Bug#708075: debbugs: requesting a "triggered-by" mechanism

Control: tag -1 moreinfo

On Sun, 12 May 2013, Michael Gilbert wrote:
> Testing currently "appears" to have quite a large rc bug count [0]
> even though most of those issues (at this time) only affect unstable.
> This is because the bug is caused by another package in unstable that
> has yet to transition to testing.
> 
> I would like to propose a "triggered-by <bug> <other package>
> <version>" command for the control server.  This would have the affect
> of making the bts only consider the <bug> affecting the releases that
> already have <version> (or greater) of <other package>.
>
> For example consider bug #707797.  This bug is currently tracked as
> affecting both jessie and sid, even though jessie does not yet have
> libffi6, so in actuality, it is not affected (yet). An example
> "triggered-by" message to the control server for this case would be:
> 
>   triggered-by 707797 libffi6 3.0.13-4

This is an interesting idea. However it doesn't allow for more complex
versioning statements where a maximum version is in place, or "or"
statements. But perhaps that isn't actually a requirement.

The syntax would also have to be triggered-by 707797 libffi/3.0.13-4
instead.

It's also worth thinking about using "found-with" and "fixed-with" or
something similar instead.

I'll have to think about this more before and get some more input I
start actually implementing this.


-- 
Don Armstrong                      http://www.donarmstrong.com

Cheop's Law: Nothing ever gets built on schedule or within budget.
 -- Robert Heinlein _Time Enough For Love_ p242