[Pkg-dspam-misc] Bug#577661: dspam: should this package be removed?

[Julien Valroff]

Hi Kurt, Jan,

Le lundi 26 avril 2010 à 18:33 -0400, Kurt B. Kaiser a écrit :
> On Tue, 13 Apr 2010 15:09:04 +0200, "Jan Hauke Rahm"
> <jhr at debian.org> said:
[...]
> > while reviewing some packages, your package came up as a possible
> > candidate for removal from Debian, because:
> >
> > * last maintainer upload 09/2008
> > * RC buggy
> > * outdated
> > * uploaders not interested or MIA (?)
> > * not part of squeeze anyways and no solution in sight
> >
> > If you think that it should be orphaned instead of being removed from
> > Debian, please reply to this bug and tell so.
> >
> > If you disagree and want to continue to maintain this package, please
> > just close this bug and do an upload also fixing the other issues.
> 
> Thank you for taking the time to review the dspam package status.  I
> apologize for causing this extra work.
> 
> While the packages do not appear to have received adequate attention in
> the last year and a half, Julien Valroff has in fact been working
> diligently to prepare the new upstream release (from January) for upload
> into experimental.  This is the first solid release upstream release
> in several years.

I also must add that development has been very active since the project
was taken over by the community. The core development team is still very
motivated, as are the users.

> I would like to request a stay of execution, and suggest the
> following plan:
> 
> First, determine which of the uploaders still have an interest in dspam.
> I think there are currently at least three people who would like to
> contribute to maintaining official Debian dspam packages.

You can rely on me.

Stevan Bajić (whom I add to the CC list) also shows a lot of interest in
keeping DSPAM in Debian, as the lead upstream developer. He supports and
helps me a lot in my work.

It is also a chance for us to get this support from upstream, ensuring
quality packages for Debian.

> Second, continue with the development of the experimental upload.  I
> think Julien is pretty close.  Since his work differs considerably from
> the current package, I think experimental is still warranted.

I agree. There is still a lot of work to be achieved (essentially
testing and ... testing) but I think the current packages are in quite
good state.

I would like to wait until 3.9.1 is released to plan the upload to
experimental, as most of my work is now made on the development branch
which adds a lot of interesting features and fixes quite a bunch of
bugs.
Some of them would however be easy to backport, but this would add extra
work.

> Third, prepare an upload to unstable which takes the current package to
> 3.6.8-10, fixing the RC issues and bringing it back into policy
> compliance.  I will work on that, if Julien has no objection.

No objection at all ;)

I think we just have to keep in mind that updated packages should be
uploaded to unstable as soon as they prove to be reliable, as having
this old 3.6.8 release still in Debian is a problem for both users and
upstream developers.

Cheers,
Julien