Why need Debian?

[Daniel Robitaille]

> A few times I have statements in the ubuntu website that there can't
> be Ubuntu if there's no Debian. This statement seems to me like it's
> only relevant to Warty, but why should they continue taking debian
> sources, especially considering that Ubuntu's main is normally ahead
> of Debian's sid? Is it the avoidance of effort duplication or is a
> matter of maintaining compatibility or...?

Ubuntu is more than Main; it's also universe and multiverse.  Between
the 3 that's the 16,000 packages available in both in Debian and
Ubuntu.  Debian  has over 1000 maintainers/developpers to take care of
all this.   Ubuntu has what?  maybe 50 people between paid developpers
and community members (mostly via MOTU).   Ubuntu cannot exist without
Debian  because you cannot compare the size of the people maintaning
this large body of packages.

While some of the more visible aspect of Ubuntu seems to be generally
ahead of Debian (think here Gnome, Xorg, etc), many of the
applications in Main are directly coming from Debian, and we get new
versions in Ubuntu simple because of updates in the Debian's sid. 
There isn't the maiunpower to do it all by ourselve in Ubuntu.


--
Daniel Robitaille