On Thu, Dec 29, 2005 at 01:45:55PM -0600, Matt England wrote: > Sarge-built binaries running on Woody systems: > > Is this feasible? > > I'm not talking about package management...just the raw, binary. > Backward compatibility is not guaranteed. That's why, for example, some packages are back-ported voluntarily. Openoffice.org version 2 is wanted by Sarge users whereas it's only currently in testing (to be Etch when released) and unstable. Someone will probably back-port it given time - but it's quite large.
> Are dynamic-library-management tricks needed? Does the Debian testing > authority (or whoever is given responsibility of anointing Debian releases > for distribution) make any attempt at backwards compatibility for this kind > of stuff? > At this point we support security fixes for "old stable" as far as I know, but new packages wouldn't go into Woody. Build for testing / unstable if you want to go into the next release. New packages wouldn't go into Sarge at this point: if your package is jolly nice to have, build a version separately targeted at Sarge users. > As per similar motivation for my previous redhat-on-Debian binary porting > conversation: I'm hoping that one Debian build will work on many Debian > systems. Given that Debian releases once every 18 months or so (with point releases in between) but freezes prior to release- you're talking the difference between RH 7.3 and 9 or 9 and RHEL 3, or virtually the entire history of Fedora,or Suse 9.0 - 10. Glibc changes happen, as do compiler changes. I'm not sure even that a pure Debian build will work on Knoppix / Kanotix and possibly won't on any Ubuntu. > > Can I at least count on a Woody-built binary working ok on a Sarge-based > system? In this context, how far "back" can I go to get "forward" > compatibility? (ie, how many revs before Sarge can I go back to "build on" > and still get Sarge compatibility?) None guaranteed. But at this stage in the game, there are likely to be fewer and fewer Woody users. > > If there are reasons why the answer is "depends" instead of a flat "yes" or > "no": I would love to know these reasons. This is what I'm specifically > hunting for. > > -Matt > HTH, Andy -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of "unsubscribe". Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]
