On Sat, Sep 15, 2018 at 1:14 AM Richard Yao <r...@gentoo.org> wrote: > > On Sep 14, 2018, at 5:28 PM, Fabian Groffen <grob...@gentoo.org> wrote: > > > > On 15-09-2018 00:07:12 +0300, Alon Bar-Lev wrote: > >>> > >>> Perhaps, if one persists on going this route, only do this for platforms > >>> that upstream supports, such that arches which will suffer from this > >>> (typically ppc, sparc, ...) don't have to be blocked by this. > >> > >> Exactly in these cases the -Werror is useful as if upstream expects no > >> warnings then any warning should block installation and trigger bug > >> report. In Gentoo in many cases we use packages on platform has no > >> access to, our feedback to upstream is valuable. A great example is > >> gnutls in which we collectively (maintainer, unstable users, > >> architecture teams, stable users) found issues on architectures that > >> almost nobody other than Gentoo has access to. > >> > > > > I don't believe Gentoo users are (supposed to be) an extension of > > upstreams. If upstreams insist on that, they should make their software > > non-free, adding a non-modification clause or something. In any case, > > it is not Gentoo's job IMHO. In the end it is Gentoo who needs to care > > for its users. I prefer we do that by giving them an option to become > > that extension of upstream, e.g. by USE=upstream-cflags, which Gentoo > > disables by default. > I am in complete agreement on this. Users should not be guinea pigs to help > upstream unless they opt into it.
A new release of upstream is out, early adopters (what we call unstable users) are guinea pings. A new release is stabilized, users are guinea pings. A new toolchain that upstream did not test, users are guinea pings. A new dependency version or a Gentoo virtual with "compatible library", users are guinea pings. Let's say upstream does not have access to architecture X we at Gentoo decide to support this architecture, maintainer do not have access to this architecture as well, architecture team is guinea pings, but it does not actually use the package, then back to early adopters and users. This process has nothing to do with -Werror, our process relays on users as guinea pings, by definition developers and arch teams cannot test entire software and all permutation of the software. The -Werror (if supported by upstream and downstream, I outlined the conditions many times) is a tool (among other) to help stop the process at early stage when suspicious finding is there to allow deal with the situation to make sure that the software is compatible with an environment or permutation that upstream and maintainer do not have direct access to. It is a tool to help users to have better system integrity (once again, provided some conditions apply).
