MaverickRemovePackageCulling
Launchpad Entry: foundations-m-package-culling
Created: 3 May 2010
Contributors:
Packages affected: many
Summary
Find and aggressively deal with packages whose merges have been lagging for several releases.
Release Note
Not particularly user-visible; no release note necessary.
Rationale
Slow merges damage our reputation with Debian, and lead us to fall behind on bug-fixes.
Design
You can have subsections that better describe specific parts of the issue.
Implementation
This section should describe a plan of action (the "how") to implement the changes discussed. Could include subsections like:
UI Changes
Should cover changes required to the UI, or specific UI that is required to implement this
Code Changes
Code changes should include an overview of what needs to change, and in some cases even the specific details.
Migration
Include:
- data migration, if any
- redirects from old URLs to new ones, if any
- how users will be pointed to the new way of doing things, if necessary.
Test/Demo Plan
It's important that we are able to test new features, and demonstrate them to users. Use this section to describe a short plan that anybody can follow that demonstrates the feature is working. This can then be used during testing, and to show off after release. Please add an entry to http://testcases.qa.ubuntu.com/Coverage/NewFeatures for tracking test coverage.
This need not be added or completed until the specification is nearing beta.
Unresolved issues
This should highlight any issues that should be addressed in further specifications, and not problems with the specification itself; since any specification with problems cannot be approved.
BoF agenda and discussion
Use this section to take notes during the BoF; if you keep it in the approved spec, use it for summarising what was discussed and note any options that were rejected.
= Packages with lagging merges = Divide problematic packages into various classes: * Permanently forked from upstream, no intention to remerge: * *Rename* * Permanently forked from Debian but not upstream, no intention to remerge: * *Blacklist* * Debian derived from Ubuntu: * Generally *blacklist*, but it's worth keeping an eye on the Debian package * We just haven't got round to merging * *Merge* for Maverick! == Algorithm == * Acquire snapshot index of Debian unstable at Karmic DebianImportFreeze * Any package with a newer version in that snapshot than currently in Maverick, and that is not blacklisted, is an important target for merging Look at set of packages that have been removed from Debian, but that we may have kept because we had an Ubuntu delta * Colin believes that `process-removals` may not in fact act this way nowadays, but it's still worth checking * Perhaps `process-removals` *should* act this way for safety, but we should regularly maintain the list