Bug#174976: Could the patch be applied?

[nils <nils_barth@post.harvard.edu>]

hi-
dunno if this is the right forum for such a request, but could
the above patch be applied?

It's totally safe, and it really clarifies how to format dpkg-query
output -- otherwise you need to dig through the documentation and
deduce the fields yourself.

-----------------------------

Also, perhaps something could be said in the documentation about
the output of --list, namely that:
- it can't be reproduced via --showformat
- it's roughly the format string
'    ${Package;-14} ${Version;-14} ${Description;-44}\n'
(or wider, if COLUMNS>80), with embellishments.

('embellishments' means, but I doubt this bears documenting):
- it has a legend and column headers
- it has short version of the installation status
- version: doesn't include epoch, and lists '<none>' if empty
- description: only includes the first line of the
  description, and lists '(no description available)' if empty

[Further, it would be nice (and a different bug) if the exact
 format of --list could be produced via a --showformat
 string; namely, there were $ShortStatus, $SmartVersion,
 and $SmartDescription fields, and a "--header" flag]

thanks!
  -nils