It seems that development of re-alpine, which is used right now for the slackware alpine packages, has also stalled. Alpine development is now continued here:

http://patches.freeiz.com/alpine/release/

A lot of fixes and improvements have already been implemented. So, I'd like to see this included in the next slackware release.

Before anyone jumps: I know I can build a package myself using the slackbuild. In fact, I have. My point is that I think it would be a good idea for slackware to include this.

It would be interesting to know how a package is selected for inclusion in a new release. I know I read a reply from Pat in another thread in which an upgraded package was requested where he said that the new package would just contain different bugs.

Whilst I do use alpine on a daily basis I am not such a power user that I really want 2.11, I am quite happy with 2.03 for what I use it for but obviously that doesn't mean others shouldn't want the upgrade.

Slackware is renowned for it's stability but with so many thousands for packages in every release how is it determined that upgraded package 'foo' is ready for inclusion? What gets 'foo' in to the next release? (or even as a patch/upgrade within the current release).

That means, a distributor can do nothing about upstream software quality.

If it ain't broke, don't fix it. Security issues usually justify an upgrade.

Thanks Pat!