On Fri, Jan 31, 2025 at 02:23:48PM -0500, Eric Dorland wrote:
> * Adrian Bunk (b...@debian.org) wrote:
> > Source: automake-1.17
> > Version: 1:1.17-1
> > Severity: minor
> >
> > src:automake-${version} source packages made sense back in the
> > days when there were also several automake-${version} binary
> > packages in the archive.
> >
> > Today automake is stale and stable, and there will likely never
> > again be more than one version in the archive.
> >
> > Today src:automake-${version} gets you a round through NEW for
> > each new automake major release, and also means some bugs have
> > to be moved manually from the old to the new package - with no
> > benefits anymore of haveing the version in the source package name.
>
> I think the problem from the past has been we weren't entirely sure
> that 1.1Y didn't have backwards compatibility issues compared to
> 1.1X. Hopefully we won't see that with 1.16 and 1.17 (so far so good),
> but it's nice to have the option built in if necessary.
Similar to autoconf2.69, you could always add a new package for the
legacy version if there would ever be a need.
> There's also paused plans for an automake-2.0 that could get reinvigorated.
I doubt it.
Automake 2.0 development died 10 years ago when Stefano stopped doing
automake development after 1.15.
Today autotools are de facto in maintenance mode.
Still used by plenty of software and some people who know it well even
start new projects using it, but the modern alternatives are meson and
cmake.
> So I'm not in any rush to undo this, but worth looking at it again in
> a year.
>From a BTS perspective it annoys me that bugs have to be moved manually
now, and would then have to be moved again:
https://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/pkgreport.cgi?repeatmerged=no&src=automake-1.16
Not a huge deal, but slightly annoying since there is no need for the
changing source package names.
cu
Adrian
