Merge lp:~dholbach/ubuntu-packaging-guide/1017984 into lp:ubuntu-packaging-guide

[Daniel Holbach]

Refer to backports process in packaging guide.

[Andrew Starr-Bochicchio (andrewsomething)]

I went ahead and landed this, but it would probably be nice to include a link to https://wiki.ubuntu.com/UbuntuBackports and maybe a discussion of the `backportpackage` command from ubuntu-dev-tools.

review: Approve

=== added file 'ubuntu-packaging-guide/backports.rst'
--- ubuntu-packaging-guide/backports.rst	1970-01-01 00:00:00 +0000
+++ ubuntu-packaging-guide/backports.rst	2012-06-26 16:03:20 +0000
@@ -0,0 +1,44 @@
+============================
+Backporting software updates
+============================
+
+Sometimes you might want to make new functionality available in a stable
+release which is not connected to a critical bug fix. For these scenarios
+you have two options: either you `upload to a PPA 
+<https://help.launchpad.net/Packaging/PPA>`_ or prepare a backport.
+
+
+Personal Package Archive (PPA)
+==============================
+
+Using a PPA has a number of benefits. It is fairly straight-forward, you
+don't need approval of anyone, but the downside of it is that your users will
+have to manually enable it. It is a non-standard software source.
+
+The `PPA documentation on Launchpad`_ is fairly comprehensive and should get
+you up and running in no time.
+
+.. _PPA documentation on Launchpad: https://help.launchpad.net/Packaging/PPA
+
+
+Official Ubuntu Backports
+=========================
+
+The Backports Project is a means to provide new features to users. Because of 
+the inherent stability risks in backporting packages, users do not get 
+backported packages without some explicit action on their part. This 
+generally makes backports an inappropriate avenue for fixing bugs. If a 
+package in an Ubuntu release has a bug, it should be fixed either through the 
+:doc:`Security Update or the Stable Release Update 
+process<./security-and-stable-release-updates>`, as appropriate.
+
+Once you determined you want a package to be backported to a stable release,
+you will need to test-build and test it on the given stable release. 
+``pbuilder-dist`` (in the ``ubuntu-dev-tools`` package) is a very handy tool 
+to do this easily.
+
+To report the backport request and get it processed by the Backporters team,
+you can use the ``requestbackport`` tool (also in the ``ubuntu-dev-tools``
+package). It will determine the intermediate releases that package needs to 
+be backported to, list all reverse-dependencies, and file the backporting 
+request.  Also will it include a testing checklist in the bug.
 
=== modified file 'ubuntu-packaging-guide/index.rst'
--- ubuntu-packaging-guide/index.rst	2012-05-09 01:46:14 +0000
+++ ubuntu-packaging-guide/index.rst	2012-06-26 16:03:20 +0000
@@ -43,6 +43,7 @@
    security-and-stable-release-updates
    patches-to-packages
    libraries
+   backports
 
 Knowledge Base
 --------------