NeilM's Sponsorship Checklist
I use this quick checklist to make sure that the package is in a suitable state to be a sponsorship candidate. If a package fails any of these, I'm not going to sponsor it :)
However, if a package satisfies these, it doesn't mean I'm gonna sponsor it either. This is just a list of common failure points.
Not all developers will want all of these, but I do :)
Musts
- dh_* lines in debian/rules
- commented out
These need removing, there is no point in leaving them in there.
- not required
EG: Don't call dh_shlibdeps if the package isn't going to depend on any shared libraries.
- ITP for new packages
Your package must have an ITP filed for at least a week before I'll upload it.
- Builds properly in-a-sane-way
I use dpkg-buildpackage, and expect the source package to throw out a nice .deb and .changes at the end.
- No spurious changes to .orig.tar.gz
Dont' remake upstreams .tar.gz, unless there is a very good reason.
- lintian / linda clean
It MUST be lintian/linda clean. If it's not, you should have an override in place. And when you email me, tell me why you've overridden it.
- Build on Sid
Your package must build under Sid, or a sid chroot. See pbuilder. Packages built under stable or testing aren't going to work in the Debian repository. It doesn't work like that.
Shoulds
- CDBS
I don't like it, and you're best off finding a sponsor who does. I'll begrudgingly do a one-time-upload though.
- Things I have no idea about
This includes things like KDE, haskell, emacs and python libraries. I don't use them, and don't want to. However, if I can test it, and it works, I'll do a one-time-upload.
- IRC
Similarly, if I say I'll do something on IRC, I won't. I need an email before I'll do it. Most of my IRCing is at work, and I can't upload things from here. I can build them, and use ssh, but that's it.
- Good sources
Please, give me a wgettable url to your .dsc, your .diff.gz and your .orig.gz, or provide an apt-source repository. Don't put ALL your debian packages in one directory, it just makes it harder to find the ones you want sponsoring.