Craig Sanders <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > On Fri, Apr 20, 2007 at 12:21:39PM +0200, Frank Küster wrote: >> > 1. why is this allegedly a 'benefit'? what's so special about libraries? >> > why is a new libc6 or libssl etc more scary than a new apache or php >> > etc? >> >> - because it's much harder to go back > > are you talking theory or practice here? because IN PRACTICE, it isn't. > i've upgraded and downgraded packages at will with no particular > difficulty. even libc6 on occasion.
I must admit that I don't have much experience in downgrading. But at least in theory it must be easier if it involves less packages... >> - because if there's a bug, or an unknown incompatibility, it's not just >> apache which breaks, but the whole system (in case of glibc, or other >> central libraries) > > and the same is true of packages in backports. a serious bug can break > your system (or, at least, require significant effort to get it back to > a known good state). I argue that the probability of a serious bug in testing, and hence in backports, is less than in unstable. Moreover, there's an additional check built in, a person has to decide "this package is fit for a backport". > but if you want to delude yourself that backports is magically safer > than testing or unstable then go right ahead. there's no law against > being mistaken. For sure it's not safer than testing. But I think it's safer than unstable. And it's also safer than running a mix of "stable" with partially upgraded libraries. > AND, as i said before, anyone with any sense whatsoever will test > *ALL* upgrades, even the most trivial, on another machine first BEFORE > applying it to their production servers. anyone who doesn't do that > should be blaming themselves before they blame either unstable or > testing or backports. There are users who do not own a production server, instead a single computer, and still feel the need for newer packages. >> > 2. backports has new/updated libraries too. it may not be the exact same >> > set of updated libs as in unstable, >> >> Sorry, did you ever care to read the backports.org policy? Or even try >> to use them, or work with people who do? >> >> I guess no, since of course "it may not" is plain wrong: backports.org >> only has packages from testing. > > english obviously isn't your native tongue. "it may not" is, in context, > a softer way of saying "is not" with the added implication that whether > it is or isn't is basically irrelevant. > > if you're going to attempt lame grammar flames, then at least do so only > in languages in which you are proficient. The fact that you compare backports libraries to *unstable* still makes me wonder whether you know what you are talking about, grammar or not. If you'd used "testing" up there, I would not have wondered. And you won't deny that there are serious breakages in unstable every now and then, and that they affect testing much less? > sometimes it happens, sometimes it doesn't. it may or may not happen. > that's besides the point. the point is, you can't count on it. tex may > have had the upgrade path tested. apache or php or whatever may not > have. the point is, that the upgrade path from backports is far less > tested than either 'testing' or 'unstable'. That's all true. But this only means that running stable is safer than running stable+backports. It doesn't say anything about stable+backports vs. testing (or unstable). Regards, Frank -- Dr. Frank Küster Single Molecule Spectroscopy, Protein Folding @ Inst. f. Biochemie, Univ. Zürich Debian Developer (teTeX/TeXLive)
