bzr 1.3 in ppa; plugins still need updates

[James Westby]

On Sun, 2008-03-30 at 18:23 +0100, Russel Winder wrote:
> Jelmer,
> 
> On Sun, 2008-03-30 at 15:44 +0200, Jelmer Vernooij wrote:
> 
> > The link is not as strict as that. As far as I know bzrtools should work
> > fine with older and newer versions of bzr. bzr-svn usually works fine
> > with one or two versions of bzr. 
> 
> Given the hassles, might it be better to just stick to a version lock
> step so as to avoid them?
> 
> > The Debian dependencies on bzrtools and bzr-svn are very strict (tied
> > to a particular bzr release) since bzrtools and bzr are always released
> > in the same week anyway and to avoid potential issues with bzr breaking
> > the API for bzr-svn.
> 
> If http://ppa.launchpad.net/bzr/ubuntu is to be the official location of
> deb files for the current released Bazaar, it really needs to be that
> there is consistency and completness, and installability -- which is
> currently not the case.  If PPA isn't up to the job that Bazaar bleeding
> edge users need in order to be able to install a consistent version of
> Bazaar then either it needs to be abandoned in favour of a repository
> that can do the job, or it needs changing so that it can do the job.
> 
> The current situation does seem to be a blocking barrier to bleeding
> edge use of Bazaar.
> 

https://lists.ubuntu.com/archives/bazaar/2008q1/039671.html

https://lists.ubuntu.com/archives/bazaar/2008q1/039782.html

Could we try and come up with a strategy from this thread to make
sure that users get the best experience?

Having the plugins have tight dependencies on the bzr version and
then not updating them in lockstep is irritating for users, may
stop people from helping to test recent versions, and probably
drives some people away if our installation instructions don't
work for them.

Martin, you said the packaging branches were now on launchpad,
is that the case? I can only find the bzr ones. Having them
there is an important step, as then it does allow anyone to
upload to the PPA and push their work back.

I can work on something that automates the easy bit of grabbing
the new tarball and updating debian/changelog, building the source
package and uploading each to the PPA, then it would just be a case
of fixing any build failures.

Alternatively there are many people in #bzr with the skills to do
this, so when it is time to upload perhaps we could share the work
out and do it that way.

Martin, as you are currently responsible for the PPA, what would
be your desired way of dealing with this? If you tell us that then
we can make it happen.

Thanks,

James