>>>>> "Ian" == Ian Jackson <ijack...@chiark.greenend.org.uk> writes:
Ian> Gerardo Ballabio writes ("What is the source code (was: [RFC]
Ian> General Resolution to deploy tag2upload)"):
>> Paul R. Tagliamonte wrote:
>> > I wonder if we have a good idea of what the project believes to
>> be the case between #1 and #2:
>> >
>> > 1) Is the source of a package the debian source distribution?
>> > 2) Is the source of a package the VCS where the source is held?
>>
>> Let me rewrite that in a different way:
>>
>> 1) is the source of a package the current version of the code?
>> [*] 2) is the source of a package the complete history of the
>> project? [**]
Ian> Yes, this ks the key question. I agree with you that the
Ian> representation doesn't matter for this purpose. [1]
Ian> My answer is that it depends on the development practices
Ian> (mostly, the development practices of upstream), but for most
Ian> modern software the answer is 2.
Ian> I should be clear that I thiknk there is room for reasonable
Ian> disagreement on this, particularly since the question is so
Ian> context-dependent.
I agree with Ian's answer.
I happened to do some digging through mail archives about our internal
discussions about preferred form of modification over the years
recently.
My conclusions are:
* There is no consensus here. We've been arguing about related issues
since 2003 and while the argument has advanced, we're no more near
consensus now than then.
* Simon Mcvittie talks about "a preferred form of modification" rather
than "the preferred form of modification."
I think that is a useful think to keep in mind.
Even for a GPLed work, I do not think we would consider either a release
tarball or a git repository to fail to comply with the GPL's requirement
to distribute the preferred form of modification for a work.
(Obviously, other factors might impact things. For example, if the work
included minified javascript without corresponding source, a lot of us
would argue that failed to be the preferred form of modification. Note I
don't even think there is project consensus on that point; it doesn't
matter because there is consensus in the FTP team that minified
javascript is not enough without the source somewhere in the archive.)
