Re: very small packages - merge into general/miscelleneous or move into core

[c.]

On 22 Jan 2014, at 14:09, Marco Atzeri <address@hidden> wrote:

> On 22/01/2014 13:55, Thomas Weber wrote:
>> On Fri, Jan 17, 2014 at 04:19:07PM +0100, Carlo de Falco wrote:
>>>> Il 17/gen/2014 15:58 "Thomas Weber" <address@hidden> ha scritto:
>>>> 
>>>>> 
>>>>> On Fri, Jan 17, 2014 at 03:10:36PM +0100, c. wrote:
>>>>>> Honestly, it does not happen often that universal physical
>>>>>> constants change their values.
>>>>> 
>>>>> I looked at the physical_constants package back in 2011 - the first two
>>>>> constants I looked at had changed values. That was enough for me to kick
>>>>> the package from Debian.
>>>>> 
>>>>>         Thomas
>>>> 
>>>> What were the constants and what was the change in their value?
>> 
>> One was Avogadro, the other I don't remember. The change in value I do
>> not remember - it doesn't matter however. I am not an expert in whatever
>> domain the constants are used, so I assume that every change might be
>> important to someone working in a specific domain.
>> My thinking was more like: does it make a difference if we continue with
>> the old package - and yes, it did. So out it went.
>> 
>>      Thomas
>> 
> 
> for details on last change:
> 
> http://physics.nist.gov/cuu/pdf/RevModPhysCODATA2010.pdf
> 
> The NIST database will be updated every 4 years
> 

I created a new version of the package physicalconstants
which uses an Octave script (rather than python) to parse
database data.

Whith this change it takes just 1 minute to create an updated
version of the package.

As the database is updated every 4 years, we should expect
an update this year, so that will be a good test for this system.

@Carnë I uploaded the new package to svn as I don't know how
to create a new mercurial repository, could you please migrate it
or explain me how to do it myself?

Of course before making a release it would make sense to remove
the function physical_constant from "miscellaneous" and make a new release
of that package as well ...

c.