src.rpm standards

[Gene C.]

Ok, this did not get a rise from anyone on fedora.us so lets try here ...

One thing that has always annoyed me about some packages are the "extra" 
source files they plug into the SOURCE directory.  While most and all "good" 
rpms have the package version id on all tarballs, patches, and other 
"official" files.  Then there are the "extra" files.  These are named 
absolutely anything.  If your are in the process of building two separate 
packages but they have a name conflict, you will never know except that the 
result may not perform/operate as expected and your will never know why.

I am not sure what the standard should be but I believe that there should be 
one.

While I am comfortable with a package xxx version=2.3.4 having a patch file 
named xxx-1.2.3-fixit.patch because it was developed on version 1.2.3 but 
still applies to version 2.3.4, that is OK with me.

But, when some package xxx has a file named perhaps "version", that is 
something that should not be happening.

I assume that the various automated build systems start with a clean set of 
directories for each build, this may not be true for individuals (it is 
certainly not true for me).

OK, what do you call think about this?

-- 
Gene