James E Keenan wrote:
Good point. Modules created with ExtUtils::ModuleMaker, by default,
include a CHANGES file in the distribution. But it's easy to set an
option to include the changes in the HISTORY section of the POD. Someone
who does that should not be viewed as creating a distribution of lesser
quality than someone who follows the default. TMTOWTDI.
Too much, and especially unnecessary TMTOWDI can be harmful in CPAN,
IMHO. Some of the success of CPAN depends on having packages following
conventions so that they can be processed by automated tools, and so
that users can figure out what's what in the package more easily. Part
of it is putting the changelog where people expect it, which in most
cases is in a file matching /change(s|log)/i. Sure, you could put it in
a file called "Chronicles", but that *should* be considered bad kwalitee.
I say look only for /change(s|log)/i. There's no advantage of using a
less used synonym such as a file HISTORY. There may be cases where the
author feels that it's really better to put the changelog somewhere in
the a POD; in that case I'd advocate adding a Changes file that says:
"please see the pod for DBI::Chages" or "please see the README file".
In case it helps the discussion, here is the case-sensitive count for
files matching /\/(changes|changelog|history)/i in all CPAN
distributions in my local CPAN mirror (which is not exactly up-to-date,
but should be a good enough sample).
21286 Changes
2371 ChangeLog
1717 CHANGES
204 CHANGELOG
143 changelog
135 Changes.pod
132 Changelog
69 HISTORY
43 CHANGES.txt
All other matches combined (including many false positives): 802
Cheers,
Ivan
