[RFC] Policy change for ChangeLog

[Thomas Bushnell BSG]

Chris Shoemaker <c.shoemaker at cox.net> writes:

>         The problems with continuing to use the existing ChangeLog
> policy are:
>         - Having to write two commit descriptions increases the chance
> that both will be of lesser quality than if only one description was
> required.

Write one description, and commit it to two places.

PLEASE continue to conform to the GNU Coding Standards; there are
important reasons for them.

You have, it seems to me, entirely ignored the value of the ChangeLog
to everyone who examines the sources distributed in the tarballs.

If you want to automatically generate the ChangeLog, which continues
to carry all the same information, that's great.  I don't care *how*
the ChangeLog file gets into the distribution, only that it do so.

>         Alternatively, we could place "big picture" descriptions
> somewhere else.  I envision that the "big picture" descriptions would
> be much closer to a suitable "release log" at release time than the
> current ChangeLog is.

The GNU Coding Standards already have a place for "big picture"
descriptions; they belong in the NEWS file.

Thomas