[RFC] Retired/dead packages in repo

[Jan Rękorajski]

Hi,
We need some form of retiring unused/dead/obsoleted packages to avoid
mistakes, duplicates or just to tell everyone "this is not the package
you are looking for". As an example lets take libcrypto++ package which
is an outdated, misnamed duplicate of cryptopp, I started updating it
recently only to realize it was a waste of time because cryptopp package
was already up to date.

My proposal is to do what Fedora does in its repo, for a retired package:
1) git delete all files in package, spec, patches, etc.
2) create "dead.package" file with explanation why it was retired (for
   example "Obsoleted by XXX" or "Renamed to YYY")
3) make package read-only to avoid grave digging

Please comment what you think about it.

-- 
Jan Rękorajski                                 | PLD/Linux
SysAdm                                         | http://www.pld-linux.org/
baggins<at>mimuw.edu.pl
baggins<at>pld-linux.org