Hi there, this is _very_ long overdue, but here come the notes taken collectively during DebConf16's LSB BoF. I'll put the takeaways first.
# tl;dr Given that the word about lsb not being granted anymore might not have spread enough, <odyx> will try to work towards producing an 'lsb-compat' package (see 'C' proposal below), ideally to be uploaded to NEW in the next days. # Gobby notes ## Short history 2002 - LSB 1.1 first package in Debian 2004 - Chris Lawrence <lawrencc> as maintainer LSB 2 2005 - LSB 3 2006 - LSB 3.1 2008 - LSB 3.2 2012 - Didier Raboud <odyx> becomes maintainer Starts merge from Ubuntu Left green [ OK ] blocks LSB 4.1 2013 - Lots of cleanup More merge from Ubuntu 2014 - Growing concerns about LSB in general DebConf14 BoF discussing LSB on the long-term Baseline was "want LSB? → Help LSB" 2015 - LSB 5 released, not adapted for Debian 9.20150826 upload Dropping all non-mandatory LSB packages LSB is about binary compatibility Debian doesn't check that it satisfies LSB Debian wouldn't alter its packages to satisfy the LSB Debian is not LSB-certified (no-one is) It's therefore better to drop our pseudo-support instead of continuing to pretend we have correct support 2016 - Ubuntu notices EPSON still releases printer driver packages depending on the `lsb` package, and partially reverts the packages drop in a Stable Release Update (xenial 9.20160110ubuntu0.1) https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/lsb/+bug/1536353 ## As Debian; what do we do about that ? * There are packages out there that continue to depend on lsb, or lsb-* * We don't have a list. * We know of: - epson-inkjet-printer-201106w (.deb converted from .rpm usig alien) Depends: lsb (>= 3.2) - google-earth depends on lsb-core, needs the ldconfig symlinks - FlexLM licensing software * It is a user service question. There are 3 options: A) Nothing Try applying our levers on EPSON (and others) That was kinda the original plan; that the removal would bring awareness of the problem. B) Ubuntu way Re-add lsb, lsb-printing and lsb-security to have epson-inkjet-printer-201106w be installable and runnable. C) Debian way ? New binary package: lsb-compat (9.20160728) Provides: lsb (= 4.1), lsb-printing (= 4.1), lsb-security (= 4.1), lsb-core (= 4.1) Replaces: ^ Breaks: Depends: whatever was in lsb4.1 and that is needed by the above "known packages" (Added by Ubuntu: libjpeg62) Debian bug: #609882 - Release notes entry debian-lsb@lists.debian.org D) Fix the LSB & provide the minimal subset of LSB 5 # Conclusions The current maintainer <odyx> is uninterested to work on LSB 5 support, and uninterested by a full reintroduction of a subset of LSB packages. Unless someone else steps in, he'll try to produce a working lsb-compat package (see 'C' proposal above), ideally uploaded to NEW before mid-october. -- Cheers, OdyX