Re: NPTL support in 2.4 kernel series?
Andreas Metzler <ametzler <at> downhill.at.eu.org> writes:
>
> For the whole time I have been using Debian it has been accepted and
> supported practice to _not_ use kernel-package but "make install" for
> the kernel. Installing kernel's as .deb has always been optional.
>
> On a freshly installed Debian system you can happily uninstall any
> kernel-image package because there are no[1] dependencies on it,
> *because* installing kernels with make install is supported practice.
> [1] Except for acouple of kernel-modules packages, which depend on a
> specific kernel compiled with specific options selected.
Then one might wonder what is the use of a general "Provides:
kernel-image-xy" if one is not to use it. In my opinion it is there so
one can use it if necessary.
>
> OTOH anybody installing glibc with make-install will get "You shot
> yourself" on _any_ report of a problem.
That is why I think the comparison is valid. Citing 'accepted and
supported practice' does not change its validity, if anything then
only whether there should be any consequences...
>
> A debconf warning displayed conditionally in preinst and config
> (debconf will only show it once but depending on whether
> dpkg-preconfigure is used one or the other script will run earlier)
> still seems to be the best way.
I still don't like this as the only solution, because by default it
will break the running setup of people still using 2.4
kernels. They'll get the update installed and the package is
broken. Is that what you expect? I know, you can have kernel-image-2.6
installed and still be running a 2.4 kernel, but then there is no way
you could prevent this using package management and the run-time
checks have to come in.
It is just my opinion that the very idea of package management is to
avoid breakage where possible and in this case having that kernel
dependency does it.
Of course, if everybody keeps telling me that not having a proper
kernel package installed is a sacred tradition that must be honored
(while for java2 etc it's not), I will not add the dependency while
still being convinced that it is not the right thing to do.
What's the use of package management if you don't go all the way?
Martin.
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