finding upstream

[Bob McElrath]

It is, in general, difficult to find the upstream developers of a given
debian package. The package page does not include any mention of a web
site or mailing list where actual development occurs. The .dsc files
also do not generally list how to find upstream.

I suggest that when there is an upstream, debian should include a link
to it on the package page (for instance, a link to the sourceforge
project page or the project's home page), and/or a development mailing
list if one exists. The same information should be in the .dsc file for
the package somehow.

Any thoughts on this?

Cheers,
Bob McElrath [Univ. of Wisconsin at Madison, Department of Physics]

"Knowledge will forever govern ignorance, and a people who mean to
be their own governors, must arm themselves with the power knowledge
gives. A popular government without popular information or the means
of acquiring it, is but a prologue to a farce or a tragedy or
perhaps both."
- James Madison (4th President of the U.S.)

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[Joerg Johannes]

On Wednesday 06 August 2003 00:40, Colin Watson wrote:

> On Tue, Aug 05, 2003 at 02:50:43PM -0500, Bob McElrath wrote:

> > It is, in general, difficult to find the upstream developers of a
> > given debian package. The package page does not include any
> > mention of a web site or mailing list where actual development
> > occurs. The .dsc files also do not generally list how to find
> > upstream.

>
> This is normally the purpose of /usr/share/doc/*/copyright, and by
> and large it fulfils that purpose well.

Yes, and no. If you want more information about the program you will
first have to download it and then read /usr/share/doc/package/*.
Such a link on the package page would at least prevent the user from
using google...

> > I suggest that when there is an upstream, debian should include a
> > link to it on the package page (for instance, a link to the
> > sourceforge project page or the project's home page), and/or a
> > development mailing list if one exists.

>
> I don't think there's any disagreement that this would be useful, but
> it's up to individual package maintainers to do this. The
> packages.debian.org pages are generated from package descriptions and
> dependencies.

Is there a possibility to suggest it for further versions of the package
maintaining policy. Something such as "The description should include a
reference to the upstream source" ?

> > The same information should be in the .dsc file for the package
> > somehow.

>
> I disagree; it should be in the package description, i.e. the .deb.
> That's where we put descriptive metadata.

Me too. The .dsc file is nothing a user should have to read. The package
description is the right place for an upstream link.

joerg

--
Gib GATES keine Chance!


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