revisionism

[norman at nose.cita.utoronto.ca]

Tim Shoppa:
  This brings up a question: should fixes (and I mean fundamental fixes
  like Y2K ones) be incorporated back into the boot images in the archive, or
  should they be left in their "pristine" state?  (Yes, i know, some of
  those boot images aren't quite so pristine.)

I would argue strongly that the archive should contain absolutely pure
copies of any historic objects, whether they were proper distributions
or just snapshots like most of the older boot images.  It's important
to preserve accurate, unbowdlerized history; that is part of what we
should be doing.

There's nothing wrong with keeping fixed-up versions too, but but they
should be clearly distinguished from the historic originals.  (Perhaps
we could label them `ancient' and `primary platform'?)

Even using a CVS repository somehow doesn't feel kosher to me, though
that is probably silly as long as it is possible (and clear how) to
extract the unimproved original, and as long as the very original
distribution or dump tape or whatnot is kept around too so that future
archaeologists have the right thing to study.

Norman Wilson
684 Crawford Street, Toronto
(Formerly 696 Crawford Street before a renumbering in the 1950s;
I keep thinking of putting the old number up too.)

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