Frank McCormick wrote:
> After fixing a networking problem this morning, I attempted to update
> my Sid system.
> ...
> I am dumbfounded at the number of packages apt wants to remove,
> including things like gedit and rhythmbox !
> I have always run a unstable system but never had anything like this before?
>
> What is going on here ?
You are running Sid and you are not prepared for it being Unstable?
Okay. Let me explain. Sid is the bleeding edge where maintainers
upload new versions of software. Everything enters Debian by being
uploaded into Unstable Sid.
Testing is a release candidate. Packages flow from Unstable to
Testing after a short waiting period. When preparing for a release
Sid Unstable is frozen. This makes it easier to finish the Testing
release candidate. During the freeze time if an update can be made
then it is uploaded to Unstable as normal and will be unblocked and
will flow into Testing for the release. That would not be possible
without the freeze. There is testing-proposed-updates[1] as a special
case but it is avoided if not needed.
So for the last year, since the freeze in Sid on June 30 last year Sid
has been frozen and quite stable. There haven't been large migrations
allowed to go into it. Some small things sure. But nothing major.
Because everyone was working toward the release of Testing.
Now Wheezy is released. There are almost a year's worth of
enhancement bugs to be cleared asking for newer versions of almost
everything to be packaged and uploaded to Unstable. Maintainers are
looking at their bug lists and working through them and uploading new
versions of everything.
There are a thousand maintainers. What do you think the chances are
that out of a thousand humans that one of them will make a mistake? I
would say that the chances are pretty high! Approaches 100%. On the
first day there were two very bad network bugs in ifupdown almost
immediately! Going forward now every few weeks there will be one or
two major fiascos. It will be an exciting time to be part of this
development effort!
There are several major transitions that are going to be thrashing
Unstable Sid over the next few months. There will be many
incompatible package uploads such as the "man hates less"[2] thread.
Those incompatible uploads may happen one at a time and for long
periods Unstable Sid may not be fully clean. It will be necessary to
check upgrades very carefully, especially packages listed to be
REMOVEd, before applying. After upgrade if there is a problem then
those will need to be debugged and handled. This is situation normal
for Unstable Sid.
People run Sid because all of that software needs to be tested. Thank
you for running Sid and helping Debian by testing the software and
submitting bugs about problems found. You are on the bleeding edge!
And being on the bleeding edge means that there will be blood
spilled. It is only through the tireless efforts of testers and bug
reporters and people debugging the problems and writing patches that
Debian advances.
To be useful contributing member of the Sid team it is necessary to be
able to keep up with bug reports on critical packages. Maintainers
get annoyed when the same bug is filed ten times. It feels like, "I
know I know, just see the original bug report." So it is important to
check for prior submissions before reporting new bugs. (It is a race
condition. Some duplication during the same time is inevitable.)
To be useful it is sometimes necessary to be able to pull old packages
from snapshot.debian.org and downgrade them in order to get your
system working again. Then recreate the problem and fix it several
times while trying to generate a real package fix or bug report for
it.
And as such with all of the above Unstable Sid is always a use at your
own risk[3] release track.
Hope that helps!
Bob
[1] http://www.debian.org/doc/manuals/developers-reference/pkgs.html#t-p-u
[2] http://lists.debian.org/debian-user/2013/05/msg00317.html
http://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/bugreport.cgi?bug=706916
[3] http://www.debian.org/releases/sid/index.en.html
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