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Date:      Tue, 26 Apr 2011 00:55:10 -0500
From:      Ade Lovett <ade@FreeBSD.org>
To:        Charlie Kester <corky1951@comcast.net>, FreeBSD Ports <freebsd-ports@freebsd.org>
Subject:   Re: saving a few ports from death
Message-ID:  <A9C17565-97D8-43F1-9CF7-8CFC79EFEA7B@FreeBSD.org>
In-Reply-To: <20110426024122.GA38579@comcast.net>
References:  <ip53jn$92d$1@dough.gmane.org> <4DB6165F.1010806@FreeBSD.org> <20110426024122.GA38579@comcast.net>

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On Apr 25, 2011, at 21:41 , Charlie Kester wrote:
> Maybe freshports could implement a voting system like the one at
> osx.iusethis.com?

"Voting" implies some kind of democracy.

This may come as a shock to folks, but FreeBSD in general is in fact not =
democratic.  It's based around the concept of folks putting in their own =
time to keep a part of the Project alive.

Whether it's a device driver, some chunk of base userland, =
ports/<foo>/<bar>, or support for an entire architecture and/or release =
of FreeBSD -- doesn't matter.  Without at least a modicum of active =
maintainership (hint:  MAINTAINER=3D ports@FreeBSD.org is _not_ active) =
then it will eventually fall by the wayside and die.

For ports, there's a non-zero cost associated with each and every single =
one in the tree.  Directly, in terms of clusters trying to build =
packages for the combination of supported releases and architectures, =
and indirectly, in case of infrastructural changes affecting chunks of =
the tree, when it comes to determining whether port breakage is a result =
of said changes, or whether it was broken already.

Generally speaking, such "dead" ports are marked DEPRECATED with a =
sizable amount of time before being reaped.  Honestly, I'd personally =
prefer the variable to be named PUT_UP_OR_SHUT_UP (but that's just me).  =
The fact remains though, that that is _exactly_ what it is.  If, in the =
period between a port being marked DEPRECATED and it being removed from =
the tree, and especially in the case of UNMAINTANED=3DYES (that'd be =
ports@FreeBSD.org for those in the back), no-one steps up to (a) fix the =
problem, (b) take maintainership and (c) _continue_ with maintainership.

Well, in that case, the port does not _deserve_ to live.  After all, =
no-one cares about it.  If they did, they'd take care of (a) thru (c) =
above.

-aDe




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