Matthias, you may want to comment on https://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/bugreport.cgi?bug=982892 (You did not receive first invitation because of a typo in your address)
> Some binutils bug is discovered. Once understood, Matthias is > usually quick at uploading a fixed binutils. If I understand well Matthias' point of view, this reactivity is possible exactly because he can fix major architectures without dealing with consequences on less important architectures. If src:binutils were to build binutils-bpf or if binutils-bpf were to Build-Depend on an exact DEB_VERSION of binutils-source, an incompatibility between the fix and bpf would prevent migration of the fixed src:binutils to testing. Would these ideas mitigate the issues you are describing? * debian/watch may automatically report packages outdated by a new binutils-source.deb, for example in the package tracking system. * debian/README.source may allow no-change NMUs rebuilding against binutils-source (and ask for a RC bug report if the rebuild happens to fail).