PureOS packaging guidelines only suggests to change Maintainer field (and even explicitly encourages to not do it).
Debian Derivatives Census recommends at https://wiki.debian.org/Derivatives/Guidelines#Packages to change Maintainer field - and for good reason: That field tells who is responsible for the package, and Debian cannot be responsible for package releases done outside of Debian.
Please update PureOS packaging guidelines to mandate setting proper Maintainer field.
I made the changes to the debian/control file (maintainer email address, VCS-*) mandatory.
Sorry to reopen, but I think the Guidelines are currently in a confusingly odd state:
The headline says "Mandatory debian/control file changes" but the following text then contains sentences starting like this:
If you change the maintainer address [...], please use [...]
and
You don't actually need to change the maintainer address [...]
Neither of those sentences seem mandatory to me.
I propose to replace both those two sentences with the following:
You must always set PureOS Maintainers <pureos-project@puri.sm> as maintainer address.
Alternatively, I suggest flagging this issue not as solved but as wontfix or invalid - preferably with a clarification why, obviously.
Looks good.
Could be further improved based on https://wiki.debian.org/Derivatives/Guidelines#Packages:
[...], and rename the original Maintainer field to XSBC-Original-Maintainer
@jeremiah.foster I think this issue is making good progress but still not resolved: Packaging Overview now properly covers requirement to add maintainer address, but lack the detail of preserving older Maintainer field.
Concretetely, I propose to replace this:
Please add the team based maintainer address for PureOS packages;PureOS Maintainers <pureos-project@lists.puri.sm>. This ensures that more than one person will be able to help maintain the package in PureOS and is required.
with this:
Please add the team based maintainer address for PureOS packages;PureOS Maintainers <pureos-project@lists.puri.sm>, and rename the original Maintainer field to XSBC-Original-Maintainer. This ensures that more than one person will be able to help maintain the package in PureOS and is required.
having the these texts in a form that is suitable for c'n'p would help:
Please add the team based maintainer address for PureOS packages; PureOS Maintainers <pureos-project@lists.puri.sm>. This ensures that more than one person will be able to help maintain the package in PureOS and is required. So if the debian/control file had
Maintainer: Cool Package Maintainers <team-pkg@example.com>
it should be changed to:
Maintainer: PureOS Maintainers <pureos-project@lists.puri.sm> XSBC-Original-Maintainer: Cool Package Maintainers <team-pkg@example.com>
Strictly speaking, this issue is about Maintainer field. T1023 was about Vcs-* fields.
@guido: If you mean to say that it would be helpful to also spell out that old Uploaders and Vcs-* should *not* be preserved like old Maintainer, then propose a text for that - I have no suggestions on that related but arguably slightly different topic.
@jonas.smedegaard i think you mean https://tracker.pureos.net/T1028 not https://tracker.pureos.net/T1023 above? (this issue is T1023)?
Le't leave it as is then for now (since this seems current PureOS practice):
Suggestion:
Please add the team based maintainer address for PureOS packages; PureOS Maintainers <pureos-project@lists.puri.sm>. This ensures that more than one person will be able to help maintain the package in PureOS and is required. So if the debian/control file had
Maintainer: Cool Package Maintainers <team-pkg@example.com>
it should be changed to:
Maintainer: PureOS Maintainers <pureos-project@lists.puri.sm> XSBC-Original-Maintainer: Cool Package Maintainers <team-pkg@example.com>
Note that the Uploaders: field remains untouched.