Mangling other people's code

[ian@chiark.greenend.org.uk (Ian Jackson)]

For the second time recently I've wanted to do a bit of work on a
package I wrote which others have been making releases of, and find
that substantial and unwarranted reorganisations have taken place
which make the job a lot harder.

The first case was dpkg, whose build system has been replaced with a
fragile Byzantine monstrosity which depends on libtool and automake
and is the source of several bug reports.  Also, a directory was
renamed without rhyme or reason !  I intend (when I have some tuits)
to undo all that and go back to the previous arrangements.

The second case was debiandoc-sgml, where the current maintainer or
one of their predecessors (I gave the package away) has completely
changed the layout of the code in the backends.

Does the policy list think it would be a good idea to add a piece to
the policy manual asking maintainers who inherit a package and
uploaders of NMU's not to change the layout, structure or style of the
source code unless it is really necessary ?

Thanks,
Ian.