Bug#662632: RFS: libaio-ocaml/1.0~rc1
Goswin von Brederlow wrote:
> Benoît Knecht <benoit.knecht@fsfe.org> writes:
> > Goswin von Brederlow wrote:
> >> [...]
> >>
> >> The package is native because I am both maintainer and upstream
> >> author. Does a watch file make sense for a native package?
> >
> > That's not what native means. See the third point of [3].
>
> It says "should" and not "must" and a native package is just so much
> simpler to work with at the current state of the package. Current state
> is about 50 upstream releases to 3 debian changes only releases.
> That might change in the future and then the package can become
> non-native. But for now I feel native is the best way.
You're of course free to do as you want, but I maintain that it's a very
bad idea, and not doing something right because it's easier to do it
wrong will almost certainly turn out to be much more of a mess and a
burden than you'd have anticipated.
With the path you're choosing, you're essentially making sure that no
other distribution will ever package your software. They'd have to sort
through every new upstream release to see if anything changed besides
debian/; and when they fall behind on the upstream version simply
because only Debian-specific stuff has changed, their users will start
complaining and they'll have to explain the disparity.
And as mentioned in [4], NMUs will be much more complicated.
I think it important for any maintainer to clearly differentiate in
their mind upstream from Debian, even if they happen to be the same
person. Otherwise, you're artificially limiting your software to Debian,
which is at the opposite side of what free software should strive for.
Of course, I can't sponsor your package either way, so you can
completely ignore my advice if you wish. But if I was in the position of
sponsoring it, I wouldn't do it based on this point alone (and I kind of
hope prospective sponsors feel the same way).
I sincerely hope you'll do the right thing here.
[3] http://wiki.debian.org/DebianMentorsFaq#What_is_the_difference_between_a_native_Debian_package_and_a_non-native_package.3F
[4] http://wiki.debian.org/DebianMentorsFaq#What.27s_wrong_with_upstream_shipping_a_debian.2BAC8_directory.3F
Cheers,
--
Benoît Knecht
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