Re: obsolete R packages

[David Holland <dholland-pkgtech%netbsd.org@localhost>]

On Fri, Jul 26, 2019 at 07:42:25PM -0600, Brook Milligan wrote:
> I am planning to update the R packages in the near future.  In the
 > process, I have discovered that several packages are obsolete and
 > apparently are no longer distributed by CRAN; geography/R-GRASS is
 > one example.  We still may have (very) old distfiles, though; for
 > example, the one for GRASS is dated 2009-09-17 on
 > ftp://ftp.pkgsrc.org/pub/pkgsrc/distfiles/R/.  I have not tried,
 > but I doubt these will build.
 > 
 > What is the best strategy for these packages?  Should we keep them?
 > Keep them only if they build and delete them otherwise?  Delete
 > them unconditionally?

First thing is probably to look for users, or people who know what the
deal is or was upstream. E.g. if R-GRASS is dead upstream because the
entire community migrated to R-WEED six years back, there's no reason
to keep it.

For packages that don't build, if you can't find any real information,
the question is whether to patch or delete, and that should be based
on the perceived inherent value of the software vs. how much work is
needed.

There's generally no point removing old things that still build,
unless it's clear that they're entirely useless to everyone to have
around.

-- 
David A. Holland
dholland%netbsd.org@localhost