Re: dpkg and symlinks

["Nikita V. Youshchenko" <yoush@cs.msu.su>]

> Nikita V. Youshchenko wrote:
> > on my system /usr/share/qt/lib was a symlink to /usr/lib.
>
> You should probably not do that, since it confuses dpkg.
>
> When dpkg sees that a directory is a symlink, it just follows it
> when unpacking the contents of a package (as every unix tool would do).
>
> This is a sometimes a useful thing if used wisely, but if you get into
> trouble because of it, you should blame yourself, not dpkg.

I am not going to blame dpkg for my own errors.
In the described case, it was mine error, not dpkg's.


It is ok to have a symlink in the system when there is a directory in the 
package. This is normal method to put a part of directory tree to a 
separate partition mounted elsewhere.

But if there is a symlink in the system (e.g. created by mistake) that 
makes two pathnames equivalent, normal dpkg invocation may do bad things.
On the other hand, it should be easy to check on dpkg side - just also 
compare real pathnames (witl symlinks resolved) where now package-provided 
pathnames are compared. Or something similar.

Just my 2c.