Hello world, I'd like to briefly suggest a different perspective on the issues at hand. Rather than looking at whether this will delay lenny or not, it might be more useful to just take a step back and work out what our principles are. FWIW, I think what should be done about lenny follows pretty obviously from that.
I think there're four or five options that people might reasonably hold
about the social contract:
1) the social contract should apply to everything Debian does, now and
in the future; _AND_ the social contract should stop us from
including anything that doesn't comply with the DFSG in main
2) the social contract should apply to everything Debian does, now and
in the future; _AND_ it is and was a mistake to have the DFSG
cover firmware because we have not yet been able to limit Debian to
only DFSG-free firmware in a suitable way
3) the social contract should apply to /almost/ everything Debian
does, now and in the future; _AND_ for the few cases where it
should not apply now, there should be an explicit GR affirming
that variation (by simple majority)
4) the social contract is an aspirational document: while we aim
to achieve as much of it as feasible at all times, we don't
expect to get it completely right for some time yet. This includes
DFSG-freeness of all firmware
5) the social contract is a statement of principle only, and has
no particular force on the day to day operations of Debian, except
in so far as it influences individual contributors' actions. If
the kernel team or RMs don't feel influenced to delay lenny,
that's their decision, no vote necessary
All of those would be simple position statements, w/ a corresponding
simple majority requirement.
The conclusions related to lenny that would follow from these, imo, would
be:
1) lenny should be delayed until non-free firmware is removed from main
2) the social contract should be amended via a separate (3:1) vote
to reflect our stance on non-free firmware, allowing lenny's
release to go ahead
3) there should be a separate vote asking whether the "totally
free" requirement of the social contract should be waived for
lenny, and the release of lenny would depend on that result;
a similar vote for squeeze would be required if things don't
change by then
4) lenny's release should go ahead
5) lenny's release should go ahead
Reserving the right to change my mind, I think my vote on this would be 2,
1, 3, 4, 5, FD; but I know others think differently, and frankly I can
respect any of the positions above as self-consistent and honourable. Debian's
current approach, not so much. YMMV on all that, of course.
(I must admit, I'd also be fascinated to see how many advocates of
position (1) would take a utilitarian approach to getting non-DFSG-free
stuff out of main by voting option (2) below (3), (4) or (5), versus
putting the ideal of strictly adhering to the SC above how strongly it
supports your personal position in practice)
Cheers,
aj
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