[arch-dev-public] Where [erxtra] ends and [community] begins

[Damir Perisa]

Sunday 14 October 2007, Thomas Bächler wrote:
 | To me this is easy: The core/extra/unstable repositories are
 | maintained by the smaller group of Archlinux Developers, the
 | community repository is maintained by the larger and less strictly
 | controlled group of Trusted Users.

i agree to this distinction. extra is per definition extra to core (or 
earlier current - the main official repo). it is extra, but it is 
official. 

community is not official by devs but official by community - 
therefore also the name. it is less strict and can also be less clean 
(of course it should be kept as clean as anything :) )

official means, that at least one dev is responsible for the contents. 

if somebody needs (wants) to document this, here a first draft from my 
thoughts:


== a package needs to be in extra (if not core) because:

* it is a dependency to other pkgs and crucial to their 
functionability i.e. it is a node in the dependency tree - compared 
to the leaves on the end of the tree - e.g. non-core libs, xorg, ...)

* it has a main benefit on the system functions (additional drivers 
against kernel26 or official xorg)

* it affects in any case any of the functions of packages in [core]


== a package may be in extra (per definition not in core! core only 
has pkgs that _need_ to be there) because at least a dev is willing 
to maintain it and:

* it is an open source project product (i.e. not limited distribution) 
in the state of usability --- if this criteria is not set, it may be 
in unstable

* it is a very popular package 

* it covers a unique function to an OS with open source software (e.g. 
publishing - scribus)


== a package should not be in extra:

* if it does not need to be there + there is no reason that it may 
reside there

* if no dev is using it

* if no dev is willing to maintain it (orphans are temporary per 
definition and should be moved after a certain lag phase to 
unmaintained (=unsupported) if nobody wants it)


please feel free to enhance this thoughts if you feel needed.

... and a general note on the whole matter: i realise that several 
devs - mostly newer devs - raise the matter now on the regular 
basis... and link it to the fact that we have quite some orphans 
laying around. stop it! we are all aware of the lots of orphans and 
the thoughts i listed above.... but i do not want to have it risen 
every time i include a new pkg to extra (to my list of pkgs! i never 
orphaned a pkg without a fundamental reason in the last 3 years).

- D


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