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Op zaterdag 26 april 2014 16:51:57 schreef Ben Finney: > "Steve M. Robbins" <steve@sumost.ca> writes: > > On April 25, 2014 11:02:29 PM Ben Finney wrote: > > > We promise the source for everything any recipient downloads as part > > > of Debian. If non-source files are distributed in Debian source > > > packages, without a way to confidently guarantee the corresponding > > > source is what's already available in Debian, then that is a > > > definite impact on the freedom of Debian recipients: it threatens > > > the freedom promises in the Social Contract. > > > > That is certainly not a universally held view. Some of us [1] regard > > random trash littering the source distribution -- but not used in > > generating the actual software (binary distribution) -- as merely a > > nuisance that can be tolerated. > > If it's in the Debian source package, it is distributed as part of > Debian. > > If it's distributed as part of Debian, it is subject to the promises in > the Debian Social Contract. > > Those promises include the promise that anything in Debian has its > source in Debian.
Yes. And while I agree that this is a problem for things like precompiled Windows binaries, I'm not so sure when it regards convenience copies of minified _javascript_ libraries. After all, there are many other packages whose upstream source ships with convenience copies of other code, and we don't consider those to be problems.
If a package will work equally well when using the Debian-packaged version of a _javascript_ library rather than using the shipped convenience copy of the said library (as proven by using a symlink and a dependency to the relevant file and package rather than shipping the convenience copy in the binary package), then the source requirements for all relevant code is satisfied; it's just that they're done so by another source package.
> > I have to say that this absolutist zeal in scrubbing the source > > package grates on me for two reasons. FIrst, it introduces an > > undocumented difference between upstream source and Debian source. > > The difference should not be undocumented: the difference should be > described in the package, and its rationale given. ‘README.source’ is a > good place to document the difference.
No, that's not what README.source is meant for. This should document "weirdness" about the package build system as necessary for an NMU'er to figure out how the package works.
-- It is easy to love a country that is famous for chocolate and beer
-- Barack Obama, speaking in Brussels, Belgium, 2014-03-26
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