Re: dpkg, ELF, upgrade order, broken systems

[Carl V Streeter <streeter@cae.wisc.edu>]

Fernando Alegre writes:
> 
> On Mon, 22 Jan 1996, Carl V Streeter wrote:
> 
> 
> > I think that the assertion that all packages could be unpacked in any 
> > order is flawed.  
> 
> I think it is a desirable goal. 

I'd call it noble, and practically speaking, unrealistic.  Especially
when dealing with system innards.
 
> I think this is much more customizable than adding 
> a field. It will deal with unforeseen problems much better. 

I disagree.  This goes a long way toward the general problem of updating
shared libraries and associated binaries.

> There is a better way to deal with this kind of problem: 
> installation scripts.

Installation scripts can't deal with the fact that if I, say, unpack a new 
major version of libc, and ncurses, and elm, and telnetd, that elm and
telnetd which will assumedly need the new libraries won't work until the
libraries are fully installed.

-- 
Carl Streeter                     |  "I'll forgive even GNU emacs as long 
streeter@cae.wisc.edu             |     as gcc is available" --Linus Torvalds
Just another Perl hacker          |  "Etiquette-wise, there is no proper time
Ask me about Debian/GNU Linux.    |    to use the phrase 'It sucks.'" --Dogbert