Hi I've been looking at various python 2 cruft packages (packages no longer built by the corresponding source packages) and why they can't be cleaned up, I have been looking in a derivative but many of my results are also relevant to debian proper. Where relevant I have been filing bugs against the reverse-dependencies of these cruft packages, so they can be fixed or ultimately removed.
Most such packages have been part of upstream projects that have dropped python 2 support, notablly django and openstack. In such cases it is pretty clear that the only reasonable way forward is for the reverse dependencies to be either removed or migrated to python 3. One package that stood out from the rest was python-monotonic. python-monotonic is maintained by the Debian openstack team, but it doesn't seem to be in any way openstack specific, nor does upstream seem to have dropped python2 support. It seemed to have a fair few reverse dependencies. python-humanfriendly (has rdeps) oz (rc bug filed https://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/bugreport.cgi?bug=933509 ) python-fasteners (has rdeps) python-futurist (has rdeps, cruft) python-octaviaclient (assumed to be openstack related) python-oslo.log (assumed to be openstack related) python-oslo.messaging (assumed to be openstack related) python-oslo.service (assumed to be openstack related) python-oslo.utils (assumed to be openstack related) python-tenacity (has rdeps, cruft) There are also indirect reverse dependencies, (i'm not investigating reverse dependencies of packages that are clearly openstack specific here) python-coloredlogs (via python-humanfriendly, no reverse dependencies) python-datalad (via python-fasteners, no reverse dependencies) duplicity (via python-fasteners) python-oauth2client (via python-fasteners) python-oslo.concurrency (via python-fastners, openstack related) python-taskflow (via python-fasteners, cruft) python-tooz (via python-fasteners, openstack related, cruft) python-googleapi (via python-oauth2client) python-pypowervm (via python-taskflow, openstack related, cruft) python-googleapi-samples (via python-googleapi) python-etcd3gw (no rdeps) python-gnocchiclient (openstack related, cruft) If we ignore openstack stuff, python modules and an examples package the two main packages left seem to be oz and duplicity, oz seems to have very low popcon, but duplicity seems to have a popcon of around 3000 and growing. So the main question seems to be can duplicity be reasonably migrated to python 3 and if not is it worth reinstating the python-monotonic binary package to save duplicity?
