[Ubuntu] Packaging osm2pgsql releases

[Sebastiaan Couwenberg]

On 19-10-15 18:42, Alex M wrote:
> I think from past discussions the preferred route is to get the package
> into DebianGIS, then we pick up everything from there more or less with
> as little change as possible.

I actually advised Paul against packaging osm2pgsql himself and instead
ask the UbuntuGIS team to provide newer osm2pgsql upstream releases
using the Debian GIS packaging for Ubuntu users.

Please read the 'osm2pgsql development PPA' thread on osm-dev for the
history of this request:

https://lists.openstreetmap.org/pipermail/dev/2015-September/028704.html
https://lists.openstreetmap.org/pipermail/dev/2015-September/028705.html
https://lists.openstreetmap.org/pipermail/dev/2015-September/028707.html
https://lists.openstreetmap.org/pipermail/dev/2015-September/028708.html

I've also commented on the OSGeo-Live list about the osm2pgsql packaging
which is outdated and should be updated using Debian GIS packaging for
the latest release:

https://lists.osgeo.org/pipermail/live-demo/2015-September/010546.html
https://lists.osgeo.org/pipermail/live-demo/2015-September/010547.html
https://lists.osgeo.org/pipermail/live-demo/2015-September/010548.html

Providing osm2psql backports for Ubuntu is valuable for both UbuntuGIS
and OSGeo-Live already, and these teams contain much more packaging
expertise than among the OpenStreetMap developers. I was disappointed to
see the osm2pgsql packaging history being thrown away in the
osm2psql-dev PPA that Paul setup instead of just improving the Debian
GIS maintained packaging for Ubuntu.

I'd like the OpenStreetMap community to also benefit from the better
maintenance of the Debian packaging for their software, but the OSM
community has standardized on Ubuntu LTS so they cannot benefit from
improved situation in Debian directly (e.g. using the backports),
UbuntuGIS is an obvious choice to service this need for Ubuntu LTS users.

Since it seems no one from Debian GIS nor UbuntuGIS is willing or able
to maintain osm2pgsql releases for Ubuntu, I'd like to offer my help to
Paul with maintaining osm2psql packaging for Ubuntu if he agrees to
maintain the packaging as part of the Debian GIS team (i.e. using the
git repository on Alioth for the source package) to prevent yet another
standalone packaging effort that doesn't benefit the wider community and
is actively harmful by ignoring the existence of the official packages
in Debian & Ubuntu.

Kind Regards,

Bas

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