#429577 RFP: emacs-snapshot -- The GNU Emacs editor (development snapshot)

#429577#5
Date:
2007-06-18 18:29:27 UTC
From:
To:
* Package name    : emacs-snapshot
  Version         : 22.whatever.would.be.fine
  Upstream Author : RMS & Co.
* URL             : http://www.fsf.org/...
* License         : GPL
  Programming Lang: lisp
  Description     : emacs that is not very old

Debian needs to revive their emacs-snapshot package. A once every
three months snapshot would be fine. Six months OK too.

You see, many users using the now disappeared emacs-snapshot package
have already long ago got hooked, tailoring their .emacs files for
emacs 22, and would go bananas if forced to rip all that up to go back
to emacs 21.

I am using the "daring" sid version of Debian, but it seems like
"dusty" "woody".

If it were that simple for lesser users such as myself to just
roll-our-own, snap-in-place, then long ago the greater users would
have not stopped packaging it or whatever.

#429577#20
Date:
2009-04-25 02:56:11 UTC
From:
To:
Hi there.

Is there any progress on this? Any updates?


Thanks for any information, Rogério Brito.

#429577#25
Date:
2009-06-08 23:05:11 UTC
From:
To:
Hi,

you should look here to get a Debian package:

http://emacs.orebokech.com/

Regards

#429577#30
Date:
2009-11-06 02:08:24 UTC
From:
To:
retitle 429577 RFP: emacs-snapshot -- The GNU Emacs editor (development snapshot)
noowner 429577 !
thanks


Sorry I have not enough time for this package: (

#429577#39
Date:
2011-07-27 15:57:23 UTC
From:
To:
close 429577
thanks

Hello,

This is an automatic mail sent to close this RFP.

Your RFP wnpp bug is being closed because of the following reasons:
- It hasn't seen any activity for the last 18 months.
- The amount of RFPs on the Debian BTS is huge and we need to
  clean up a bit the place.

As this an automatic procedure, it could of course have something
wrong and probably it would be closing some bugs that are not intended
by owners and submitters to be closed, for example if the RFP is still
of your interest, or there has been some kind of activity around it.
In that case, please do not hesitate to reopen the bug!

To re-open it, you simply have to mail control@bugs.debian.org
with a body text like this:

reopen 123456
thanks bts

Replacing '123456' for the number of your RFP bug. The subject of the
mail is ignored. Or if you have any kind of problems when dealing with
the BTS, feel free to contact me and I'd be more than happy to help
you on this: <lucas@debian.org>.

Thanks for your cooperation,

#429577#56
Date:
2018-04-18 03:18:12 UTC
From:
To:
Hi,

[Cc'ing the ITP FTR]

I have  almost finished preparing emacs-snapshot  and temporarily pushed
it there, so  please have a look when  you have some time as  I may have
messed things around ;-):
https://salsa.debian.org/arnau/deb-emacs

I have a few questions though:

  * bin_priority (for update-alternatives): I  think it would make sense
    to have  an higher one for  emacs-snapshot, what about a  number big
    enough so it doesn't clash with future stable release (such as 999)?

  * Currently emacs-snapshot version is:
    2:YYYYMMDD-<LATEST_AVAILABLE_TAG>-g<MASTER_COMMIT_ID>-1

    Considering  that this  is not  really the  LATEST_AVAILABLE_TAG but
    MASTER_COMMIT_ID at  the time of  packaging and in order  to shorten
    the version  which is  currently rather long,  MASTER_COMMIT_ID only
    should be  enough, isn't it?

    This would mean  having something like this after  bumping the epoch
    and where the first '-1' is only  in case of we upload two different
    Git snapshots on the same day:
    3:YYYYMMDD-1+git<MASTER_COMMIT_ID>-1

    What do you think?

  * I put  myself as Maintainer, and  Rob and Dima as  Uploaders, but if
    either Rob or Dima wish to be in the Maintainer field, please let me
    know as either is fine to me.

  * I was  thinking about having  deb-emacs repository for  both emacs25
    and emacs-snapshot in  collab-maint Git (as emacs.git)  instead of a
    user repository. What do you think?

  * Rob: I  have made several  changes to  emacs25 branch, feel  free to
    merge them if they look fine to you:
https://salsa.debian.org/arnau/deb-emacs/commits/deb/emacs25/d/sid/master

And some packaging questions I will add to debian/README.source:

  * Dima is using gbp-pq  and Rob git-dpm. In order to  keep it as close
    as  possible to  emacs25 packaging,  I have  been using  git-dpm.  I
    don't really well both of them as  this is the first time I use them
    so I have absolutely no opinion on this. Dima: is that ok?

    Rob:  I  ran the  following  command  after importing  patches  from
    emacs25  and merging  them with  the ones  from emacs-snapshot  from
    Dima:
    $ git-dpm init --record-patch-name ../emacs-snapshot_20180414-1+git836dce6.orig.tar.xz deb/emacs-snapshot/d/sid/upstream

    However,  I'm  not so  familiar  with  git-dpm,  so would  you  mind
    explaining how you use it for emacs25?

  * Rob: I followed your naming scheme for branches and tags, thus:
    + Branches:
      deb/emacs-snapshot/d/sid/master
      deb/emacs-snapshot/d/sid/upstream
    + Tags:
      deb/emacs-snapshot/v/upstream/20180414-1+git836dce6

  * Rob: Could you please explain  how you remove non-DFSG documentation
    (such as emacs.texi) from the Git repository?

  * Here is what I have been using to create a new upstream release from
    deb/emacs-snapshot/d/sid/master branch:

    $ git tag -s -m "Upstream tagged for Debian version 20180414-1+git836dce6." deb/emacs-snapshot/v/upstream/20180414-1+git836dce6 deb/emacs-snapshot/d/sid/upstream
    $ gbp buildpackage --git-builder=/bin/true --git-upstream-tree=deb/emacs-snapshot/v/upstream/20180414-1+git836dce6
      =>  Thanks to  debian/gbp.conf  I added,  this will  automatically
         generate  the tarball  with pristine-tar.  If that's  ok, maybe
         debian/gbp.conf should be added to emacs25 branch too?

Cheers,

#429577#61
Date:
2018-05-12 17:12:00 UTC
From:
To:
Arnaud Fontaine <arnau@debian.org> writes:

Could you repost the questions that I don't sufficiently address below
to debian-emacsen@lists.debian.org?  I think there are people there who
should also see them, particularly those like David and Sean who are
working on the broad add-on packaging effort.

For the moment I'd prefer to keep the "emacs25" (soon to be "emacs"[1])
flavor repository separate, which might suggest creating a collab-maint
emacs-snapshot repository for now, if that's what you'd like.

[1] In case you weren't already aware, we're about to unversion the
    emacsXY package to just be "emacs".  It's possible that won't affect
    your work too seriously, though it does involve a bunch of changes
    to the emacs25 debian/ files.  As part of that, the "emacsXY" binary
    package is becoming "emacs-gtk" because we're also moving the
    "emacs" metapackage into the upcoming unversioned emacs source
    package.

    I say "we" because although I'm handling the code, David, Sean,
    etc. have been helping figure out the details.

Appreciated -- my current plan is to finish the unversioning, and then
look back at what's pending elsewhere, emacs 26, bugs, etc.  I'd guess
that it might make sense for you to rebase at that point (or at least
compare the changes), and then we can see where we stand.

I'm more than happy to attempt to minimize differences between
emacs-snapshot and emacs when we can, and I expect I should have more
time to help in a few weeks.  But regardless, we should be able to
resolve your more immediate questions on debian-emacsen soon.

Thanks

#429577#66
Date:
2018-05-15 04:19:22 UTC
From:
To:
Hi,

Ok.

Ok.

There are not so many changes  and most of them are for debian/copyright
which  is  not  related  to   your  work  on  unversioning  the  emacsXY
package. Would you  mind at least applying the changes  I did which does
not clash with your work?

Cheers,

#429577#71
Date:
2018-05-22 21:26:15 UTC
From:
To:
[Resending this email to debian-emacsen@ as per Rob's request]

Hi,

I have almost finished preparing emacs-snapshot[0] and as I said to Rob,
my  plan is  to  keep emacs-snapshot  package as  close  as possible  to
emacsXY package. I  know that you've been working  on unversioning emacs
package (BTW Where is that repository?).

I have a few questions before uploading emacs-snapshot though:

  * bin_priority (for update-alternatives): I  think it would make sense
    to have  an higher one for  emacs-snapshot, what about a  number big
    enough so it doesn't clash with future stable release (such as 999)?

  * I have  made several changes to  emacs25 branch, feel free  to merge
    them  if they  look fine  to you  (mostly debian/copyright  work and
    fixing lintian warnings):
https://salsa.debian.org/arnau/deb-emacs/commits/deb/emacs25/d/sid/master

And some packaging questions I will document in debian/README.source:

  * Do you  plan to keep using  git-dpm?  (I'm asking because  Dima, the
    current  packager of  emacs-snapshot, is  using gbp-pq.   I have  no
    preference/opinion on this subject, just asking)

    I ran the following command after importing patches from emacs25 and
    merging them with the ones from emacs-snapshot from Dima:

    $ git-dpm init --record-patch-name ../emacs-snapshot_20180414-1+git836dce6.orig.tar.xz deb/emacs-snapshot/d/sid/upstream

    However,  I'm  not so  familiar  with  git-dpm,  so would  you  mind
    explaining how you use it for emacs25/unversioned emacs?

  * I followed deb-emacs25[1] naming scheme for branches and tags, thus:
    + Branches:
      deb/emacs-snapshot/d/sid/master
      deb/emacs-snapshot/d/sid/upstream
    + Tags:
      deb/emacs-snapshot/v/upstream/20180414-1+git836dce6

    I guess  unversioned emacs Git  repository follows this  scheme too,
    right?

  * Could you please explain how you remove non-DFSG documentation (such
    as emacs.texi) from the Git repository?

  * Here is what I have been using to create a new upstream release from
    deb/emacs-snapshot/d/sid/master branch:

    $ git tag -s -m "Upstream tagged for Debian version 20180414-1+git836dce6." deb/emacs-snapshot/v/upstream/20180414-1+git836dce6 deb/emacs-snapshot/d/sid/upstream
    $ gbp buildpackage --git-builder=/bin/true
    --git-upstream-tree=deb/emacs-snapshot/v/upstream/20180414-1+git836dce6
      =>  Thanks to  debian/gbp.conf  I added,  this will  automatically
         generate the  tarball with  pristine-tar.  If that's  ok, maybe
         debian/gbp.conf  should be  added to  emacs25/unversioned emacs
         branch too?

Cheers,

#429577#76
Date:
2018-05-23 02:12:41 UTC
From:
To:
Arnaud Fontaine <arnau@debian.org> writes:

How many of the existing add-on packages in sid have you tested with
your emacs-snapshot package? Do you have some plan to prevent/manage
breakage of add-ons by a new upload of emacs-snapshot? It seems like
every upload is potentially like a library transition, in that changes
in emacs tend to break add-on packages.

d

#429577#81
Date:
2018-05-23 03:30:00 UTC
From:
To:
Hi,

I use  it myself on a  daily basis for a  few months (and Dima  for much
longer so he may  know more than me about that)  with around 20 add-ons.
Except the fact that old-style backquotes  have been removed for which I
have a few  patches ready (and which  is something that will  have to be
deal for emacs26 anyway AFAIK), I have not had any problem so far.

Anyhow, emacs-snapshot  will only be available  in sid/experimental and,
except  4   source  packages,  all   of  them  don't   Build-Depends  on
emacs-snapshot.  Also, most of the  time, add-ons breakage to expect are
on deprecated/removed interfaces (such as old-style backquotes) which is
something  that  will have  to  be  dealt  anyway  on new  Emacs  stable
releases.

But I get your point and indeed there  need to be a plan to check before
each upload of emacs-snapshot whether  it breaks add-ons. A shell script
installing  in a  clean chroot  emacs-snapshot  to be  uploaded and  all
available add-ons  in the  archive would probably  be enough  and fairly
easy to write?

Cheers,

#429577#86
Date:
2018-05-23 05:40:33 UTC
From:
To:
Arnaud Fontaine <arnau@debian.org> writes:
It would be great to have. Rob: how do you usually do this in your
packages?

#429577#91
Date:
2018-05-23 16:51:52 UTC
From:
To:
Dima Kogan <dima@secretsauce.net> writes:

As far as I know checking is a manual process with the stable emacs
uploads. But there are many fewer such uploads.

d

#429577#96
Date:
2018-05-23 17:15:03 UTC
From:
To:
Hello,

+1

I'd suggest installing the old emacs-snapshot and all addons, and then
upgrading to the new emacs-snapshot.  And then also test installing all
addons without emacs-snapshot, and then installing the new
emacs-snapshot.  And perhaps installing the new emacs-snapshot and then
all addons, too.

I think you are aware, but just in case/for onlookers, the main issue is
that all addons will get bytecompiled against the new Emacs by
maintscripts, so if emacs-snapshot breaks addons, apt will be in a
"failed to configure" state which can be a pain to recover from.

I think there should be a warning in the package description that the
package is for fairly advanced users only -- I can see someone not
really familiar with apt/dpkg installing it, and then finding their
system in a state from which they don't know how to back out.  Unstable
has garnered a reputation for actually being quite stable...

#429577#101
Date:
2018-05-27 16:07:44 UTC
From:
To:
Arnaud Fontaine <arnau@debian.org> writes:

The unversioning is nearly finished, so I suspect the thing to do is for
me to finish the work, and then we'll look at your changes in that
context.  Any changes outside debian/ should be relatively unaffected,
but others may require accommodation.  In any case, I'll be happy to
work with you on that once we're there.

Unless something unexpected happens, I expect to upload the unversioned
packages in the next week or so, if not sooner.

Thanks

#429577#106
Date:
2018-05-27 19:06:35 UTC
From:
To:
David Bremner <david@tethera.net> writes:

Right.  At the moment, I don't have any package-level automated testing.

#429577#111
Date:
2018-05-28 00:05:35 UTC
From:
To:
Rob Browning <rlb@defaultvalue.org> writes:

Great,  thanks!   Let  me  know  when  it  has  been  pushed  so  I  can
merge/rebase my  changes. I  will probably  have a few  more by  then as
there  are  a few  more  Lintian  warnings that  I  want  to fix  before
uploading emacs-snapshot to NEW...

#429577#118
Date:
2019-11-05 06:19:12 UTC
From:
To:
Hi,

I no longer  have an interest to maintain this  package so I'm retitling
it as RFP. The work done is not lost though and still available there if
anyone wants to take over (and there is also a TODO list in the previous
messages):
https://salsa.debian.org/arnau/deb-emacs

Cheers,