On 2014-05-10 23:21, James Curbo wrote:
To add to this remark, Debian has an explicit process for situations just like this called Non-Maintainer Uploads (NMUs) which you can read about here: https://www.debian.org/doc/manuals/developers-reference/pkgs.html#nmu
It seems like having a similar capability within Hackage, or more defined policy about when it kicks in, would be a good idea. The way it works in Debian, the original maintainer is not stripped of his role and a fork is not necessary. NMUs are often only done in extreme cases where the changes are small. (extreme breakage of a library, fixing security vulnerabilities, and so on)
Of course, collaborative maintenance helps as well, but ultimately it's helpful to have some process to deploy quick fixes in a timely manner.
James
As usual Debian has encountered and solved all these problems before. Sounds eminently sensible, so +1 to such a policy change.