Re: Bug#65429: boot-floppies installation stopped by tetex-bin bug

["Robert J. Chassell" <bob@rattlesnake.com>]

Many thanks for your response.  Obviously, you are not having the
problem I am having.

But I would not be making this bug report unless 
`apt-get dist-upgrade' and `apt-get -f install' were 
telling me all is well, yet I cannot then install boot-floppies.

This is the problem:  there is something wrong, either in the
documentation that leads me to think all should be well when 
`apt-get dist-upgrade' and `apt-get -f install' both claim all 
is well, or else in `apt-get install boot-floppies', which fails.


   If you want to build boot-floppies, you have to install tetex. If you
   cannot install tetex, that is a bug in tetex, not boot-floppies. 

I agree tetex-bin has a bug and have sent them a reminder.  But the
bug extends to you.

   ... Although there is no way it is holding up boot-floppies
   considering *every* (and that means all 6) one of the archs releasing with
   potato have built boot-floppies 2.2.15. They are in the archive, go check.
   So, it is not holding up anything.

This is false.  I cannot install tetex-bin and I cannot install 
boot-floppies using 

    apt-get install boot-floppies

on a system that otherwise says:

     # apt-get dist-upgrade
    Reading Package Lists... Done
    Building Dependency Tree... Done
    Calculating Upgrade... Done
    The following packages have been kept back
      communicator gedit gnumeric netscape 
    0 packages upgraded, 0 newly installed, 0 to remove and 4 not upgraded.

and also says;

     # apt-get -f install
    Reading Package Lists... Done
    Building Dependency Tree... Done
    0 packages upgraded, 0 newly installed, 0 to remove and 4 not upgraded.


So this is a bug.  I should be able to install boot-floppies using
apt-get in these circumstances.  (If tetex is required for
boot-floppies, then it has to install sucessfully also.)

*You* may be able to install boot-floppies without tetex-bin, or with
a version that is not what is used by apt-get on frozen.  But that is
a different matter.  

I cannot, and I am following the proper procedure as *it is
described*.  (If I misunderstood the procedure, that is a bug, since I
have done a fair and reasonable job of doing things right.  Well, more
than `a fair and reasonable job', but I won't go into that.)

It looks to me that you do not experience this bug, which makes it
hard for you to appreciate the problem.  But the point is, a
reasonable user (that's me) cannot install boot-floppies.  There needs
to be a solution, and not one of `blaming the user'; I am not one to
blame.

I have sent a bug report to the tetex-bin maintainers.  But your
problem is that with a configuration that apt-get says is OK,
boot-floppies does not install.  This is your problem.  It is an
unhappy dependency.  

I have gone to `the archive' as you suggest -- that is what apt-get
does, right?  If not, then the documentation for using apt-get has a
bug and needs to be revised to tell me to specify some place else than

    deb http://http.us.debian.org/debian frozen main contrib non-free

in my /etc/apt/sources.list file.

Please figure out how to fix things so 

    apt-get install boot-floppies

works successfully when both dist-upgrade' and `apt-get -f install'
claim all is well.

Thank you.

-- 
    Robert J. Chassell                  bob@rattlesnake.com
    Rattlesnake Enterprises             http://www.rattlesnake.com