Re: Bug#504880: Disambiguate "installed" for packages
Jonathan Nieder <jrnieder@gmail.com> writes:
> Russ Allbery wrote:
>> I found the original awkward and hard to puzzle out. How about this:
>>
>> <p>
>> Since <tt>Depends</tt> only places requirements on the order in
>> which packages are configured, packages in an installation run
>> are usually all unpacked first and all configured later. [*]This
>> allows multiple packages to be upgraded in one unpack and
>> configure step even if some packages being upgraded have
>> versioned dependencies on the upgraded versions of other
>> packages involved in the installation run.
>> </p>
> The rationale makes sense. The second sentence, which I have marked
> with *, is getting a bit long and still does not have the charm of the
> original.
How about this:
<p>
Since <tt>Depends</tt> only places requirements on the order in
which packages are configured, packages in an installation run
are usually all unpacked first and all configured later.
<footnote>
This approach makes dependency resolution easier. If two
packages A and B are being upgraded, the installed package A
depends on exactly the installed package B, and the new
package A depends on exactly the new package B (a common
situation when upgrading shared libraries and their
corresponding development packages), satisfying the
dependencies at every stage of the upgrade would be
impossible. This relaxed restriction means that both new
packages can be unpacked together and then configured in their
dependency order.
</footnote>
</p>
That moves the whole thing into a footnote and gives a more specific
example.
>> In the case
>> of <prgn>prerm</prgn> or other <prgn>postinst</prgn>
>> actions, the package dependencies will be at least
>> unpacked or "Half-Installed".
> Again, it will have been unpacked at some version and not removed
> since then, right? A very careful person can take advantage of
> that. Stealing your wording from elsewhere:
> In the case
> of <prgn>prerm</prgn> or other <prgn>postinst</prgn>
> actions, the package dependencies will be at least
> unpacked, except they may be only "Half-Installed"
> if an upgrade of the dependency failed.
I now have:
In the case
of <prgn>prerm</prgn> or other <prgn>postinst</prgn>
actions, the package dependencies will normally be at
least unpacked, but they may be only "Half-Installed" if a
previous upgrade of the dependency failed.
--
Russ Allbery (rra@debian.org) <http://www.eyrie.org/~eagle/>
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