symlinks replaced by directories and vice versa
Hello,
IMHO, one of the most frequently re-appearing issues in package-upgrades
is symlinks in previous package versions replaced by directories in
current versions and vice versa.
Although the Debian policy clearly states in 6.6 (4) "A directory will
never be replaced by a symbolic link to a directory or vice versa" it
seems to me that many package maintainers cannot deal well with this
behaviour or just don't know it.
I personally filed lots of bug reports against lots of packages in the
past regarding this issue. Unfortunately, this issue is typically not so
easy to detect soon when it appears. Instead, such cases linger around a
long time until eons later some unexpected overwrites happen or until
you try to remove a package or something like this. I personally just
detect them soon because I run daily filesystem-modification checks (in
conjunction with debsums) and thus notice quickly when new files appear
where no files out of the package managers scope should exist.
Unfortunately, the issue appeared so often that at some point in the
past I just resigned and gave up to file bug reports because of it and
instead I began just to fix it on my systems locally and forget about
it.
However, since this is such a frequent source of bugs and since so many
package maintainers seem not to be able to deal well with it, I'm asking
myself, if it wouldn't make sense to change this behaviour to something
which is more native to maintainers - i.e. automagically replace
symlinks by directories and vice versa (which would natively equal a
package upgrade to a package removal followed by an installation of the
new version) or abort package installation if it occurs or something
like this.
I'm not sure if this is the right list to discuss that, but perhaps it's
the best list to collect notions from others (especially package
maintainers) about it.
I know there *are* maintainers out there who *know* about this case and
*do* handle it carefully and sometimes even *use* it intentionally, like
the sendmail maintainer (although even there it makes problems because
of undetected overwrites).
However, I have never seen any single case where it was really necessary
to package something this way.
regards
Mario
--
<delta> talk softly and carry a keen sword
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