On Sat, Aug 10, 2019 at 10:28 PM Kevin Kofler <kevin.kofler(a)chello.at> wrote:
Miro HronĨok wrote:
> Because if we don't, people just gonna ignore FTBFS forever.
And this would be a problem why exactly?
Packages built for older Fedora releases tend to run on newer Fedora
releases just fine. If the package:
* has no broken dependencies, and
* is not reported as completely broken in Bugzilla,
it should be assumed to be working by default.
If you encounter a package that does not actually work, it is your job as a
user to report it. This can happen independently of whether the package
still compiles or not. It can even still be broken after a successful
rebuild.
So why are we wasting packagers' time on fixing FTBFS issues (which are
typically NOT caused by their package, but by changes in dependencies such
as your python-unversioned-command change, or such as yet another
incompatible change in GCC for the sake of compliance with some obscure
subparagraph of a language standard, etc.) when not actually needed? I
actually NEED to fix the FTBFS if the package has broken dependencies or if
I need to make some other change to it. Otherwise, the FTBFS fix is just
churn that Fedora forces me to waste my time on.
Hi,
I understand where you are coming from, but I still disagree. I think
there has been an unfair hostility towards Miro on this topic.
Your package suddenly FTBFS because of dependencies or system-wide
changes but the latest package build is still functional? I agree that
there is no urgency to fix this, but I disagree that status quo is
fine X releases later.
For starters may miss out on system wide changes (and whether someone
agrees with proposed changes is not the question) and in the case you
made about bug reports that mandate action from the maintainer, not
taking care of FTBFS timely means that once shit hits the fan you have
to both solve the FTBFS situation and the user-facing bug report.
So yes, it sucks when someone's package fails because someone else
screwed up by not coordinating an soname bump or whatever, but it
doesn't mean that we can keep the latest successful build around and
let the source repository bit-rot forever because there are no bug
reports.
Now there's certainly room for improvement, but I don't have a
solution to offer and hammering Miro because he's been (very) active
lately retiring FTBFS or orphan packages (as per the normal process)
is helping. Here we had an acknowledgement from a couple maintainers
and someone who stepped in to help, a very positive outcome.
Dridi