Subject: Bug#884499: lintian: Pedantic check for packages not using debhelper or CDBS

From: Russ Allbery <[email-masked]>
Date: Sun, 06 May 2018 18:07:04 -0700

Scott Kitterman <[email-masked]> writes:

> Back in the debate about the python2 check (thanks for fixing), I made
> the point that not all lintian checks are created equal.  Some represent
> serious package defects that needs to be addressed and some merely
> reflect the lintian maintainer's opinion on what should be tracked and
> it's entirely up to the maintainer to decide if any action is needed.

> This is one of the latter.

Which is why it's pedantic, no?  Speaking as the person who merged
Raphael's patch to introduce pedantic, that's precisely what pedantic
*means*.

> I worry about this class of tag because some people view a lintian
> 'clean' package as an important goal when it's not universally.  One
> needs to look at what lintian is reporting and evaluate it.  Not
> everyone does a great job of that and so unintended consequences arise.

In the lintian man page:

    Pedantic tags are Lintian at its most pickiest and include checks for
    particular Debian packaging styles and checks that many people
    disagree with.  Expect false positives and Lintian tags that you don't
    consider useful if you use this option.

I'm not sure how one could possibly be more clear.  If one's definition of
lintian-clean includes --pedantic, one's definition of lintian-clean is,
well, wrong.

-- 
Russ Allbery ([email-masked])               <http://www.eyrie.org/~eagle/>