Re: Should -dev packages providing .pc files depend on pkg-config?
On Wed, Apr 16, 2008 at 07:15:53PM +0200, Goswin von Brederlow wrote:
> You are missing the point.
>
> What if the library says "You must call /usr/bin/foo during build"?
But the library can't say "foo must come from a Debian package". What if
I have my local replacement? Why should I be forced to install a package
that is now useless for me (and installing it would only cause confusion
as there are now two different tools with the same name present in
$PATH)?
> The libarry does not use foo, only the user, so no depends?
Of course no dependency is needed. If the library is not used by anyone
(think about an NFS server that just exports the library), then a
missing "foo" would not hurt anyone. And if someone _does_ use the
library, then that user must depend on "foo", and everything is fine.
> Or idoes forcing users to use foo make foo part of the API and hence
> the library should depend on it?
You can't _force_ anyone to use foo. At most you can say "I'm not going
to give you support if I somehow find out you didn't use foo" but that's
it. I should be able to write my own tools and use the library in
whatever way I want - or the library must go into non-free.
Gabor
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MTA SZTAKI Computer and Automation Research Institute
Hungarian Academy of Sciences
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