Re: Bug#582423: tech-ctte: reaffirm that violating Debian Policy deserves RC bug

[Jonathan Nieder <jrnieder@gmail.com>]

Ian Jackson wrote:

>  A. Open a new bug against policy, asking that 7.6.2 be replaced with
>     something like this (exercising our power to specify what should
>     be in policy):
>   
>       Secondly, Replaces allows the packaging system to resolve which
>       package should be removed when there is a conflict - see
>       Conflicting binary packages - Conflicts, Section 7.4.  This
>       usage only takes effect when the two packages do conflict, so
>       that the two usages of this field do not interfere with each
>       other.
> 
>       Conflicts+Replaces should be used only to ensure that obsolete
>       packages are removed in favour of new packages.  A package
>       should not declare Replaces against any non-obsolete package,
>       and it should not declare Replaces against any virtual package
>       it itself provides.
> 
>       (In previous versions of policy there was a recommendation to do
>       the opposite.  That was incorrect and inconsistent with the
>       purpose of Replaces, and was not fully honoured by dpkg.

For what it’s worth, I like this proposal and think it’s the right thing
to do.  Thank you for making it.

Jonathan