> Subject: Re: Diverting from upstream
> From: mark@borkware.net
> To: crux@lists.crux.nu
> Date: Fri, 8 Sep 2006 12:59:35 +0200
>
> On Fri, 2006-09-08 at 12:25 +0200, Tilman Sauerbeck wrote:
> > Mark Rosenstand [2006-09-08 11:53]:
> > > On Fri, 2006-09-08 at 11:27 +0200, Tilman Sauerbeck wrote:
> > > > Mark Rosenstand [2006-09-08 10:44]:
> > > >
> > > > > One of my personal likings of CRUX is that it's easy to customize and
> > > > > extend. Because it (used to?) keep as close to upstream as possible,
> > > > > there tend to be fewer distribution-specific bugs.
> > > >
> > > > We _still_ do. But it's probably related to the fact that we don't read
> > > > all of the code of the software we're packaging and that we don't fix
> > > > any and all bug (-> Debian ;D).
> > >
> > > Totally fair, and that's also why I argue that keeping close to (if not
> > > verbatim) upstream is the best bet for a project the size of CRUX.
> >
> > Sure, I think everyone agrees here.
>
> :)
>
> > > Unfortunately I've had to fork some opt packages lately. For example, I
> > > depend largely on GTK+ (GNOME desktop) so I just don't dare to patch it
> > > for something I have no clue what does
> > > (http://crux.nu/svnweb/CRUX/revision?rev=1701)
> >
> > You could had asked Matt, Johannes, or me about it (it was kinda a group
> > effort to get that bug nailed :)
> > The patch has been incorporated into GTK+ 2.10.2, btw. See the changelog
> > for the bug ID (it's tiny, I'm too lazy to look it up right now).
> >
> > I think it's safe to assume that your GTK maintainer depends largely on
> > GTK+/Gnome, too...
> >
> > I think applying that patch was the right thing to do...
>
> If it was a bug fix, sure! The problem is that there were no description
> of what it did, "added cptn's modified stock icon patch" doesn't tell
> much. The fact that it fixed a bug, and preferably what bug it fixed as
> well as it was applied upstream would have been really nice additions to
> that commit message. (This is a general problem, I think. Take
> http://crux.nu/svnweb/CRUX/revision/?rev=1678 for instance.)
>
> > > I think that recently there have been a growing number of patches in
> > > core and opt - are upstreams just getting insane? I get the feeling that
> > > the heavy patching is also the primary reason we're stucked with years
> > > old versions of things such as grub.
> >
> > I don't share the feeling that core and opt are getting more patches
> > recently. I'm not saying it's not true, I just didn't notice it.
>
> It could just be me being more sensitive to this :)
>
> > Regarding grub - the version we're using isn't actively developed
> > anymore AFAIK. Switching to the new development branch seems a bit risky
> > to me. I'd rather stick to the old version here.
>
> I'm all for sticking to the widely used 0.x branch, but 0.95 is 2.5
> years old and 0.97 have been available for more than a year.
>
> The patches applied to 0.95 include additions of essential features such
> as support for splash images, and there's so many that they're
> distributed in an out-of-tree tarball!
>
> > > > > To avoid these kinds of distribution-specific problems, I'm kindly
> > > > > asking packagers to think twice before deciding to divert from upstream
> > > > > - perhaps even limiting it to "required for essential functioning of the
> > > > > package" and basic CRUX integration (no nls, man-pages in /usr/man,
> > > > > etc.) :)
> > > >
> > > > Uh uh, I actually thought twice before doing that Openbox commit.
> > > > I even contact upstream, ziomg! ;)
> > >
> > > Ah, true, you said that. I shouldn't have used that as an example, it
> > > was rather a case of "shit happens" :)
> > >
> > > The autoconf 2.60 mandir patch was probably a better example.
> >
> > Agreed, that was a bit silly. We also already discussed that matter ;)
> > I don't see how one case of "shit happens" and one case of sillyness
> > shows a trend of messing up opt ;D
>
> Those were just the ones on the top of my head, but I have to admit that
> I don't understand what all the shadow patches are for. Some comments in
> the patch headers or in the Pkgfile would be warmly welcomed - after all
> there's a lot of tinkerers in the CRUX crowd (cruwd? OK, no more coffee
> on my day off) :)
>
I have to agree with this, and more than once, I've been bitten by the shadow port in particular. Just last night I was trying to update dbus, and when I went through the pre-install items (as distributed in the port's README), I couldn't execute useradd -n -g because of the port. Even removing the -n option still gave me an error about those two being mutually exclusive. I can figure it out, it's just that I don't want to. And I think the shadow patches may be to blame. If not, shouldn't the README in dbus be changed?
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