* Andreas Barth (aba@not.so.argh.org) wrote: > | O. What are maintainer scripts? What are the major operation modes? > | What can each of them assume about the system? Where can you > | get more information about them? Perhaps it would be better to list out specific example situations and ask for maintainer scripts which are written to handle them? Something more than the very basic scripts many packages have. > I doubt the value of these questions [...] > for the NM process. This is a highly difficult thing, and there is > even no consensus in Debian what's the recommended way of operation > is. IMHO, it might be better to hint the applicants to e.g. the paper > of Ulrich Drepper, and e.g. ask them how they deal if upstream changes > to often the name of libraries. Having difficult questions is a good thing, imv. They do not necessairly need to know the answer right off the bat but they do have to do some real research and come to a good understanding of what's going on. It's becoming easier over time too as more people discuss the issues on mailing lists and in various proposals. Certainly I've had applicants come back to me and ask for help, and I've given them pointers. That's *good* though, imv. It makes the NM process a learning experience in addition to a test, and it allows the AM to gauge the NM's interest level, determination, and learning skills. All of which I believe are important to the role of being a DD. As for 'no consensus', I'm not sure where you get that idea from, I'm pretty confident the consensus in Debian and with some upstreams is to use versioned symbols which are basically just a stamp of the SONAME for each library. It's reasonably simple, can be automated and handled by libtool and similar things (in fact, a patch exists to do exactly this for libtool) and has minimal impact on upstream. > What would help me: If I can do private comments on nm.d.o, so that I > can track there the status of my applicants at a very detailed level > (instead of using a text file for that); also, a "custom" date-field > that's shown directly at my main page (and not presented to the > outside world) would help me in tracking inactive applicants. I do this already in the existing comment fields. It's public, but personally I really don't see a problem with that. I havn't had any complaints from anyone about it yet and it gives them a good idea where I am and what I've received from them. Stephen
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