On Tue, May 25, 1999 at 05:36:09PM +0200, Santiago Vila wrote: > Such programs should be configured <em>with</em> X support, > + and should declare a dependency on <tt>xlib6g</tt> (which > + contains X shared libraries). Users who wish to use the > + program can install just the relatively small > + <tt>xfree86-common</tt> and <tt>xlib6g</tt> packages, and do > + not need to install the whole of X.</p> > > I still fail to see why do I need xfree86-common to execute emacs or > ghostview in console mode (as I always was able to do under Debian 2.0). Because xlib6g depends on xfree86-common. xlib6g also depends on libc6 (>= 2.1), but that was not mentioned in the above paragraph. The sentence "Users..." is explanatory, not a statement of policy in and of itself. If you read the sentence by itself, you will see that it has no bearing on a package maintainer's decision at all. "Users who wish to use the program can install just the relatively small xfree86-common and xlib6g packages, and do not need to install the whole of X." The actual statement of policy is: "Such programs should be configured with X support, and should declare a dependency on xlib6g (which contains X shared libraries)." This directive is unchanged from the previous version of section 5.7 So, let's get things out in the open. Do you object to the proposal or not? > When I asked about xlib6g's new dependency on xfree86-common, people said > "this is to avoid a lot of packages to depend on xfree86-common". Well, > hiding real dependencies via indirect dependencies is not the way things > are usually done in Debian. Are you asserting that there is no dependency chain in Debian that is deeper than one level? I beg to differ. > Which exactly is the problem which is intended to be solved by adding this > dependency? Read the package description of xfree86-common. Do you object to the proposal? Do you have an amendment for it? -- G. Branden Robinson | I have a truly elegant proof of the Debian GNU/Linux | above, but it is too long to fit into branden@ecn.purdue.edu | this .signature file. cartoon.ecn.purdue.edu/~branden/ |
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