Why new package name libsasl2-2

Fabian Fagerholm fabbe at paniq.net
Mon Oct 16 05:30:03 UTC 2006


On Sun, 2006-10-15 at 14:41 -0400, Roberto C. Sanchez wrote:
> On Sun, Oct 15, 2006 at 01:42:22PM -0400, Roberto C. Sanchez wrote:
> > On Sun, Oct 15, 2006 at 07:39:35PM +0200, Sven Mueller wrote:
> > > Andreas Metzler schrieb:
> > > > #1 The library package name has changed from libsasl2-2 to libsasl2. I
> > > > cannot see a reason for that, the soname is the same one as
> > > > previously. 
> > > 
> > > I'm also wondering the same thing: Why is there a need to rename the
> > > package? I didn't find any so far. The new library seems to work as a
> > > drop-in-replacement for the old one AFAICT (I didn't test it on a
> > > production system yet), but the packaging makes updates a lot more
> > > difficult than they would need to be, especially so close before the
> > > freeze for a new stable release.
> > > 
> > OK.  I started renaming to correspond to the old names and then
> > reverted.  I will go ahead and rename and then commit so that we are
> > dropping in for old packages.
[...]

*sigh*

Are you guys paying attention? :)

Read policy, the library packaging guide and the posts sent to this list
when I started this thing.

Back when cyrus-sasl2 was first packaged, it was loosely modeled on the
ancient cyrus-sasl (1.5.x) package. In those days, library packaging was
much more ad-hoc than it is now. These days, people have accumulated
more experience and this has been documented in the library packaging
guide.

I first considered just updating the old (cyrus-sasl2) package with the
new upstream version. However, I quickly realised that the packaging
would end up totally replaced, and I would waste time doing the same
work twice. So I started over, and got to the same point packaging-wise
as the old package in a matter of weeks.

Also, I think it's very late to start working on getting this package
into etch. It's a critical and difficult package, and those who wanted
it in should have started investing time at the beginning of this year.
If I had a package that depended on cyrus-sasl2, I would be very
reluctant to accept a change at this time. I anticipated this from the
start (based on the involvement in this project at the time) and wanted
to make sure we don't interfere with other packages while bringing this
into experimental and then sid.

So the reason for the name change includes these points:
      * Be policy-compliant.
      * Follow the library packaging guide.
      * Don't allow choices made in the old package to unnecessarily
        influence the new package. 
      * Allow coexistence in the archive with cyrus-sasl2 (though not
        coexistence in the same installation).

So please, please, please, go back and read what I have written on this
list *before* banging your head against the same issues.

-- 
Fabian Fagerholm <fabbe at paniq.net>
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