Re: Intent to package: debian-keyring
On 20 Apr 1998, James Troup wrote:
[snip]
> > There is a currently a discussion on debian-policy about this
> > section--but until we have a result from the discussion, this
> > section applies _as_ _is_.
>
> Sorry, but if you invent a policy which says "packages must call `rm'
> with the arguments `-fr' in postrms'", I *will* ignore you. Neither
> you nor policy deserve blind faith or obedience; nobody in the project
> does.
Noone said that you have to follow policy without verifying it. We have a
special procedure if someone discovers something in the policy which is
suboptimal or broken: one can either file a bug report against the
"debian-policy" package, email me directly, or start a discussion on
debian-policy.
However, just ignoring policy and sending provocative mails to
debian-devel explaining, that one just ignores every aspect of policy
which one doesn't understand or like, is _NOT_ the correct procedure.
That's the only reason for my (perhaps harsh) reply.
> > If we leave it up to the maintainers to either follow policy or to
> > reject it, we wouldn't need a policy at all!
>
> Policy is not infallible. Just look at the ldconfig episode;
[snip]
Please don't blame me for the broken ldconfig policy. I've taken over
maintenance of the Packaging Manual only a few days ago, and one of my
first actions was to fix this bug. IIRC, the first discussion about the
ldconfig policy which clearly had shown that the policy was broken was in
Dec 97 on debian-policy--I wasn't the maintainer for that manual at that
time--maybe that's the reason why the issue was forgotten about and not
fixed earlier.
[snip]
> If I hadn't been so... annoyed by the way this particular policy was
> created, and the so-called justification for it's continued existence,
> I would have probably done what I did with the ldconfig FUD; ignored
> it. In retrospect, maybe I should have.
No, next time you encounter a bug in policy, please file a bug report
against the appropriate policy package.
[snip]
> > Our policy applies to all packages in the distribution. Any package
> > failing current policy in a severe way will be removed from the
> > distribution.
>
> Oh really? Why haven't you removed dpkg then? It's been failing your
> personal policy for a long time. And please define severe; unless you
> do so carefully you'll find you just promised to remove a large
> proportion of the distribution with your fiat power.
>
> > Guy, please don't install the debian-keyring package into hamm or
> > slink until we've resolved this issue.
>
> Guy doesn't support this policy either Christian; fiat power or not,
> how long are you willing to flout that power and go against the view
> of the majority of people participating in the discussion?
You are clearly ignoring the facts, which are:
- That particular aspect of policy has been included by me because I
thought it was already policy and because I considered this topic
as very important (which I still do). IIRC, at that time no package in
the distribution failed that rule.
- A few weeks ago, someone (I don't remember who--but that doesn't really
matter) came up with this issue on debian-policy and said that current
policy is `bad' and should be changed.
- Answering that request, I said that I'm willing to discuss this issue,
but until we all agree on a new policy, the old policy will not be
removed since this issue is just too important. With that, I didn't
use my fiat power to implement the policy, but to keep it official
until we've agreed on a new policy.
Ok, now let us get back to the original discussion: It looks to me, like
we are stuck. Most participants fail to see the importance of having the
responsibility of our packages well defined, and I still fail to see the
advantages of allowing several people to maintain one package at once.
When I thought about this topic again today, I noticed that we don't have
any documentation or policy about what the maintainer's duties and rights
are. Perhaps we should start discussing this first. I'll start a different
thread for this.
Thanks,
Chris
-- Christian Schwarz
schwarz@monet.m.isar.de, schwarz@schwarz-online.com,
Don't know Perl? schwarz@debian.org, schwarz@mathematik.tu-muenchen.de
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http://www.perl.com http://fatman.mathematik.tu-muenchen.de/~schwarz/
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