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Re: Bug#42477: PROPOSED} delay the /usr/doc transition till after potato



Hi,
>>"Chris" == Chris Waters <xtifr@dsp.net> writes:

 >> Secondly, I think that the policy should not hard code release
 >> names

 Chris> I would call this a serious flaw in policy then.

        My opinion is a flaw in policy? ;-)

 Chris> I think we NEED a way to say, "these are the rules for release
 Chris> "X", these are the rules to follow subsequently."  Ideally, I
 Chris> think we'd have a strategy document that takes precedence over
 Chris> policy, but that's a fairly major proposal, one that I'm a
 Chris> long, *long* way from proposing formally. :-)

        Think about adding a layer of abstraction. I would rather
 couch your example above as "These are the rules that need be
 follwed right now. (footnote: at a latter point policy may be
 amended to follow these other rules"). That leaves us some leeway to
 decide when to make the changes, and allows us to reflect upon and
 change the ``other rules'' to reflect any changes in the situation. 

        It also does not tie us down to a particular release frame
 (the project may decide to have an e,ergency woody release two
  weeks after potato -- not very likely, but why close doors we need
  not?)

 Chris> The way this was handled in the symlink proposal (leaving the
 Chris> cleanup to an unspecified future policy change which may or
 Chris> may not ever happen) strikes me as a *really* awful way to
 Chris> handle this.  Far better to just allow the proposal to specify
 Chris> which parts apply to which releases if it's important to do so
 Chris> (as it is with these proposals).

        I think the loss of flexibility is not worth the gains. Of
 course, I may be missing some of the gains, since all you say is that
 your opinion is that this is a really awful way, but give no
 rationale (at best, the gain is that you feel better about the
 proposal, but that is not really a satisfactory reason for me). 

 >> At a latter date, policy can be changed to reflect that the move is kosher. 

 Chris> I think this is much worse than "hard coding" release names in

        Could you give some reasons?

 Chris> policy.  Though I agree that neither is *ideal*.  But there's
 Chris> only so much that can be done today.  Either we institute
 Chris> temporary policy with *no* markings and *assume*[1] that we'll
 Chris> fix it later, or we clearly mark it as temporary policy when
 Chris> we all know that it is temporary policy.  I think the latter
 Chris> is *far* preferable.

        We can mark it as a temporary policy. We just leave the end of
 the temporary period open, to allow us to set the time when we are
 closer to the change, and to change what needs be done if the
 circumstances change (dpkg may get revamped, for example). 

        manoj
-- 
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Manoj Srivastava   <srivasta@debian.org>  <http://www.debian.org/%7Esrivasta/>
Key C7261095 fingerprint = CB D9 F4 12 68 07 E4 05  CC 2D 27 12 1D F5 E8 6E


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