retitle 39299 [AMENDED PROPOSAL] Permit use of bz2 for source packages thanks
I hereby amend my proposal as follows: --- The available space and bandwidth available to our FTP server network, and the space available on individual CDs, is increasingly unable to meet the demand for their use. It is virtually certain that potato will require 3 source CDs, and future releases are likely to require even more unless we improve the compression of source packages. While people have raised legitimate objections to the use of bz2 for compressing binary packages, these concerns are less relevant to source packages, which are an archival medium typically used by a relative minority of users and/or build daemons, the latter of which uncompress source packages without user intervention. Therefore, I propose that we permit the use of bzip2 to compress source package files (.orig.tar for non-native packages, .tar for native packages). A patch to dpkg-1.4.1.16 is available that implements this capability as an option. Note that diff files are still compressed with gzip, even with bzip2 support for tar files enabled, because few are over 5k in size (compressed). Furthermore, I propose that the policy document recommend, but not require, the use of bzip2 compression for large source packages where this will not compromise the goal of providing "pristine" source. However, it should be up to individual maintainers to decide whether the use of bzip2 compression is appropriate in each case. --- In original form, this proposal was seconded by Goswin Brederlow. Objections were raised to a requirement for the use of bz2 format, and thus this proposal makes its use strictly voluntary. As far as I recall, no objections were raised to permitting the use of bzip2 format if dpkg-dev had the necessary support available. The functionality is available as a patch, so it should be integrated into dpkg if there are no objections to this revised proposal. Chris -- ============================================================================= | Chris Lawrence | Get Debian GNU/Linux CDROMs | | <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> | http://www.lordsutch.com/cds/ | | | | | Open Directory Editor | Visit the Lurker's Guide to Babylon 5: | | http://dmoz.org/ | <*> http://www.midwinter.com/lurk/ <*> | =============================================================================
