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dpkg-shlibdeps modifications proposal



I just noticed that dpkg-shlibdeps now calls "dpkg --search" for all libraries
it finds with a path to find the package they come from. It seems that this is
a hack to support shlibs for libraries with the same soname, but different
libc versions. Since calling dpkg --search both:-

	a) is slow, and
	b) prints errors when it can't find a library which is in /usr/local,

I propose that it would be a better idea to extend the shlibs file format to
specify the libc version as part of the information provided. For example,
for libgpm1/libgpmg1:-

libgpm	1:libc5	libgpm1 (>= 1.12-1)
libgpm	1:libc6	libgpmg1

If no libc version is given, it is assumed none is needed (for example,
libc6 only libraries). To retain backward compatibility, if no libc version
is given, but there are multiple versions of a soname, e.g.:-

libgpm	1	libgpm1 (>= 1.10-1)
libgpm	1:libc6	libgpmg1

Then the one without a version is assumed to be libc5. If neither are given
a version, dpkg --search may be invoked for the library.

This is a much cleaner interface, and it also fixes the following problems:-

	a) currently, shared libs specified in debian/shlibs.local are not
	   scanned until after dpkg --search has been called on them.
	   An example of this:-

I have a locally installed library, /usr/local/lib/libawe.so.0.4.1, for
testing, before I package the thing for Debian. In debian/shlibs.local, I
have:-

libawe	0.4	libawe0.4

(The libawe0.4 source being the same as that for the binaries I am running
dpkg-shlibdeps on).

However, dpkg-shlibdeps says:-

dpkg: /usr/local/lib/libawe.so.0.4 not found.

Which, although is not an error, looks enough like one to be confusing.

	b) since /usr/local is meant _NOT_ to be managed by dpkg, libraries
	   residing in /usr/local should not be searched for in the package
	   database. This would fix the above error.

What does anyone think?


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