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Re: Behaviour of "Conflicts:"



On May 13, Todd Harper wrote
> 
> I'm curious about how dpkg handles the "Conflicts:" line of packages
> that are already installed on the machine.  If package X conflicts 
> with package Y, and Y is already installed, I cannot install X.  This
> is normal.  BUT... if X is installed, what happens if I try to install
> Y?  Y doesn't say that it conflicts with X.  Does dpkg somehow scan 
> thru the installed packages' control files to check for conflict?
> I would hope that dpkg would somehow catch this and prevent the 
> installation of Y.  This could be a serious problem otherwise.

When starting up, dpkg loads into memory all the details concerning the
packages currently installed on the system. This include conflicts,
provides, etc. for each installed package.  So in this case dpkg will still
refuse to install conflicting Y. (Unless, of course, you use
--force-conflicts.)

  Christian

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