[Pkg-bitcoin-devel] Bug#718272: Bitcoin still not ready for stable release in Debian

[Scott Howard]

Below is my opinion, and is open for debate:

Although there are mechanisms for supporting security updates in
stable debian releases, and luke-jr's work of porting fixes is great
and exactly what is needed, updates to network protocols would not
classify as a security update and would only be available via
backports.d.o.

"Mandatory" network updates from upstream don't have a propagation
system through stable Debian releases, therefore it should not be in a
stable release.

Ubuntu has just removed the bitcoin package in favor of the upstream
"official" PPA. This package, as it is an unstable-only package, has a
similar function as a PPA at this point. Users can apt-pin to it and
stay up-to-date via regular updates.

As bitcoin evolves, and network protocols becomes standardized, we can
revisit whether this would be viable for stable release.