On Thu, 27 May 2010 09:12:24 +0200 Iustin Pop <iusty@k1024.org> wrote: > Data packages are a good point, to which I reply: how will they take > advantages of new compression formats? No need - just because these are data packages doesn't mean they are even tens of kilobytes in size. These are source packages, not data binary packages split out from other compiled binaries. A new compression format won't save more than a few bytes on a small data package - why bother? We cannot restrict ourselves to only the .deb files in Debian. There are plenty of situations where the .deb format is used to package a specific configuration tweak or a little snippet of data. In many cases, the contents vary slightly across lots of different use cases, so the source builds dozens of tiny data packages and the devices pick and choose which configurations to support. Think along the lines of xorg-xserver-video-* where you don't want -all, you want specific devices to cherry-pick only the drivers that are needed for that specific chipset. The packages themselves are tiny but there are a LOT of them. You don't want to rebuild and reupload dozens and dozens merely to add debian/source/format to every single one. You also cannot allow every device to install every variant, even if you remove most later, because of all the unwanted dependencies. > > After Squeeze is released, I'll have half a dozen or more packages that > > will be the same version in oldstable through to unstable and none of > > those currently have any bugs or lintian warnings other than an > > old/ancient standards version or similarly minor issues. None of those > > would give any benefits *to users* by being "updated" with respect to > > the packaging. > > To users? Probably not. But to fellow developers? Do those packages > already have Vcs-* fields so that I can retrieve them easily with > debcheckout? Do the patches already come in DEP-3 format, so that > tracking where they originate is easy for automated tools? Some have no VCS - they are downloaded from CPAN or are my own upstream, I have the debian/ directory on my own systems and that's all that's needed. There are no patches (especially when I am upstream). There really are packages out there which are so simple and trivial to package that the enhancements in Debian packaging methods since Etch have no benefit to anyone, including other DD's. Again, this is also applicable to uses of .deb outside Debian where thinks like VCS- and DEP3 are meaningless, even lintian is ignored. Emdebian automatically drops all VCS- fields, indeed all debian/control fields which are absolutely mandatory to get the package accepted into a random reprepro archive. We cannot go around assuming that everyone using dpkg is only using it within the confines of Debian Policy, let alone "Debian Best Practice". Why do we assume that every package should automatically use the latest whizz-bang-feature merely because that feature exists? Some packages do not need a VCS of any kind and some never need patches or even debhelper >> 5. .deb is a useful format in it's own right - Debian should not make changes that undermine the usefulness of .deb outside Debian, if only because it undermines the maintenance of some packages within Debian where packaging life really is that simple. > I agree that we don't *have* to update the packages. All I'm saying, to > me it seems that the world of packaging standards is not sitting, and > not doing an update once per release seems a bit (just a bit) strange to > me. Not to me. One release to last from oldstable to unstable is actually very appealing, for packages where life is sufficiently simple. One day, I might even get a package where it gets into oldstable at the very first upload. > But I understand your point, and I'm not saying it is a wrong point. > Just trying to express why I believe doing a rebuild per release helps > more than hurts. I think you're seeing complexity where none exists. I have some very simple packages and I like them like that. :-) Changing the packaging merely because the maintainer is "bored" of using debhelper 5 etc. is just sad. (I remember someone in the Debian release team - at the time, no names but he knows who he is - saying that DD's should consider every upload to unstable to be the version that will get into stable.) -- Neil Williams ============= http://www.data-freedom.org/ http://www.linux.codehelp.co.uk/ http://e-mail.is-not-s.ms/
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