Re: Bug#645895: ftp.debian.org: epoch should be part of the .deb file name
]] Neil Williams
| On Wed, 19 Oct 2011 13:42:06 +0200
| Tollef Fog Heen <tfheen@debian.org> wrote:
|
| > Package: ftp.debian.org
| > Severity: normal
| >
| > (Cc-ed to debian-devel@l.d.o for their input in whether this would cause
| > problems anywhere else in the toolchain.)
| >
| > It's a bit confusing that the file names of .debs don't contain the
| > epoch. I think we should change that.
|
| Is there any reason other than aesthetics to change this?
The first and obvious one is to avoid file name clashes in the
archive. Another one is so the version number in the file name actually
is the version number of the package which makes it less confusing when
you need to download a package with an epoch by hand for whatever
reason.
| There are a lot of tools which have to build a .deb filename from
| debian/control and debian/changelog or from a Packages file. Right now
| it is trivial to strip the epoch where necessary - this change
| requires multiple character substitution which is far more error
| prone.
|
| (It would dramatically complicate all the tools I'm using / developing
| for Emdebian.)
If it would dramatically complicate all the tools you're using for
Emdebian, your tools must be pretty simple and I'd suggest you move the
bits that generates debs into some sort of module. Or your toolset
isn't particularly big. :-)
Multi-character substitutions are not particularly hard to do, nearly no
matter which language you're talking about.
| The epoch is fully visible in the pool/ and has no direct relevance to
| the binary package version.
No, it's not visible in the pool. That's what I'm suggesting we
change.
| > I would suggest %-encoding it, so foo-1:1 becomes foo_1%251_all.deb.
|
| ... which then complicates any number of previously working regular
| expressions in tools all over the place.
You shouldn't trust the file name to contain the version number anyway.
| I think we should not have % characters in .deb filenames if at all
| possible.
Why not? Are there any tools that have trouble with % characters in
file names?
--
Tollef Fog Heen
UNIX is user friendly, it's just picky about who its friends are
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