Removed packages still have udd branches

[Evan Broder]

Packages which have been removed from the archive still have bzr branches, e.g. lp:ubuntu/audiere

While I can appreciate the desire to maintain the history, this seems like it could lead to user confusion, especially since much of the documentation we've started recommending uses UDD. It seems like, if nothing else, we don't want those branches to be copied forward to the *next* release when they were never present in that release in the first place.

(I noticed this because a user filed a bug against oneiric-backports because the checkout of a removed package FTBFS'd - bug #942119. There's clearly a fair amount of confusion going on there, but this seems like it's responsible for at least part of that confusion)

[Micah Gersten (micahg)]

As the lp:ubuntu/foo branch is an alias to the dev branch, perhaps this can be removed when a package is removed from the dev release. That way, all the history is intact, but someone just has to hunt for it if it's wanted and it'll be clearer which series the package is coming from. Maybe this would also come with a note that if there's no lp:ubuntu/foo branch that it's most likely not in the devel release.

[Barry Warsaw (barry)]

On Feb 27, 2012, at 06:31 PM, Micah Gersten wrote:

>As the lp:ubuntu/foo branch is an alias to the dev branch, perhaps this
>can be removed when a package is removed from the dev release. That
>way, all the history is intact, but someone just has to hunt for it if
>it's wanted and it'll be clearer which series the package is coming
>from. Maybe this would also come with a note that if there's no
>lp:ubuntu/foo branch that it's most likely not in the devel release.

+1

Note that if the package was available in e.g. Lucid, the ubuntu:lucid/foo
branch would still exist.

[Jelmer Vernooij (jelmer)]

That seems reasonable to me as well.