Re: pkg/48375: etckeeper fails to run with /bin/sh

[Robert Elz <kre%munnari.OZ.AU@localhost>]

The following reply was made to PR pkg/48375; it has been noted by GNATS.

From: Robert Elz <kre%munnari.OZ.AU@localhost>
To: gnats-bugs%NetBSD.org@localhost
Cc: 
Subject: Re: pkg/48375: etckeeper fails to run with /bin/sh
Date: Sun, 10 Nov 2013 23:25:54 +0700

     Date:        Sun, 10 Nov 2013 14:20:01 +0000 (UTC)
     From:        Joerg Sonnenberger <joerg%britannica.bec.de@localhost>
     Message-ID:  <20131110142001.81E2BA61B0%mollari.NetBSD.org@localhost>
 
   |  Consider the latest point release whatever
   |  we try to support and to a degree the matching release branch.
 
 There is no release of NetBSD with the fix for this bug in it, so for
 this particular PR, it really makes no difference.
 
   |  I find the attitude of "everything must work around the bugs in .0" very
   |  unproductive,
 
 That's only because you're thinking of pkgsrc as a part of NetBSD (which is
 also why you're claiming what is done for other OS's as irrelevant).
 Pkgsrc claims to be portable.   That means it needs to run on all kinds of
 systems, with all of their bugs - including older NetBSDs (as far back as they
 remain supported - by pkgsrc.)
 
   | especially if the result is an accumulation of workarounds
   | in random programs that likely will never get cleaned up and just create
   | technical debt.
 
 First, it is entirely possible that bugs in NetBSD utilities might be
 duplicated in other systems, so when it is as trivial (& safe) to work
 around as this one is, adding the workaround makes sense just as a defensive
 measure so the same problem doesn't need to be investigated and solved
 again on some other system.
 
 Second, it is entirely reasonable to ask the originators of the package
 to accept a patch to handle this problem, doing so would be easy for them
 and essentially cost free.   So, it need not even necessarily require keeping
 a patch in pkgsrc for very long.
 
 kre