[Pkg-running-devel] Bug#789875: subsurface: FTBFS in experimental

[Christian PERRIER]

Quoting Dirk Hohndel (dirk at hohndel.org):

> We have asked SPECIFICALLY Debian to stop providing an out-dated version
> of Subsurface to its users as that caused confusion and problems for our
> users and support burdon for us. Debian was unwilling to follow our
> choices of open source components that we used. So we asked Debian to drop
> bundling Subsurface since we provide a version of Subsurface which a diver
> who happens to run Debian and wants to use Subsurface can install.


One hilarious thing in this discussion is seeing how people speak about
"Debian does this" or "Debian chooses that" and then later on give big
details about their big background in "open source" (bleh) software.

That's interesting because it is very common from outsiders of the
Debian community to believe that the project follows a direction with
some "head" telling people who contribute to it what they should do.

"Debian" does nothing. It has no CTO, CEO, WhateverO. The project is a
collection of hundreds of individuals who give their time to some
parts of the distro. Some do packaging, some others do documentation,
translation, infrastructure system adminitration or whatever else.

But nobody tells us what we should do. One very minor part of my
Debian tasks is being part of the pkg-running project and maintain
sports-related software. But nobody can and will tell me that I
"should" or "must" do this or that, including dropping a package I maintain.

You asked *to the maintainers of the subsurface package* to stop
distributing so-called "outdated" versions of Subsurface. You didn't
ask "Debian". If you find a way to "ask Debian" about something,
please telle me so, because after 17 years in this project, I never
found a way to do so.

I would very much see people who are not involved in the project
understand this. Because some griefs would be easier to leave behind.

Apart from that, this discussion leads to nothing : we clearly have
different views about what a distribution is and should be....and we
know for quite some time that the original author of Subsurface (at
least I learned something) also has different views.....and many
actually do not really care about that...:-)


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