Fedora Board Recap 2007-NOV-13

[Jesse Keating]

On Wed, 21 Nov 2007 11:56:08 -0800
Karsten Wade <kwade at redhat.com> wrote:

> Note that EPEL, a Fedora project, has a much longer window of usage of
> packages based on older Fedora source.  Currently eight years.
> 
> How does EPEL fit in here?  Is it a downstream?

As I see it, EPEL is it's own project, because it publishes the srpms
along side the binaries.

> 
> EPEL explicitly only supports what people are interested in
> maintaining. I.e., a package for EPEL 5 may be orphaned after a few
> years. 
> 
> Does EPEL's obligation to make sources available stop at that time?
> Or N periods of time after that?

EPELs obligation with regard to the sources lasts as long as the binary
is made available.  If you retire the binary, you can retire the source.

> 
> What if a package is un-orphaned after that?  E.g., during year four,
> someone picks up an orphaned foo.rpm.  Does that restart the clock on
> making sources available?  What does EPEL do if Fedora no longer has
> that source available?

Again, unorphaning the package would mean making a build for it, which
would produce a binary, and a source.  The source would be made
available along with the binary, and then there is no clock.  Just keep
the source up as long as the binary.

-- 
Jesse Keating
Fedora -- All my bits are free, are yours?
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