Re: Debian-Med policy proposal: 64-bit & little-endian only* for new packages

Steven Robbins <[email protected]> Sat, 06 Apr 2024 11:29:08 -0500

Newsgroups	gmane.linux.debian.devel.medical
Message-ID	<3640094.usQuhbGJ8B@riemann>

On Saturday, April 6, 2024 7:39:10 A.M. CDT Michael R. Crusoe wrote:
> On 29/03/2024 19.44, Steven Robbins wrote:

> > I am left with a question whether [reactively dropping troublesome
> > architectures] is what you are proposing, or
> > whether you mean to preemptively restrict the architectures even when
> > they are not troublesome?  I would support the former but the latter
> > position seems unwarranted to me.
>  
> At least the first, but preferably also the second. Why waste the computing
> resources / climate damage / maintainer time when that does not benefit our
> users?

I guess I would say that, to me, the contention that there is a waste of 
resources like maintainer time is unproven.  I have read all the replies but 
saw nothing that convinces me of that.  

What is your estimate of fraction of troublesome packages?

> Yes, it is true that compiling for 32-bit and/or big-endian architectures
> occasionally highlights coding errors that were otherwise hidden and could
> cause problems later. But I'm proposing that it isn't worth it, and that if
> a member of the team wishes to restrict the architectures built, they
> should do so.

To be very precise: I absolutely agree with the position that  one doesn't 
need to adopt heroic efforts to deal with issues on minority architectures - 
which, in my mind, includes all non-release architectures.  As I say, I adhere 
to this myself and years ago restricted ITK for this reason.  Under current 
policy.

In my case, ITK was far and away an outlier.  Is your experience different?  If 
we were to adopt policy language that makes it easier to "opt out" of 
universal architecture coverage - but not change the default - what fraction 
of packages do you expect you'd choose to opt out on?

At this point, I don't see a need to change the default to "64 bits only" for 
everything in the debian-med umbrella.  That seems counter to the Debian 
spirit.  

-Steve

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