Hi Simon, On Mon, Aug 10, 2026 at 9:12 AM Simon Josefsson <[email protected]> wrote: > Here is a transition idea: > > Upload dh-golang to unstable with an opt-in mechanism to enable the new > build method. > > For example, a debian/control field of 'XS-Go-Module: on' could be > introduced to enable the new mode. > > Then we can upload all packages to unstable, enabling this opt-in > mechanism package per package.
Thank you for your idea. Sounds tempting! But I worry this creates long-term technical debt and splits the archive between two competing build systems. Having two parallel build methods in unstable makes debugging reverse dependencies more difficult and confusing. Also, since dh-golang still needs a lot work for module-aware builds, adding more hacks to support both systems at the same time will be hard to maintain when there is new issue addressed. I suggest we focus all our energy only on polishing dh-golang for module-aware builds right now, rather than spending time adding fallback options to the tooling. > Instead of uploading all packages to experimental, confirming it works, > and then upload everything AGAIN to unstable, potentially seeing lots of > of FTBFS due to the dh-golang bump. > > Uploading 300+ packages first to experimental and then to unstable > sounds like really boring work if we can go directly to unstable. I agree that we want to avoid double-uploading 300+ packages. The best way to achieve that is to get dh-golang production ready as soon as possible so we can use it straight in unstable without needing opt-in flags. I hope we can have more other major complex applications like `incus` ported. Because porting large application with complex dependencies with dh-golang 1.66 may do stress-test with module-aware build logic. It helps to discover edge cases and validate how complexity module resolution may handled in new tooling. Once dh-golang handles more large packages, we will know the tooling is ready for unstable. At that point, dh-golang maintainers can upload it directly to unstable with high confidence, and minimizing unnecessary for package maintainer to do double-uploading. Mathais already mentioned he expected to upload dh-golang to unstable within this month. What do you think? Happy hacking, -- -Andrew
