Package memory needs attention

[erikd]

The package memory has its Git repo marked as "archived".

I have forked the repo and am willing to take over maintainership.

[andreasabel]

We need to summon a stronger wizard for this.

ATTN: @gbaz

[ysangkok]

Since Vincent refuses to hand over Hackage packages, I think there is no way around allocating a new name?

This is what was done with x509, it is now available in LTS-23 as crypton-x509 and Kazu Yamamoto is maintaining it.

Why is memory any different?

More discussion at (this also includes a message from Nicolas di Prima, the other Hackage maintainer for memory):

• reassign vincent hanquez packages commercialhaskell/stackage#7336

[erikd]

I am still pretty certain than someone in the Hackage Trustees has the power to do this without requiring the package to be forked. From personal experience, I can tell you that replacing cryptonite with crypton in a large codebase (Cardano) is a HUGE pain in the neck.

It would be much better to this package reassigned than to fork it..

I have sent an email to the Hackage Trustees mailing list.

[andreasabel]

The Hackage admins can do this, and the current list of admins is:

• BenMillwood @bmillwood
• DuncanCoutts @dcoutts
• ErikHesselink @hesselink
• GershomBazerman @gbaz
• JohanTibell @tibbe

From this list, I have only seen Gershom being responsive and active for the Haskell community as a whole (so I wonder whether this group needs some reformation to stay agile...).

[erikd]

On the Hackage Trustees mailing list Gershom stated that this situation is one that the Trustees guidelines never envisioned. The Trustees will need to come to a decision on how to deal with situations like this and extend the policies.

[bmillwood]

huh, I definitely assumed I had been replaced as an admin some time ago... I have been absent from the community for a long time but I'm somewhat on board with getting more involved again. Might need to rejoin some mailing lists.

[phadej]

On the Hackage Trustees mailing list Gershom stated that this situation is one that the Trustees guidelines never envisioned.

Package takeovers are handled by Hackage Admins, not Trustees. Don't mix these groups.

[bmillwood]

I've had a closer look at this particular issue, and:

• I believe I'm not on the hackage-admin@haskell.org mailing list, so I've e-mailed them about that.
• I think Vincent's viewpoint is pretty reasonable here, so I'm disinclined to eagerly overrule him.
• I think the package takeover process does not explicitly handle the case where you can contact the maintainer, and they explicitly don't want a takeover. It seems to me like forking is the recommended remedy there. I'm aware it's painful (I've run into it myself: https://github.com/ocheron/cryptostore/issues/13) but the alternatives also seem somewhat painful to me.

In any case I won't take any action until hackage-admin@ get back to me, since I'm not clear anyone knew I was still an admin, so I want to double-check people are comfortable with that first.

[hesselink]

I've also been an admin for a long time, but am not longer involved in the Haskell community much. As such I'm also hesitant to make any call on this issue, although I'm happy to help out where there is consensus if other admins are absent.

[bmillwood]

I posted on Discourse about this: https://discourse.haskell.org/t/policy-regarding-taking-over-hackage-packages/11121

My plan is to support a fork and not a takeover, but we'll see if anyone persuades me otherwise.