Bug#726763: Processed: block 726763 with 727708

Josh Triplett josh at joshtriplett.org
Sat Feb 1 21:42:23 UTC 2014


On Sat, Feb 01, 2014 at 03:24:47PM -0500, Steve Langasek wrote:
> On Sat, Feb 01, 2014 at 08:09:24PM +0000, Debian Bug Tracking System wrote:
> > Processing commands for control at bugs.debian.org:
> 
> > > block 726763 with 727708
> 
> On whose behalf are you setting such a block?  You are not listed as a
> maintainer of gnome-settings-daemon, and even those members of the TC who
> have been arguing against codifying a requirement to support multiple init
> systems in the TC resolution have said they want maintainers to work
> together to provide reasonable support for init systems other than the
> default.
> 
> The above 'block' would be tantamount to an assertion that you have no
> intention of accepting patches from maintainers of non-default init systems
> to provide compatibility unless forced to do so by the TC; but as you're not
> a maintainer of the package, that doesn't seem relevant here.

I'm going to attempt to ignore the confrontational tone of your mail, on
the assumption that you can't possibly be proposing that nobody other
than a package maintainer should ever do bug triage for fear of stepping
on the maintainer's toes.  I've done such triage on numerous bugs in the
past, including adjustment of blocks, severity (including RC
severities), and so on, always on the assumption that the maintainer
will agree with the change; that assumption generally holds true.  Bug
metadata is trivially changed or reverted, and we already have informal
policies regarding such metadata, notably the general presumption that
the maintainer can always change it if they disagree, and that they have
the final say.  Thus, implicit in the block added above is the
assumption that the maintainer can trivially change it if they disagree;
if they did so, I certainly would not change it back and play BTS
tennis.

The block added above simply reflects the many comments from GNOME folks
(and systemd folks for that matter) saying that they're waiting for the
fallout to clear before making any drastic changes.  Furthermore, it
reflects the reality of the current situation: you explicitly stated in
the bug log of 726763 that systemd-shim was not ready to serve as an
alternative to GNOME (though with different assumptions about how to
resolve that), and you furthermore objected to the suggestion of
resolving the situation by adding a recommends on systemd-sysv.  Thus, I
don't see any obvious action the gnome-settings-daemon maintainer could
take at this point to resolve 726763 without drawing ire.

I would furthermore object strongly to your claim that the block is "an
assertion that you [sic] have no intention of accepting patches from
maintainers of non-default init systems to provide compatibility unless
forced to do so by the TC".  Metadata is a dynamic thing reflecting the
current reality as it stands, and there are no such patches currently on
offer.  Patches that the maintainers find acceptable would certainly be
cause to remove the block (and add the patch tag).

See also Russ's very clear response, which I agree with wholeheartedly;
thank you, Russ.

- Josh Triplett



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