forcing eglibc and gcc, breaking *glx*ia32 and lib32ffi on amd64
finish: [eglibc,gcc-4.4,alsa-lib,bzip2,gcj-4.4,gnat-4.4,readline5,ia32-libs,
ecj,zlib,ncurses,libshout/alpha,openafs/alpha,acpitool/armel,aespipe/armel,
calcurse/armel,consolekit/armel,dwm/armel,freej/armel,gadmin-rsync/armel,
galleta/armel,geeqie/armel,gpicview/armel,halevt/armel,iec16022/armel,
jinja2/armel,keytouch-editor/armel,libjavascript-minifier-xs-perl/armel,
libsys-virt-perl/armel,libtest-leaktrace-perl/armel,libwant-perl/armel,
libwww-curl-perl/armel,logapp/armel,luckybackup/armel,matplotlib/armel,
missidentify/armel,moreutils/armel,myrescue/armel,pasco/armel,pipebench/armel,
pycairo/armel,pymssql/armel,python-enable/armel,pywebkitgtk/armel,
reglookup/armel,rifiuti/armel,rpy/armel,safecopy/armel,scponly/armel,
scrounge-ntfs/armel,shed/armel,sleuthkit/armel,ssdeep/armel,swapd/armel,
tct/armel,tmux/armel,trousers/armel,virt-manager/armel,xcftools/armel,
flasm/ia64,fontforge-extras/ia64,frama-c/ia64,freecell-solver/ia64,gcom/ia64,
geeqie/ia64,gpicview/ia64,gupnp-tools/ia64,heimdal/ia64,hex/ia64,
janest-core/ia64,jinja2/ia64,joystick/ia64,keytouch-editor/ia64,ldm/ia64,
libhtml-template-pro-perl/ia64,libjavascript-minifier-xs-perl/ia64,
librep/ia64,libshout/ia64,libsys-virt-perl/ia64,libtest-leaktrace-perl/ia64,
libtioga-ruby/ia64,libwant-perl/ia64,libwww-curl-perl/ia64,lua-bitop/ia64,
lua-lpeg/ia64,luckybackup/ia64,lxrandr/ia64,matplotlib/ia64,mklibs/ia64,
mlt/ia64,mpdscribble/ia64,mtasc/ia64,ncmpcpp/ia64,newsx/ia64,
ocaml-libvirt/ia64,open-cobol/ia64,openafs/ia64,oprofile/ia64,
pangomm/ia64,pari/ia64,pidgin-facebookchat/ia64,pipebench/ia64,
postgresql-8.4/ia64,prelude-lml/ia64,printfilters-ppd/ia64,ptlib/ia64,
pymssql/ia64,python-enable/ia64,qd/ia64,quodlibet/ia64,rasmol/ia64,
reglookup/ia64,reprepro/ia64,rifiuti/ia64,rpm2html/ia64,rpy/ia64,
safecopy/ia64,scponly/ia64,scrounge-ntfs/ia64,serf/ia64,shed/ia64,
sleuthkit/ia64,ssdeep/ia64,structure-synth/ia64,tct/ia64,
telepathy-gabble/ia64,tex-guy/ia64,timidity/ia64,tmux/ia64,transmission/ia64,
trousers/ia64,util-vserver/ia64,varconf/ia64,yasm/ia64,gmp,nss-mdns]
endloop: 30+15272: i-5:a-2:a-2:a-2:h-5:i-3:m-2:m-2:p-2:s-3:s-2:k-7623:k-7649
now: 34+5455: i-5:a-2:a-6:a-2:h-5:i-3:m-2:m-2:p-2:s-3:s-2:k-2725:k-2730
* amd64: fglrx-glx-ia32, lib32ffi-dev, lib32ffi5, nvidia-glx-ia32
* kfreebsd-amd64: gcj-4.4-jdk, gcj-4.4-jre, libgcj10-awt, libgcj10-dev
* kfreebsd-i386: gcj-4.4-jdk, gcj-4.4-jre, libgcj10-awt, libgcj10-dev
This means that we pushed eglibc and gcc-4.4 through to testing. This
reduces the uninstallability count on *bsd by more than half (rather 64%
gone). On the other hand, we broke 4 packages additionally on amd64, which
are for the i386-compatibility stuff on amd64. Two of them are non-free
and linked to the xorg-transition (and we would like to avoid waiting for
that transition before we can update eglibc in testing). The other two
packages are discussed in bug
#533009, and not uploaded yet.
After the package is fixed, it can move to testing anytime. As there
weren't any reverse dependencies broken, we decided that this decision is
the best for our users.
I realized also that it's quite tempting to just fix testing a bit here and there. However, I'm not intending to be back in the "need to fix testing every day"-camp. It's quite a bit of fun to do that after a long pause (and definitly very tempting), but don't expect me to do that every day again.
About being a press officer
Some of you know that besides Debian I'm also volunteering in the germans
national association of public transport users. A few know that I'm a press
officer for more than 15 years on the local level, and more than 10 years
on the national level. As that, I've had my fair deal (or even more) of
issues and experiences (and also seen how other organisations deal with
that). Some recent discussions have convinced me to write up my experiences,
and try to clarify some common misunderstandings - press communications is
very different from normal open source stuff.
One of the most important things to respect as an press officer is the proper division of tasks: As press officer I'm not making the decisions nor do I communicate them to the inside. I'm "only" communicating them to the outside, and trying to get the focus of the media set right. That doesn't mean I'm not discussing afairs with the responsible persons for the decisions, and giving advise (and sometimes I'm also voicing an opinion as delegate to the national council - but that's non-public then). But in the end, they need to decide which decision is the right one. Disagreeing with a decision only allows me two ways to handle them: Either ignore my disagreement and still distribute the decision (and that means also publically welcome). Or to step back.
To avoid misunderstandings, one usually considers at the beginning how critical and how much potential for trouble a position statement has. Depending on that one decides how many people need to review a position statement before handing it out - next to no position statement goes out unreviewed. It is always recommended to let any position statement be signed off by the people responsible for the decision. (But in constrast to signed-off patches, never tell in public who did review and sign-off a position statement - either the organisation has decided it according to their internal governance process, then the decision is proper and signed off by the organisation as whole. Or it isn't, then there is no position statement.)
Asking the press officers to make their own decisions and contradicting the decisions as taken by the governancy rules is counter-productive: This will at best only lead to confusion to the outside, and unnecessary conflicts on the inside. Usually it will get way worse though.
Looking at Debians press team, I'm quite happy to say that they work in a very good way. Please continue to keep up your good work.