Re: [Automake-NG] Can we require GNU make >= 3.81? (make memoization doesn't work with GNU make 3.80)

[Russ Allbery]

Bob Friesenhahn <address@hidden> writes:

> The logic used by Debian/Ubuntu for when to update package versions
> totally escapes me.  Users of my own software suffer as a result.

90% of the logic in Debian is "when the volunteer maintainer has time to
deal with whatever issue arose."  Yes, there's another 10% that's other
things, usually involving transitions or dependencies, but nine times out
of ten, if you're reading some grand plan into delays, you're probably
over-reading the situation.

In this specific case, the make package maintainer in Debian changed jobs
and has had almost no time to work on Debian in the past two years.  I
suspect most of the reason for the delay is that, and the rest is:

    http://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/bugreport.cgi?bug=635317#59

(which of course due to lack of time he's not had a chance to coordinate).

Sadly, due to that bug, you should expect the next stable release of
Debian to also have make 3.81, since it's now too late in the release
cycle to introduce a disruptive change to a core build system package.
That wouldn't have had to be the case if people had more time two years
ago, but that sort of thing happens.  :/  It's very difficult to release
something as large as Debian, and there's always something that's much
more out-of-date than we'd like.

Ubuntu by and large freezes with whatever Debian has in unstable or
testing at the time of their release preparation since Ubuntu, for
packages that aren't an Ubuntu-specific priority, just imports Debian,
which sometimes can result in highly unfortunate choices if no one on the
Ubuntu side is paying attention.

-- 
Russ Allbery (address@hidden)             <http://www.eyrie.org/~eagle/>