Re: Effect of “should certainly do foo” in policy

2010-01-29 Thread Russ Allbery
Bill Allombert writes: > There are package management programs that depend on the synopsis to be > short for proper display. A 90 columns synopsis is probably a minor > bug, but a 200 column is probably at least "normal", a 1000 columns > synopsis is probably "serious". Yeah, I suppose that's p

Normative meanings for policy directive wording (was: Effect of “should certainly do foo” in policy)

2010-01-29 Thread Ben Finney
Bill Allombert writes: > On Sun, Jan 24, 2010 at 11:19:33AM -0800, Russ Allbery wrote: > > The ideal solution would come as part of a general Policy rewrite to > > use more formal and precise language. > > I am not sure this is desirable. The policy is a technical document > and not a legal docum

Re: Effect of “should ce rtainly do foo” in policy

2010-01-29 Thread Bill Allombert
On Sun, Jan 24, 2010 at 11:19:33AM -0800, Russ Allbery wrote: > Ben Finney writes: > > Severity-wise, it's the same as "should." Policy is not written in formal > standards language, and certainly here has the normal fuzzy English > meaning. In the first case, for instance, I'd read it as an at

Re: Wording question for multiarch exception

2010-01-29 Thread Russ Allbery
Steve Langasek writes: > On Fri, Jan 29, 2010 at 02:22:46PM -0800, Russ Allbery wrote: >> The text of the multiarch exception as committed says that: >> "Packages may not install files into any triplet path other than the >> one matching the architecture of that package" >> Was that "ma

Re: Wording question for multiarch exception

2010-01-29 Thread Steve Langasek
On Fri, Jan 29, 2010 at 02:22:46PM -0800, Russ Allbery wrote: > The text of the multiarch exception as committed says that: > "Packages may not install files into any triplet path other than the > one matching the architecture of that package" > Was that "may not" (and another subsequent

Wording question for multiarch exception

2010-01-29 Thread Russ Allbery
The text of the multiarch exception as committed says that: "Packages may not install files into any triplet path other than the one matching the architecture of that package" Was that "may not" (and another subsequent one) supposed to be "must not"? -- Russ Allbery (r...@debian.org)