Bug#1144046: define term 'release critical'?

On Wed, Aug 12, 2026 at 01:17:50PM +0200, Simon Josefsson wrote:
>>>I couldn't find a good reference of what a 'release critical' bug means,
>>
>> The wording suggests that it's a term external to the Policy.
>>
>>>would it be reasonable to include this in the policy manual?
>>
>> If this part causes confusion it could be moved to a footnote I guess?
>
>I've always been uncertain if the definition of a 'release critical bug'

This question may need additional context.

Usually when people talk about RC bugs they mean a specific distinction 
between RC and non-RC bugs in various Release Team related tools (mostly 
migration and autoremoval ones). And for that the severity is used, per 
your option 1 below.

>should be considered:
>
>1) Any bug with severity critical, grave, or serious.
>
>2) A bug that fulfills the ever-moving definition in
>https://release.debian.org/testing/rc_policy.txt

A bug that fulfills this definition but has a severity lower than serious 
is said to have a wrong severity and that needs to be adjusted. After that 
the distinction no longer exists. Or, one may say "installing this package 
makes firefox crash on start which is RC" eve when there is no bug report 
in the BTS at all, yet, with the understanding that such a bug report 
should be created and have a severity serious or grave.

(again, it's always possible I'm misunderstanding the confusion)

-- 
WBR, wRAR

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