I think it's a great idea. I also note that quite a few base packages already have multiple or backup maintainers -- dpkg, boot-floppies, and tasksel come to mind. I've also been unofficial backup maintainer for some other packages in the past and I doubt I'm alone. Formalizing this and using the Uploaders field and everything seems like a natural progression.
(So who would like to be a backup maintainer for debconf? ;-) I'm having a hard time getting it to work though. I tried Uploaders with dpkg 1.9.17 and no go: dpkg-gencontrol: warning: unknown information field Uploaders in input data in general section of control info file Also, do you have to redundantly list the package maintainer in the uploaders field if it's present, or do you just list any other maintainers? Separated by commas? This thing needs some documentation. -- see shy jo
