Bug#370282: Worth mentioning that Gnome needs a fix for newer Autoconf?

Loïc Minier lool at dooz.org
Mon Jun 5 08:43:06 UTC 2006


        Hi,

On Sun, Jun 04, 2006, Ralf Wildenhues wrote:
> > However, I wonder whether it's worth mentioning breakage of
> > important software like Gnome in Autoconf's NEWS (or elsewhere),
> > and I told Loïc that I'd make that suggestion here.  Consider it
> > made :-)
> I wonder what's necessary to make the NEWS item explicit enough:
> - it's the single biggest item in the NEWS entries since 2.59.
> - it's one of the two items that I've explicitly hinted at as well
>   in the 2.59c release notes.

 I want to make it clear here: I didn't check Autoconf's NEWS because it
 isn't presented to me automatically on package upgrades, I expected a
 NEWS.Debian to warn me of anything to take care of.
   When I installed the CVS snapshot of autoconf on my Debian box, I
 expected some problems to pop up with various software, but I didn't
 see any backward incompatibility warnings.  Strictly speaking, none of
 what I reported against the Debian autoconf package was a backward
 incompatibility or upstream regression, yet it would affect so many
 software packages that it was worth highlighting and warning about.

 All I want is that Debian's NEWS (which is presented to the end-user /
 end-developer on upgrades) warns of important changes, and when a nice
 document such as upstream's NEWS is already available, I consider that
 all that is needed is a pointer to this document or a summary of the
 most important issues.
   It seems Ben already proposed a NEWS.Debian which outlines the
 problems I encountered, and that completely addresses my wish that a
 big warning pops up when you upgrade your autoconf package (thanks
 Ben!).

> I will mention it prominently again for 2.59d, and of course for 2.60.
> Please tell me what else is necessary.  Please consider making this item
> and the exit(3) one part of a NEWS.Debian, if NEWS isn't read enough.
> http://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/autoconf/2006-04/msg00085.html

 I'm afraid "NEWS" is not presented automatically on upgrades, probably
 because it isn't easily machine-readable, and because it doesn't take
 Debian specificities into account.

 I also had the feeling you were frustrated that I didn't see the NEWS
 document prior to reporting this bug.  I'm sorry that you spent extra
 effort in properly documenting this, I should have checked NEWS and
 requested a pointer to NEWS from our NEWS.Debian in the first place.

 Thanks for following this and sorry for requesting documentation of
 things already clearly documented upstream.

   Bye,
-- 
Loïc Minier <lool at dooz.org>





More information about the Pkg-gnome-maintainers mailing list