Re: Behaviour of dpkg-source with "3.0 (quilt)" and VCS and automatic patches
"Bernhard R. Link" <brlink@debian.org> writes:
> * Scott Kitterman <debian@kitterman.com> [110531 14:36]:
>> For some of us (me anyway), applying patches when unpacking a
>> source package is just the wrong kind of automagic. I'd like to
>> have patches applied when I say they should be applied.
>
> Please think of the children^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^Husers. ;->
>
> As user of some package I have some trouble with I want to fix
> I always found it very confusing to have to hop through all the
> steps to get to the actual source. Having the patches in debian/patches
> and on patch-tracker.d.o is nice to be able to see what is changed
> relative to upstream and to cooperate with people using other
> distributions, but having to apply them means to always remember to
> first apply those patches after unpacking the source (which already
> applies some patch, only that on many packages that patch only adds
> new files to debian/).
>
> The more Debian packages you have seen, the more different ways you
> have encountered and the less likely you are to be confused or to
> forget to apply the patches before looking at the source, but as
> much as this kept repelling me from looking deeper into some packages
> even after some years of being DD, I can only imagine how someone not
> so deep into debian development is obstructed by this to help themselves
> and us.
>
> As a Debian package is a .orig and some changes anyway, having all of
> those changes always applied is not so much magic but only consistent.
> Having sometimes all the changes applied (because they are in the
> .diff.gz), sometimes not (because the diff only creates debian/), and
> sometimes even only having random artefacts changed directly in the .diff
> while the important changes are in debian/patches and needing extra
> commands to be applied is extremly confusing.
>
> Bernhard R. Link
+1. Thank you.
And note that as maintainer or for the VCS copy you can allways
configure debian/soruce/local-options to unapply patches if you so
desire.
MfG
Goswin
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