Re: Bug#134658: ITP: lsb -- Linux Standard Base 1.1 core support package
> rational as part of the spec document, would probably make the actuall
> spec a little "wordy" (not sure of the right term). There should
> perhaps be 2 documents, 1 would be the actual spec, the other would be
> the spec + rational. This would also help avoid the traditional
> disagreement in the meaning of the spec, as the "commentary" on the
> "bible" (so to speak) would be readily available :)
Rationale is often banished to the back of the document in
an appendix, or for a large volume, to a separate document.
Andrew Josey and others who've been through the mill several
times can probably comment more on the reasons for including/excluding
rationale. Certainly one con argument is that it makes more work since
the rationale also has to have carefully crafted wording, and choices
have to be made on what to include.
Personally, I would have found a rationale section very useful as
I came to this process quite late and the answer to certain
questions seemed on occasion to be "it's in the mail archive" - which,
as we've just seen from the number of posts on this thread - can mean
quite a bit of work to wade through - and may sometimes be buried under
a subject name that doesn't seem to relate if the dicussion has evolved.
Or to put it shorter, the historical record may be accurate, but it's
not necessarily concise or to the point.
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