Re: ChangeLogs and a pure debian package.
> > All pure Debian packages must included a debian directory. Non-native
> > packages may or may not include a debian directory in the upstream
> > source file. (Upstream source is upstream source. If the upstream
> > author provides an old/obsolete debian directory in the upstream tarb=
> all,
> > you should not remove it.) Non-native packages must contain a debian
> > directory after the Debian diff has been applied to the upstream sour=
> ce
> > tarball.
>
> This is not policy so I would not use "must".
>
> Native debian packages can contain a debian directory since such
> an application would not make sense on a non-debian system.
How can you make a Debian package without a debian directory? It either
has to be in the source or the diff. Native packages have no diff, so
it must be in the source, no?
> Then, considering the non-native applications, it is cleaner to
> separate the application (uptream source) from its packaging.
>
> But again, this is only my opinion.
I think maintaining the separation of upstream-pure/Debian-patched is
more important than maintaining a separation of source/packaging. If
the upstream source contains packaging info (including packaging info
for other distributions) it should stay in the upstream tar file.
As a user, I expect to be able to look at the .diff to answer the questions
"What did the Debian maintainer do to this software after he downloaded
it from the upstream author? How will this software be different if I get
it from Debian vs. compiling it from upstream source myself?". If the
maintainer is making changes to the upstream tarfile itself, there's no
way to see what the Debian maintainer did to the package.
Eric
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