Re: Non-DDs as official Debian package maintainers
Jonas Smedegaard <dr@jones.dk>
> Packages with noone explicitly nursing them is a bad thing. that's why
> we have the routine of "oh - someone seems to be MIA - let's check what
> packages is hurt by this". This is not (easily) trackable with
> sponsored packages.
I really don't see why that is necessarily so. If you are
arguing against "anonymous sponsorship" then I agree. Users
should be able to identify the sponsors easily and the sponsors
should be reading the bug reports. That does not need them to
take credit due to the maintainer, like developers-reference
does. The non-DD maintainer should still be attributed correctly.
If the sponsor goes MIA, it should be simple to see what it
affects. Pretty early on and regularly, sponsors should make
sure NMs know what to do if they go MIA, but I fail at that ;-)
> So again: What is the responsibility of sponsoring, if not the full
> responsibility of "everything the non-DD did to make the software
> suitable for inclusion into Debian" (what I call "maintainance")?
Sponsors are responsible for the uploaded material and should
act as a sort of mini-ftpmaster/qa/mia/bugs-help routine. My
NMs get pinged occasionally if they go too quiet. It is not the
same as me maintaining, but I'd consider it if a NM did go MIA,
because I mostly sponsor stuff I use or am interested in.
Sponsored packages should be unmaintained less often than DD
ones, because there should be someone who's already read and
understood the packaging and might take over, isn't there?
--
MJ Ray (slef), K. Lynn, England, email see http://mjr.towers.org.uk/
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