Bug#364609: O: Gnus -- A versatile News and mailing list reader for Emacsen.
> Package gnus, version x.y-z.dfsg.
> That way its clearly marked that gnus is modified to be dfsg free,
> and you dont change any source/package name. A lot of other packages
> in Debian already go this way, I dont see why gnus can't do it.
In Debian, source package components have precise meaning.
The package name is Gnus, and the version you are referring to is the
"upstream" version. In case you are not aware, that implies that
this is a source package for an upstream release versioned
x.y-z.dfsg -- which in turn implies that the upstream author has
created a DFSG free version, perhaps unreleased, for Debian.
I think pretending with a fake upstream version that this is
the same Gnus upstream packages is misleading at best, and deceptive
at worst.
The reason binary package is not changed is that the binary
package is indeed unchanged -- whether or not the sources had dfsg
docs or not, the Gnus binary package would be the same. It is
perfectly legitimate to split up p[acakegs into foo and foo-doc, in
case the user only wants to install docs on one of the 8 machines she
may have in her office.
Also, other people doing what I consider unethical is not
really much of a motivating factor for me to follow the same
unethical practice. I might not be haranguing other folks, since
there ethos may well differ from mine, but I am not alone in
considering fake "upstream" versions to imply that there is a dfsgf
free upstream version of the package as deceptive.
Ad why is this being rejected, you may ask? On IRC, the ftp
master agreed that the only reason is that a one line edit is
required in the override file; end sers are not impacted, since gnus
and gnus-doc are available to them, and the only ones who work with
sources with apt-get source gnus would be, since they see the
different dir thepackage unpacks into. Not a major impact there
either.
And it is not as if there is no precedence for foo-dfsg
packages -- mysql-dfsg, polgen-dfsg, make-dfsg all come to mind. So,
an inconsistent policy, all to avoid a single line edit in overrides
(or so it has been communicated to me).
manoj
--
Being popular is important. Otherwise people might not like you.
Manoj Srivastava <srivasta@debian.org> <http://www.debian.org/%7Esrivasta/>
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