Re: fplll

[Tim Abbott <tabbott@MIT.EDU>]

The reason fplll is in Debian is as part of the effort to package Sage 
(sagemath.org) for Debian.  So while it has no rdepends, removing it from 
Debian would be counterproductive towards that effort (which as I 
understand it, there are people working on again after a few years of 
inactivity on the project)

I would recommend the option of just assuming nothing will actually break 
if we upgrade the package to the newer ABI, since that's the least work -- 
the package has no rdepends in Debian and I don't think it is used by many 
folks other than those who are using it via Sage (I'm not aware of any 
users outside the Sage usage).

	-Tim Abbott

On Thu, 9 Aug 2012, Julien Puydt wrote:

> (The following discussion started because the current fplll has the same
> soname as the one currently finding its way into wheezy, while being probably
> incompatible.)
> 
> Le 07/08/2012 15:43, Bernhard R. Link a écrit :
> > * Julien Puydt<julien.puydt@laposte.net>  [120807 12:41]:
> > > I don't know what happens to old programs, but :
> > > 1) nothing in debian depends on that library ;
> > > 2) this library is for scientific computations at the research
> > > level, and the current version is five years old.
> > > 
> > > I'm annoyed by the idea of increasing the soname myself -- isn't it
> > > upstream's job?
> > 
> > It is upstream's job. But they did not do it.
> > (ideally one would increase it to something upstream will not likely
> > use, for example something non-nummerically).
> > 
> > Alternatives are:
> > - check if anything could actually break (the program coming with fplll
> >    for example seems to run find with the new one even when compiled
> >    against the old one, perhaps everything is always inlined and having
> >    the .so in the old was not really needed).
> > - wait a stable release to get rid of the old one. This approach would
> >    currently take a shorter amount of time than it sounds as we are in a
> >    freeze so no new version cannot enter testing before wheezy is
> >    released anyway. (To file a removal request use reportbug, chose
> >    other, then release.debian.org, then rm then explain your cause).
> >    _If_ the release team thinks it is a good idea to remove the fplll
> >    package from wheezy with _this_ explanation given (you want to break
> >    abi compatibility without changing the soname and can persuade them
> >    that it is acceptable in this specific case), then I'd have no problem
> >    in this regard to sponsor it even without the soname bump or further
> >    analysis what kind of programs could be broken by it.
> >    (Though I'm not doing any prediction whether there is also someone
> >     else with less qualms who would upload it without any of the three).
> 
> I'm not confortable asking for the removal of Tim's package from wheezy: it is
> something I'd rather see him do himself. There are good arguments for it :
> nothing uses it in wheezy, it's basically unmaintained and it's obsolete.
> 
> I put him on CC so he knows about the discussion, with a () preamble to
> complement what I'm quoting.
> 
> So, Tim?
> 
> Snark on #debian-science
>