Hello Chris.
I think this statement is not true. It's not clear at first so I'll explain.
Backports is a repository of packages that are outside of the normal
Debian repositories and have their own policy of how they operate.
Backports are not covered by the Debian Security Team and packages in
the repository will be removed if they violate the policy for Backports.
- The Backports FAQ [1] first item states:
Q: Where shall I report bugs I found in packages from backports to?
A: Please report them to the debian-backports mailing list. The
Debian bugtracking system doesn't know anything about backports
versions, and sometimes the backporter isn't in the Debian packaging
team so they might miss the report.
- The last item in the Backports Instructions [2] states:
Report Bugs
Please report bugs in backported packages to the backports mailing
list and NOT to the Debian BTS!
- Bug reports going to the Backports mailing list is part of the
Backports policy. [Or at least that's the case last I knew, it doesn't
seem to be clearly indicated in the FAQ or instructions.]
The reason for this policy is that the Debian BTS doesn't know about
Backports packages, so the BTS get into "version confusion" because it
doesn't have visibility into the repository, leading to a lot of confusion.
- Violating the policy of where bug reports go is common because users
of Backports typically start with ReportBug or opening a bug report in
the BTS not knowing the package being used came from Backports.
For new developers of packages in Backports, bugs going to the BTS is
tolerated for a time, but eventually the developer is told to stop this
or the package will have to be removed. [Or at least that's what used to
happen when I last uploaded to Backports.]
So to get around that issue packages end up needing to be modified to
change where bug reports go by default so that users can use ReportBug
to file bugs.
What I recall doing is adding something like "Bugs:
mailto://[email protected]"; to the debian/control file
to get this to happen without having to change the Maintainer field.
The manpage for deb-control [3] shows this Bugs: field, but the
current version of Debian Policy [4] does not seem to make mention of
it. I will need to figure out if this field is still active and still
used by ReportBug.
-- Chris
[1] https://backports.debian.org/FAQ/
[2] https://backports.debian.org/Instructions/
[3] https://www.man7.org/linux/man-pages/man5/deb-control.5.html
[4] https://www.debian.org/doc/debian-policy/ch-controlfields.html
Chris Knadle
[email protected]
On 6/1/25 08:02, Chris Hofstaedtler wrote:
Only replying to this part, obviously:
On Sat, May 31, 2025 at 06:31:31PM -0400, Chris Knadle wrote:
Dealing with Debian Backports isn't fun, BTW, because bugs to Backports
aren't supposed to go to the Debian BTS last I knew. So the package will
have to be modified so that the bug reports go to Backports, and then I'll
need to change my Sieve mail filters in some way to grab the MLMMJ bugs
going to Backports to move them into my Debian-Bugs folder so that I'll see
them. Regardless of not wanting to deal with that complication, I will do
that, because it's what I think is the right thing to do here.
If you are both the uploader of the backport and the package
maintainer in testing/unstable, you can run the BTS for such a
package in any way you like.
Chris
