Ansgar:
Hi, could we drop the Priority field from most packages? Most packages use "Priority: optional" and this is just noise in d/control (source package). Tools should just assume "optional" when no other value is set. [...] I would like to drop it pretty much everywhere, most importantly debian/control in source packages (as often humans edit these).
I support this.I am happy to look into having debhelper clear the `Priority` field in the deb if it is redundant early after the release. Additionally, if the missing field breaks tools that cannot easily updated, I can have dehelper inject the field again (even if it is missing from d/control), so people can benefit in d/control already and we fix the .deb version when the infrastructure/tooling is ready.
The debhelper tooling already did something this for "Multi-Arch: no", which caused problems at some point. In that sense, there is already "prior art" for debhelper managing asymmetry between d/control and DEBIAN/control.
But it could be dropped in other places (CONTROL in .deb and Packages indices) as well.
Yes please! Best regards, Niels