On Thu, Feb 10, 2011 at 12:24:56AM +0100, Samuel Thibault
<[email protected]> wrote:
> > > > (*) debian has a long tradition of non-communication with upstream and
> > > > deliberate bug-introducing patches,
> > >
> > > Please don't FUD.
> >
> > And how would you know?
>
> Because that's written in the Debian policy:
Yeah, did you read it? It says you don't need to, you should.
Contrast this with e.g. fedora's upstream policy, which makes NOT sending
upstream patches an exceptional case, and even discourages patches that
deviate from upstream altogether, except in grave cases (such as grave
security problems).
If you wanted to show that debian clearly doesn't care much, you
succeeded.
> > Infatc, how would you even make this claim, if you
> > could just sit down for a few minutes and check reality?
>
> So far, I've mostly seen more good behavior that bad behavior.
I have seen mostly abuse. Guess that makes you right and me wrong by
default, eh...
> > Right, but as I said, debian also has a long tradition of
> > non-communication with upstream and deliberately bug-introducing patches.
>
> That's definitely not the case for the areas where I've been having a
> look at: Xorg, kernel, accessibility, to name a few.
It's definitely the case for projects where I have been looking at. Your
point being? You are biased? I already knew that.
> > This is trivially true for rxvt-unicode,
>
> Sure, there are black sheeps. But don't make that a generic point,
> i.e. FUD.
Well, _I_ didn't.
> > Contrast that with other distribution, like fedora, which have this
> > as an explicit *policy* - no forks except under very very speivcifc
> > circumstances.
>
> It *is* in the policy.
And it is *not* a violation of the policy not to, or in otehr words, there is
no debian policy that patches must be sent upstream.
q.e.d.
> > Sorry, samuel, you fail both the reality check and the theory check.
>
> In the reality I have seen so far I haven't had seen so many
> issues. Sure, there are examples of issues. Are there really _no_ such
> examples in Fedora?!
Well, I personally hate redhat (as a distro), and I feel fedora might not
do perfectly, but at leats in the cases where I looked at (that includes
rxvt-unicode), they have always been responsive, send issues upstream,
talked to upstream, and tried to work on solutions to problems, of there
have been many.
So, I use debian, I think it's technologically better than fedora, I am
not a fan of fedora, but all the maintainers I have talked to do a good
job of *maintaining* their packges, without overstepping heir bounds and
assuming they are the better coders and hack around in their packages.
I can't say the same for debian, neither for my projects nor for projects I
have reported e.g. bugs on, at leats for the majority.
There are some exceptional debian maintainers that are genuinely
interested in moving forward, and it is a pleasure to work with them.
Most of them are an arrogant bunch who know everything better, even when
they clearly don't understand even the basics of what they are doing.
Thats my personal experience.
> > > There can always be black sheeps, that's not a reason to blame Debian as
> > > a whole.
> >
> > The only one who blamed debian as a whole is you.
>
> ?!
Well, you broguht it up. I was limiting myself to howd ebian mistreated
rxvt-unicode in the past, which is on-topic. For some reaosn you felt
you need to drag it down into some idiotic flaming contest of FUD about
debian.
> There is a misunderstanding then: saying "Debian" definitely means the
> whole Debian. If you wanted to mean the Debian maintainer of rxvt, then
> say "the Debian maintainer".
When I talk about how debian is mistreating some of my packages then
I mean the whole of debian who ever cared, obviously. There have been
multiple maintainer,s the first one was, sorry to say so, a total asshole,
it was completely impossible to discuss bugs with him. This one, I
thoughtz, was quite nice and reasonable, until he stopped talking to me
and fell back into the barbarian debian ways of breaking rxvt-unicode
without a second thought or notice.
> > Or, even better, put your efforts where your mouth is, and don't harass
> > poor upstream maintainers that continuously get abused by debian, and
> > *only* debian.
>
> Again, the problem at stake here is with the maintainer, not with Debian.
It's endemic, this maintainer is by far a smaller problem then the
previous one, which applied broken patch after broken patch, removed our
faq entry that politely asked to report to the dbeian bugtracker and
generally acted liek a jerk.
That does not mean that other maintainers do better.
I am a latecomer to debian, maybe, only getting interested in debian 10
years ago or so, but I am very active in reporting bugs about software
packages, and have a number of my software packages in debian as well.
I also read the bugtracker a lot, and see how others are treated.
Maybe 10 years ago it was nicer - maintainers actually listened, but these
days, bug reports are usually ignored, replied with a "will close, your
version is old", and the number of custom patches that are never reported
upsteram increases.
If you want to convince me otherwise, you need to do much better. I have
*extensive* experience with debian, and this is what I see done to users and
upstream maintainers alike.
And yeah, there are a lot of debian maintaiers who do a good job and
care. But they only requite a miniscule amount of attention and effort,
as generally, they don't do stupid things such as apply idiotic patches
without the slightest understanding of what they are doing.
--
The choice of a Deliantra, the free code+content MORPG
-----==- _GNU_ http://www.deliantra.net
----==-- _ generation
---==---(_)__ __ ____ __ Marc Lehmann
--==---/ / _ \/ // /\ \/ / [email protected]
-=====/_/_//_/\_,_/ /_/\_\
--
To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [email protected]
with a subject of "unsubscribe". Trouble? Contact [email protected]
