Re: dpkg should recommend dselect

[Colin Walters <walters@verbum.org>]

On Sat, 2002-08-10 at 21:59, Glenn McGrath wrote:

> If it could be done safely in one step then im sure we can all agree that
> it would be better aproach.

It can't.  To split a package, you have to add a Depends: for one Debian
release.  That's just how it works.

For example, the spamassassin maintainer decided to split spamc out of
spamassassin into its own package.  I was using spamc to filter my mail,
and when I upgraded to the newer spamassassin, spamc was removed.  This,
needless to say, broke my email filtering. 

So, just like dpkg, the spamassassin maintainer will have to live with a
Depends for one Debian release.  After that, he can remove the
dependency.