[Pkg-puppet-devel] Setting upstream source to tarball instead of git tag?

[Stig Sandbeck Mathisen]

I was wondering if we should set the upstream source to the released
tarball instead of the git repo tag.

When upstream switch their stable branches between releases, significant
git wizardry may be required.

Importing the published tarballs instead would make upgrades quite a bit
easier, and prevent merging errors. It may also make packaging easier
for others who base their work on our packages.

We have a "debian/watch" file for "uscan" already. "git-buildpackage"
has a "git-import-orig" tool which does the fetching, tagging, and
merging into the master branch to handle upgrades.

Example upgrade with tarball for 2.7.4:

  git-import-orig --uscan --pristine-tar
  <hit enter to confirm guessed version>

  <do debian stuff, add a changelog entry in each commit message>

  git-dch --release --since=<merge from upstream commit>

We use quilt patches for changes already, this will not change how we
handle changes to upstream source.

I've already done this for two other packages I maintain. "mod-gearman"
and "jemalloc".

There are some changes required for puppet due to the differences in
paths, I can do a test packaging of 2.7.4 using this method, and push
this to "experimental".

-- 
Stig Sandbeck Mathisen