Bug#164868: glibc-$DEBVERSION dependency is harmful for unreleased architectures

[Santiago Vila <sanvila@unex.es>]

GOTO Masanori wrote:
> Santiago Vila wrote:
> > That's not the problem, the problem is that *while* it's not
> > recompiled yet, the locales package becomes *completely* uninstallable,
> > because the old version is not available anymore.
>
> How many uninstallable period do you have?

Undefined. May be a short time, but it may be a lot of time as well.

> > If you do not consider this a problem in libc, please reassign this
> > to the ftp.debian.org package so that they create a testing
> > distribution for all unreleased architectures, one that does not
> > remove old packages until the new ones become installable.
>
> (1) At least we use pool system for released architecture, and
>     some versions stay for a while.
> (2) Unreleased architecture does not stay and only single version
>     is placed. You hit this case.
> (3) However, we can't remove '='-type dependency for locales.
>
> Thus, our discussion goes side by side. We can't agree.

I think you can make '='-type dependency in locales to be something
slightly different which achieves the same desired result without
harming unreleased architectures so much.

The DEBVERSION thing is arbitrary, in some sense. You just need a
character string which has the property that it changes every time
there is an incompatible change in the locales code.

Certainly, DEBVERSION has such property, since it *always* changes.
The problem is that most of the time it changes without real need.
You could also use a character string of the form locales-DATE, and
update DATE when (and only when) an incompatibility in the locale
code is detected.