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Re: [PATCH] added --force-* options for conffile handling



On Mon, Oct 11, 1999 at 11:37:05AM -0400, Ben Collins was heard to say:
> What we have now is a situation where if there are changes from the old and
> new conffile, dpkg prompts for what to do about it. Given that dpkg usually
> has a sane default, and the admin usually has a good idea of what he/she
> wants to do with these requests, we can supply options to get the desired
> affect. Also with the current dpkg, if you remove a conffile completely,
> there is no simple task for resinstalling it, since dpkg will not replace
> missing conffiles with new ones.
> 
> The options added are:
> 
>   --force-confnew:	Obviously this forces dpkg to _always_ install the new
> 			config file without prompting.
> 
>   --force-confold:	Again, this _always_ uses the old config file without
> 			prompting.
> 
>   --force-confdef:	This tells dpkg to use the default choice when replacing
> 			config files if there is a sane default. Note, there are
> 			cases where dpkg concludes no default is possible, so a
> 			prompt would still be given in those (remote) cases.
> 
>   --force-confmiss:	This tells dpkg to actually install the new config file
> 			if the old one is missing.
> 
> Now the interesting part. You notice in the "confdef" force mode that there is
> still a chance of a prompt. If you mix --force-confdef and --force-conf{old,new},
> then you will get the default choice. If there is no default then dpkg will use
> the --force-conf{old,new} option to decide what to do.
> 
> Hopefully this can make for sane auto-upgrades.
> 
> Ben

  Hm.  While you're fixing things up, could you add an option to display a diff
of <conffile> and <conffile>.dpkg-new, and an option to mail the administrator
with a list of the conffile changes that might need to be merged? (possibly
containing these diffs)  See bug #40650 .

  Daniel

-- 
"In the Course of my Observation, these disputing, contradicting & confuting
 People are generally unfortunate in their Affairs.  They get Victory sometimes,
 but they never get Good Will, which would be of more use to them."
  -- from the autobiography of Benjamin Franklin


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