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Bug#114920: marked as done ([PROPOSAL] remove foolish consistency in perl module names)

Your message dated Tue, 04 Mar 2008 19:39:16 -0800
with message-id <87od9trg9n.fsf@windlord.stanford.edu>
and subject line Re: Bug#114920: [PROPOSAL] remove foolish consistency in perl module names
has caused the Debian Bug report #114920,
regarding [PROPOSAL] remove foolish consistency in perl module names
to be marked as done.

This means that you claim that the problem has been dealt with.
If this is not the case it is now your responsibility to reopen the
Bug report if necessary, and/or fix the problem forthwith.

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-- 
114920: http://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/bugreport.cgi?bug=114920
Debian Bug Tracking System
Contact owner@bugs.debian.org with problems
--- Begin Message --- 
Package: debian-policy

Rationalle:

Perl policy currently dictates that a perl module package have a name of
the form lib-foo-bar-perl, where "foo-bar" maps to Foo:Bar in the perl
module name. This is resulting in a lot of very large and awkward
package names -- the worst ofender so far is the longest named package
in the entire distribution: libbusiness-onlinepayment-bankofamerica-perl

There are a lot of other very long package names that result from this
foolish consistency, and indeed perl module packages make up 1/5th of
all the packages with names in excess of 25 characters. Reducing the
size of these packages names will thus have a large impact on the length
of Debian's package names in general; this in turn has many ramificatons
large and small everywhere users deal with or are exposed to package
names. (Typing in "libbusiness-onlinepayment-bankofamerica-perl" is not
fun. Neither is seeing it truncated to 20 characters in dpkg -l.)

At the same time, this consistency of package names can indeed be very
useful, when things are being automated, and we shouldn't lose that
benefit with foolish inconsistency.


Proposal:

Replace section 3.2 of the perl sub-policy included with Debian policy
with the following text:

    Packages which contain perl modules should provide virtual packages
    that correspond to the primary module or modules in the package. The
    naming convention is that for module 'Foo::Bar', the package should
    provide 'libfoo-bar-perl'. This may be used as the package's name if
    the result is not too long and cumbersome. Or the package's name may
    be an abbreviated version, and the longer name put in the Provides
    field.

Also, although they are not currently part of the formal policy, there
are conventions to use similar naming for java (and maybe python) module
packages, and if this proposal is passed, those informal policies should
be updated to work the same way.


Transition:

There is no need for a transition plan for this proposal. It allows
existing packages to remain unchanged, while new packages use shorter
names as desired. Existing packages can be renamed to shorter names at
their maintainers' discretion, though if they do, they'll have to watch
out for versioned dependancies (rare; very little depends on perl module
packages at all).


Process:

I am looking for seconds for this proposal.

--
      A foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds.
                      -- Ralph Waldo Emerson

--- End Message ---
--- Begin Message --- 
Russ Allbery <rra@debian.org> writes:

> This is a Policy proposal that's sat in the Policy bug queue with
> wording and seconds for quite some time.  I'd like to resurrect it and
> resolve it one way or the other.

[...]

>> Proposal:
>>
>> Replace section 3.2 of the perl sub-policy included with Debian policy
>> with the following text:
>>
>>     Packages which contain perl modules should provide virtual packages
>>     that correspond to the primary module or modules in the package. The
>>     naming convention is that for module 'Foo::Bar', the package should
>>     provide 'libfoo-bar-perl'. This may be used as the package's name if
>>     the result is not too long and cumbersome. Or the package's name may
>>     be an abbreviated version, and the longer name put in the Provides
>>     field.
>>
>> Also, although they are not currently part of the formal policy, there
>> are conventions to use similar naming for java (and maybe python) module
>> packages, and if this proposal is passed, those informal policies should
>> be updated to work the same way.

The recent discussion of the resurrection of this proposal was generally
negative, with nearly everyone commenting either preferring the current
consistency to the abbreviation of package names or not seeing enough
benefit to argue for a change.

I'm going to go ahead and close this bug so that it doesn't linger in the
Policy BTS further, since I believe the consensus is against taking any
action.  (Debian Policy bugs that don't reach consensus have a tendency to
sit around forever.)  If you disagree with that consensus after reviewing
the Policy bug log, please discuss this further.

-- 
Russ Allbery (rra@debian.org)               <http://www.eyrie.org/~eagle/>

--- End Message ---
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