Bug#466425: lintian: Please warn about debhelper compat level
"Roberto C. Sanchez" <roberto@connexer.com> writes:
> Package: lintian
> Version: 1.23.28
> Severity: wishlist
>
> Based on #466423, I think it would be nice for lintian to warn about
> packages using a debhelper compatibility other than whatever was latest
> in the most recent stable release.
>
> For example, take Etch, which had a debhelper compatibility level of 5
> at the time of its release. If you built a package with debhelper
> compat of 4, then that should cause a warning as it is using an outdated
> compatibility level. Likewise, if it were to use compatibility level 6
> (recently available), it should at the very least generate an info, or
> preferrably a warning.
lintian warns about compatibility levels that are marked in the debhelper
documentation as deprecated. I think that's the right tradeoff for older
versions and leaves the decision with the debhelper maintainer.
Currently, V4 is not marked deprecated.
For the compatibility level 6 part, I personally agree (and it certainly
makes backporting easier), but I know some other maintainers don't and use
V6 as a matter of course, particularly for new packages. I'm not sure
that it's appropriate in this case for lintian to be used as a way of
trying to force consensus. Basically, I don't want to irritate people
with tags that they don't agree with and aren't ever going to follow,
since it makes fewer people use lintian at all.
--
Russ Allbery (rra@debian.org) <http://www.eyrie.org/~eagle/>
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