Re: What to do if the upstream keeps debian directory in original tarball?

[Jari Aalto <jari.aalto@cante.net>]

Stan Vasilyev <stan.vasilyev@csun.edu> writes:

> I have a situation with a Debian package xdialog: 
> http://packages.qa.debian.org/x/xdialog.html
>
> The upstream author, Thierry Godefroy <xdialog@free.fr>, insists on keeping 
> the debian changes inside the upstream tarball, orig.tar.gz. This
> complicates the development process. First of all, when he makes a
> new version of xdialog, he sends it to the Debian maintainer (me). I
> then have to make changes to the debian directory and send him the
> changes. Finally, he releases the new upstream with Debian changes
> already included.

Is the upstream using a VCS? (Version control software)? 

1) If he is, can he grant you a direct write access. That would be the
   easiest.

2) Can he be persuaded into using distributed SCM[1]? That way both of
   you can synchronize at will

Jari

[1]

http://bazaar-ng.org/
http://bazaar.canonical.com/IntroductionToBzr

And excellent Python based, very easy use, 2nd generation distributed
version control system is bazaar-ng. The simple workflow is:

  $ bzr init
  $ bzr add ...
  $ bzr ci -m "My chnages"
  ...
  $ bzr pull <from remote>