Weired package policy

[Hans <hans.ullrich@loop.de>]

Hi folks, 

there is a thing, I cannot understand. 

>From time to time, there appear packages, which are in stable for a long time, 
and then suddenly they are in unstable and stable, but NOT in testing.

This is a policy, I do not understand! An actual example is "cqrlog" which 
appears in stable and sid, but not in testing.

For my feeling, I would expect "cqrlog" in testing, too, maybe in the same 
version as in stable, but not fully disappeared. 

Debian's way is not quite clear for me, and IMO I think it not a good idea, to 
let packages silently disappear. At this point, I may be wrong.

Thinking of this let me think of another point, which has never been clear for 
me since years: When I install a new system, and I want to run testing, then 
you MUST also add the repo for stable in the sources.list, otherwise packages 
you might want to use, are missing (due to the policy above).

I searched the manuals for this point, but this was nowhere mentioned. Of 
course, you may say, that this is self-evident, but people might want to have 
the repo small and may think, "hey, if I get testing, then all packages of 
stable will be available as well."

Anyway, maybe someone might enlighten me (and maybe others, too as well) of 
that.

Thank you for all your answers and the great work.

Best

Hans