Behaviour of "Conflicts:"

["Todd Harper" <toddh@nortel.ca>]

[ NOTE: I don't subscribe to debian-devel, and my question is geared
  towards the developers, so please ensure that responses are CC:'d
  back to me (toddh@nortel.ca).  Thanks. ]

G'Day,

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.

If this has been pointed out before, just let me know and I'll shut up.

Cheers,



--
Todd Harper            "Damn it Smithers, this isn't rocket science,
toddh@nortel.ca         it's brain surgery!" -- Mr. Burns


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