Re: Node.js and it's future in debian

[Jonathan Nieder <jrnieder@gmail.com>]

Hi again,

Steve Langasek wrote:

> [Dropped Cc; what does any of this have to do with the DPL?]

I was alerting him to a conversation that was going nowhere fast,
in the hope that he might use his power to

	participate in discussions amongst the Developers in a helpful
	way

It has also been my experience in the past that he is way better than
I am at figuring out a productive way forward when an endeavor is
stuck.

[...]
> I mean that it is not reasonable to expect a maintainer to recognize a
> "consensus" among other people who are not the maintainer, where his or her
> package is concerned, except when that's a consensus of a
> constitutionally-empowered body such as the TC.

That implies two bugs in debian-policy. :)  You are probably right.

[...]
>   The Technical Committee may:
>
>   [...]
>
>   2. Decide any technical matter where Developers' jurisdictions overlap.

If I understand correctly, the general conclusion in this thread has
been that that is the right way to decide this.

I don't see anything fundamentally opposed to one another about the
goals of Pat, Jonas, and Jérémy, who seem to be the developers who
would be involved.  The implied impossibility of a reasonable
conversation between them without some authority figure arbitrating is
a bit disappointing.  Oh well.

[...]
> Ok - sorry, that's not what came across in your message, it's possible I
> overlooked some context up-thread that would have made this clear.  Yes, a
> bug that's been filed against the package and gone unanswered by the
> maintainer is fair game for NMUing.  OTOH, a bug that the maintainer
> disagrees is a bug would not be fair game.

Thanks again for the clarifications and sorry for the lack of clarity.
(Also sorry for the somewhat inflamatory way I've proceeded in this
discussion --- stating my biases up front and tying this in with my
concerns about lack of an active maintainer to vet changes to the node
package was probably not the best approach.  Someone with a more
delicate touch could probably have gotten more done.)

Sincerely,
Jonathan