Policy-respecting .debs? [LWN.net]

Policy-respecting .debs?

Posted Sep 2, 2008 15:50 UTC (Tue) by GreyWizard (guest, #1026)
In reply to: Policy-respecting .debs? by vmole
Parent article: Bitten by the Red Hat Perl bug (InfoWorld)

Where do you find evidence to support the absurd conclusion that I would prefer to have policy problems hidden from me? I'll go through this again using small words: the policy is complex, the lint tool mumbles and the documentation is poorly organized. Your explanation about .pyc files makes sense and I would thank you for it if not for the tone of the rest of your post. I don't know why .py files should be executable. All I know is that lintian complains when mine aren't. Perhaps there is some arcane incantation I haven't mastered which makes that acceptable. And yes, I know there are reasons for the policy -- in fact I said exactly that the message you replied to. (Consider reading posts before you reply to them in the future.)

But having a reason is not the same as having a good reason. From the perspective of an outsider who just wants to create a policy compliant package the documentation, tools and (at least if you are a representative example) developers are decidedly unfriendly. In light of that the fact that packages created by people who aren't committed Debian developers are "policy-ignoring disasters" is no surprise.

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Policy-respecting .debs?

Posted Sep 2, 2008 17:25 UTC (Tue) by vmole (guest, #111) [Link]

And we are back to my original point: upstream developers often do not have the time or interest to create proper distribution packages. That's fine. Leave it to the experts. That's the whole point of a distribution: combine hundreds or thousands of disparate pieces of software into a coherent whole. Why would you expect that to be simpler than a writing a single program?

Policy-respecting .debs?

Posted Sep 2, 2008 18:13 UTC (Tue) by GreyWizard (guest, #1026) [Link]

Attempting to create a policy compliant package (and even arguing about the obstacles) is a way of trying to contribute in a small way. You seem to be suggesting that anyone who isn't willing to make the large investment of time and effort to actually become a Debian developer shouldn't be bothering at all. I can live with that. It doesn't cost me anything to stop running lintian. But giving up community good will for .so files without executable bits seems like a poor trade to me.

Policy-respecting .debs?

Posted Sep 2, 2008 18:49 UTC (Tue) by vmole (guest, #111) [Link]

No, I'm suggesting that anyone who isn't willing to read the relevant parts of Policy, and fix the relevant lintian errors, should let someone else build the distro-specific packages. Supplying broken packages is NOT contributing. If you want to contribute to the Linux Kernel, then you are expected to understand how the parts work, and to follow the established coding conventions, even if you don't see the point of them.

And just to be perfectly clear: I don't think you are a bad person for not wanting to invest the time. Lots of people can (and do) create distro packages. They're good at it. You should spend your time doing whatever it is you want to do, and do it well. Better you fix a bug in your code, or add a feature, than worry about Debian shared library permissions.

Policy-respecting .debs?

Posted Sep 2, 2008 19:45 UTC (Tue) by GreyWizard (guest, #1026) [Link]

Why would I run lintian at all if I thought supplying broken packages was acceptable? I complained about a few specific cases where the policy is arcane because I was explicitly asked to do so above, not because I believe I shouldn't have to follow the established conventions.

I'm touched by your concern for how I spend my time, but arguing against points I haven't actually advanced is probably not a good use of yours.