[Fedora-packaging] shipping distribution-specific patches *separately*

[Ralf Corsepius]

On Wed, 2008-05-21 at 08:31 +0200, Thorsten Leemhuis wrote:
> Hi!
> 
> Quoting a paragraph from:
> http://lwn.net/Articles/283030/
> 
> > Debian's packaging policy resembles that of most other distributions.
> > A Debian source package is supposed to contain a tarball of the
> > upstream source distribution, without changes. Any
> > distribution-specific patches are included separately and applied
> > when the source package is prepared for building.
> 
> Do we have a policy that all patches we apply in our packages need to be 
> included *separately*?
None that I am aware about, except that we ask/encourage packagers to
use clean upstream tarballs.

As a consequence of this, we have a similar rule in effect.

> Do we care or do we want to ignore this (minor) issue?
IMO, we should. 

> (¹) Side note: I think it's wrong to add such a patch, as differing from 
> upstream in things like config file naming just creates trouble and 
> confusion for everyone.
Agreed. Shipping customized tarballs, where an upstream is available
should be banned.

Ralf