This document gives a short introduction to the part of the Debian project infrastructure. We focus on the parts specifically relevant for ILK/CLiPS software packagers.
If you're mainly interested in following the packaging as a bystander, and you're not intrested in actually making changes to the packaging, just read about how to stay informed. The rest of this document is likely not relevant for you.
As of 2010-12, the software TiMBL, TimblServer, Mbt, MbtServer and Dimbl is uploaded to the Debian archive. Uploading Frog and ucto is planned. See Bug#605905: ITP: frog -- tagger and parser for Dutch language, Bug#605913: ITP: timbl -- Tilburg Memory Based Learner, Bug#605919: ITP: mbt -- memory-based tagger-generator and tagger for natural language processing, Bug#605928: ITP: timblserver -- Server extensions for TiMBL, Bug#607929: ITP: dimbl -- Distributed Memory Based Learner, Bug#607935: ITP: mbtserver -- Server extensions for the MBT tagger and Bug#607964: ITP: ucto -- Unicode Tokenizer.
Within Debian, infrastructure from the Debian Science subproject is used to maintain the ILK/CLiPS software packaging. Therefore, Debian packages targetted for distribution via the Debian archive should honor the Debian Policy Manual as well as the Debian Science Policy Manual. Also, check the Reject FAQ for Debian's NEW-Queue.
Debian packaging information for ILK/CLiPS software is maintained via Subversion at svn://svn.debian.org/svn/debian-science/packages/, one can browse the history via http://svn.debian.org/wsvn/debian-science/packages/. Next to the ILK/CLiPS ones, this repository holds all other SVN-maintained Debian Science project packages. See Build Instrucions for Software Packages for detailed instructions on how to operate on this SVN repository.
Commits on Debian packaging information for ILK/CLiPS software (as well as commits on all other Debian Science project packages) are sent to the debian-science-commits list. Commits are also sent to the #debian-science IRC channel on irc.oftc.net.
As of 2010-12, Joost van Baal has access rights for uploading the packages to the Debian archive. Packages will get uploaded to the UploadQueue. A few hours after uploading, packages will get moved to the NEW queue.
Packages will automatically get build for all supported architectures. An overview of the status of the packages is available from the Debian Quality Assurance page for timbl{,server}, mbt{,server} and dimbl, including detailed results of build-attempts as well as reported bugs.
See also e.g. buildd.d.o for more autobuild results.
Once fully processed, packages will show up in the archive at the package pool.
Reported bugs are available from bugs.debian.org for timbl{,server}, mbt{,server} and dimbl.
You'll get an email message when there's news about bugs (and other noteworthy changes) if you "subscribe" to the relevant packages: send an email with a body like "subscribe timbl" to pts@qa.debian.org. See also the Debian Package Tracking System.
Packages will also get imported by Ubuntu (in the Universe Component), see e.g. the status of timbl in Ubuntu.