[maemo-developers] [RFC] Maemo package guidelines: mandatory categories

[From: Aniello Del Sorbo]

I agree with what Graham suggests.
Good maintainers will follow the category list and try to  figure out where
to put their
packages and are still able to create a new one (eventually accepted or
rejected) by
the community.
Bad ones will be reported of their mistakes.

The AM could follow the official list and put the remaining "new" categories
in an
"Extra Categories" subsection when displaying the categories to the user.

The list of non extras categories could a regular deb package that can be
updated on the device
the usual way.

--
anidel

On Thu, Apr 17, 2008 at 2:52 PM, Graham Cobb
<g+770 at cobb.uk.net<g%2B770 at cobb.uk.net>>
wrote:

> On Thursday 17 April 2008 12:33:26 Marius Vollmer wrote:
> > I am sure you notice the conflict here: whatever list you come up with
> > will be unsuitable for someone.  You want strict policy enforcement,
> > based on community 'feelings'.  How can that work?
>
> I am strongly against strict enforcement.  All that strict enforcement
> will
> achieve is (i) packages won't be put in extras, or (ii) packages will be
> put
> into an inappropriate category.  Both these cures are much worse than the
> current category problem.
>
> There are two separate parts to the category problem.  The first problem,
> and
> the easiest to fix, is packages that appear which should not appear at
> all.
> For example, the various GPE library packages used to do that by having
> sections such as user/lib (I believe I have fixed all those now, at least
> for
> chinook -- let me know if you find any more).  These are just straight
> packaging bugs which need to be reported to the package maintainer.
>
> The second problem is the real problem: categories are random, overlapp or
> are
> just variant words for the same thing and are not translated.  As someone
> suggested when this was last discussed, some months ago, I believe there
> should be a Wiki page which lists all the package names the community
> finds
> acceptable.  That list should be editable by anyone who has upload rights
> and
> who thinks they need a new category.  If the addition of the new category
> is
> disputed, it would be discussed here and the community would come to a
> consensus.
>
> If a package in extras has a category that is not on this list it should
> be
> reported as a packaging bug to the maintainer of the package.  They should
> (eventually) either fix it or edit the Wiki page.
>
> The tools to upload packages and to promote packages from extras-devel to
> extras should highlight if the category is not on the list (providing a
> link
> to the list, of course), but should still allow the user to go ahead if
> they
> insist.  Someone can even write a whole page on why category explosion is
> a
> bad thing if they like -- but don't prevent the upload.
>
> As part of this, I would also want Nokia to commit to the community that
> new
> software releases would include translations for all the package names in
> the
> Wiki page (at some data prior to the release, of course).  That would be
> an
> added incentive for package maintainers to use the list.
>
> I guess this proposal arises from my view that people would be willing to
> use
> standard categories if it was (a) made easy, and (b) reduced some pain.
>  But
> that there are many, many cases where a new category will be useful and we
> shouldn't be trying to fix the list.  I think we should be giving this a
> try -- if it is being abused we can then look at adding enforcement or
> override.
>
> Graham
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>



-- 
anidel
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