Re: PROPOSAL: Extrafiles (was Re: Conffiles...)
phil@hands.com (Philip Hands) wrote on 11.04.98 in <[🔎] 2129.892288550@hands.com>:
> > phil@hands.com (Philip Hands) wrote on 10.04.98 in
> > <[🔎] 2421.892233295@hands.com>:
> >
> > > > I have one point to add to this. Handling files not mentioned
> > > > in the *.list file was one way of several packages to handle/edit a
> > > > common file, for example, if a bunch of packages need /etc/foo to
> > > > exist, and foo can contain the word bar or bah, then any package, in
> > > > the postinst, finding that /etc/foo did not exist, can question the
> > > > user and create the file (the other packages then accept it).
> > >
> > > In this situation, would it not be better to have an etc-foo package,
> > > that handles the creation of /etc/foo, and have the other packages
> > > depend upon it ?
> >
> > Careful. You're about to outlaw update-alternatives.
>
> No, I understand the difference --- we were talking about a file that gets
> created by any of a group of packages, and then gets treated as if it
> belonged to each of them. This is just a mess IMHO.
No. We're talking about extrafiles, that is, listing the files that
somehow belong to the package, but are not in the .deb.
/usr/bin/vi would need to be mentioned by every vi clone, if this is to
make any sense.
(Incidentally, one could argue that this is indeed "a file that gets
created by any of a group of packages".)
And it _does_ belong to each of them. Anything else is just a big mess.
> How would any of this group of packages ever remove the file in question,
> if it was the last package of the group to be removed ? At least with
Several options.
- have something like update-alternatives.
- have dpkg remove it when the last package listing it as extrafile gets
purged.
- don't remove it.
- ...
> update-alternative, the various versions disappear as you remove packages,
> but that wasn't what we were talking about anyway.
Actually, it was. That's why I told you to be careful.
We want this to be usable in dpkg --search, for example.
dpkg --search usr/bin/vi
Reasonable output would be to mention all installed vi clones.
MfG Kai
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