MOTU Application

[Mathias Gug]

Hi Stefan,

On Thu, Aug 30, 2007 at 01:05:34AM +0200, Stefan Potyra wrote:
> So here's another question from me: I remember a problem, when the split of 
> gs-esp to gs-esp-x and gs-esp for ubuntu-server had caused a number of bugs 
> on other packages in the archive. Especially it was not known back then, 
> which other packages were even affected by that split. While I don't want to 
> blame anyone here (I only remember that very bug right now, because I was 
> affected as a user myself), it shows a problem that arises with different 
> groups focussing on different goals: Hence I wonder what your opinion is on 
> the following: Is it reasonable for a specific goal to break a number of 
> packages from a "lower priority" archive such as universe? Also, what do you 
> think would be the best approach to alleviate the results of such a breakage?

I don't know the specific issues about the gs split, but I think it's
hard to avoid breaking other packages. What's important in that case is
to be able to catch the breakage as early as possible and communicate
about it. 

Increased automatic testing can help to notice such situation.  Then
communicating about it is the next important step. Identifying which
packages may be affected and how to fix them are part of this effort.
Universe being a volunteer driven project, it's hard to set deadlines.
On the other hand, we cannot wait to update a package (being in main or
universe) until all the affected packages are fixed. We just don't have
enough man power to cover all the packages. 

Sending a notice about a breaking upload giving a few weeks to fix
packages should help. That sort of changes should also be done early in the
release cycle.

Prioritizing the list of broken package can also be considered: the more
there are users of the package, the more effort should be put into
fixing the packages.

--
Mathias
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