[Mageia-dev] Backports process (addendum to policy)

[Samuel Verschelde]

(QA Team and Triage team in CC, but please answer only to 
mageia-dev at mageia.org)

I was asked to define a process for backports validation, so here is a 
proposal. We can discuss it a few days and then I'll add the result to the 
backports policy page.

Process for backports :

Triage:
- identify backport requests
- add "Backport Request: " in the bug report summary
- add the "backport" keyword
- assign to maintainer

The maintainer can refuse to do the backport :
- doesn't want to maintain it => assign the bug report back to 
bugsquad at mageia.org so that another packager can step in
- has a good reason for not providing this backport (policy, possible 
breakage...) => close as wontfix

Packager:
- create bug report if not done already
- submit to {core,nonfree,tainted}/backports_testing
- find a tester : original bug reporter when there is one, yourself if there's 
none, or ask in forums/irc/MLs...
- once tested by at least one person (it must be said explicitly in the bug 
report), hand it to QA :
  - make sure the bug report summary starts with "Backport Request: " or 
"Backport Candidate: "
  - add the "backport" keyword if missing
  - assign to qa-bugs at ml.mageia.org
  - list the source RPMs if there are several
- be ready to fix bugs and answer QA team questions

QA:
- test backports the same way that we test updates. But don't forget that 
updates have a higher priority than that of backports.
- move the packages from backports_testing to backports

Packager again:
- be ready to fix bugs : once you pushed a backport, you have to maintain it 
until the distribution's end of life :)

Does this seem a good process, from the packager, QA and triage point of view?

Best regards

Samuel Verschelde