[maemo-developers] Getting package with lower version into extras-testing

[From: Jeremiah Foster]

On Oct 13, 2009, at 15:20, Graham Cobb wrote:

> On Tuesday 13 October 2009 13:46:25 Cornelius Hald wrote:
>> Sorry to be so persistent, but I still don´t understand why I should
>> have two packages.
>
> You are probably right that the root cause of the problem is that we  
> are using
> extras-devel for two different purposes: it is a test area for very  
> early
> versions of packages as well an important step on the way for  
> packages trying
> to get to the users.  Sometime we may have to split that up.
>
> However, at the moment, your requirement is unusual.  The current  
> rules
> (autobuilder checks that it is building a newer version, and the  
> promotion
> interface only shows the latest version) help prevent lots of  
> mistakes,
> particularly by people who are not too familiar with packaging.  I  
> would not
> want to change them.
>
> So, I understand what you are trying to do and why but I think the  
> current
> rules do more good than harm.  You seem to have a few options: (i)  
> only use
> extras-devel once you are close to calling a new version stable and  
> are
> unlikely to do any more updates to the previous version (you could  
> use a
> private repository, like I still do for the daily builds from SVN  
> for my
> software), (ii) use different package names (upgrades should work if  
> you are
> using Conflicts: & Replaces:), (iii) hack with version numbers using  
> epochs.
>
> Let's see how many packages find this a problem before we look at  
> changing
> anything.

I strongly second Graham's point of view on this. Changing anything in  
the build system has a ripple effect on all packages and we can't  
afford a complete set of repository rebuilds at this point in time.  
Hopefully conforming to the current requirements of the build system,  
i.e. packages with a newer version get built, older packages do not,  
is not too burdensome.

Jeremiah