarified. In the long term, the default format will
> > > > disappear and debian/source/format will become mandatory. The
> > > > lintian tag missing-debian-source-format[2] will help us track
> > > > that.
> > >
> > > Which will force developers to touch most of the packages in the
> > > archive just to realize this? Sorry, but that's insane. You should
> > > not try to force people into migrating to some new format because
> > > *you* think it is better. This is not a decision which should be
> > > decided by the dpkg maintainers - instead it needs to be discussed
> > > within the developers and maintainers. While the new format
> > > provides some advantages when it comes to the handling of patches,
> > > the 1.0 format is still much more flexible to use - for example it
> > > does not require an existing tarball to build a package, which is
> > > very useful for testing. You know that there are a lot of arguments
> > > against the 3.0 format out there, so please do not enforce such
> > > changes without discussing them first.
> >
> > I think you're misreading the announcement. What will change is that
> > declaring the format (either 1.0 or 3.0 in whatever variant) will be
> > required, not migrating to the new formats.
>
> Declaring a format mandates touching every single package because the
> vast majority of packages are currently dpkg source format 1.0 ONLY
> because debian/source/format does NOT exist.
[…]
I was only responding to Bernd's email which sounded like he misread the
change. Whether the actual change is good or not, it's another issue, on
which I'm disagreeing (but not very strongly, i.e. I could live with
it):
> I think the announcement is wrong, we cannot ever expect every single
> package to be touched for any single change. We don't even do that when
> libc changes SONAME - that only affects compiled packages, this
> theoretically affects all source packages which means huge numbers of
> rebuilds and transitions.
Agreed.
> There is nothing wrong with a source package that glides through several
> stable releases without needing a rebuild, especially if it only
> builds an Arch:all binary package. As long as it is bug free, an ancient
> standards version alone is not sufficient reason to change anything in
> the package or make any upload just for the sake of making an upload.
But here I disagree. A couple of stable releases is, let's say, 4 years?
In the last four years, there have been significant changes
(advancements?) in the state of Debian packaging. As such, most, if not
all, nontrivial packages would be improved if they're brought up to
date.
> debian/source/format cannot become mandatory without causing every
> single source package to be modified. For what? Just to add 6 bytes?
Mandatory? I agree it shouldn't be mandatory. I would rather propose a
'W' lintian tag, nothing more, and which will only fire if the last
changelog date is after the date this proposal goes live.
iustin
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