Re: Nitpicking: you are doing it wrong

[Thomas Goirand <zigo@debian.org>]

> Hi Adam,
>
> On 08.07.2011 18:24, Adam Borowski wrote:
> > If you don't make use of newest shiniest features, higher debhelper
> levels
> > just make backporting harder for no gain.
>
> There is debhelper 8 in both, lenny-backports as well as in
> squeeze-backports.
>
> Moreover Debian packages target Sid, not (Old-) Stable, and this is
> where efforts should be invested in. Moreover backports are something
> optional, not a requirement for new packages, or something which should
> even necessarily kept in mind when working on packages.

While I agree with your argument of debhelper being present in
lenny and squeeze backport, I think it is the only one. I strongly
do not agree with the "or something which should even necessarily
kept in mind" part. Giving an advice here or there to have backporting
made more easy doesn't hurt. It's not a strong requirement, but it
for sure is a good thing.

If you (build)-depend with (>= version) being unecessary too high,
you are unecessarily making the life of the eventual backporter
harder, and this should be avoided if possible. When I do a sponsoring,
it might not be very common to do so, but I always try the package in
both Stable and SID, to see if there are eventual issues that may raise.
Sometimes, a few minor tweaks here or there really helps to make the
backport being reduced to a diff in debian/changelog. That doesn't only
help an eventual backporter, but also anyone which is running Stable,
and wishes to rebuild a SID package for his own use (which I do often
for myself).

Thomas