Re: Bug#504880: Disambiguate "installed" for packages
Russ Allbery wrote:
> Jonathan Nieder <jrnieder@gmail.com> writes:
>> Russ Allbery wrote:
>>> The <tt>Depends</tt> field should also be used if
[...]
>>> the dependend-on package
>>> is desirable for cleanup done by <prgn>postrm</prgn>.
>
>> I guess I am confused; when in practice is Depends better than Suggests for
>> this last purpose?
>
> When you actually want it to do something. :) Suggests doesn't result in
> a package being installed; it's more an informational tool for high-level
> package managers.
All right, Recommends then. :)
My real question was: does this ever happen in the real world?
- doc-base already removes any remaining state when *it* is purged
- debconf does not, but that is a bug. In practice, debconf is
almost never uninstalled.
My worry is that people will start depending on such packages “just in
case”. Recommends seems better for this purpose since there are already
no guarantees.
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