On Wed, Aug 19, 2020 at 12:49:11PM +0200, Ulrike Uhlig wrote: > Hi Alexis, > > On 18.08.20 23:10, Alexis Murzeau wrote: > > > I'm wondering why Vcs-* fields in debian/control (Vcs-Browser and/or > > Vcs-<type>) > > are not recommended (or maybe even strongly recommended) ? (I mean here > > that I think > > having Vcs-* fields should be recommended for active packages) > > > There is no lintian tag for missing Vcs-* fields (not even a low severity > > one, > > but I don't know if it's because of lack of interest or because of the > > policy). > > If one uses lintian in its pedantic mode, and a package is > co-maintained, i.e. has a Maintainer and Uploader field, then lintian > does recommend using a VCS: > https://lintian.debian.org/tags/co-maintained-package-with-no-vcs-fields.html > > I agree that it might be useful to extend this tag to non co-maintained > packages as well, potentially at least in pedantic mode. > > > Maybe the fact that we still have the package' source tarballs for each > > released version is enough, but this loose the VCS history and ongoing work > > in > > case someone else wants to contribute too. > > I fully agree with you here. > > For non actively maintained packages on could check them into Git > oneself and then start a history from there, and potentially update the > package. > I have had good results with snapshot.debian.org. On a few occasions, simply downloading each successive version from snapshot.debian.org and then using something like 'gbp import-dscs *.dsc' gives more than sufficient version history. Granted, that has limitations, but it is available right now.
Regards, -Roberto -- Roberto C. Sánchez
