Bug#525997: old-versioned-python-dependency check returns false results

[Russ Allbery <rra@debian.org>]

Bernd Zeimetz <bzed@debian.org> writes:

> While checking python-sip4-dev (latest revision, not uploaded yet),
> lintian complains about
>
> W: python-sip4-dev: old-versioned-python-dependency depends: python (<<
> 2.6)
>
> although the dependency is corrent. Although I didn't look at the
> lintian code (but at the long description), lintian should be changed
> as described below:

We really need to overhaul the Python package checking to check more of
what people are currently doing.  I haven't had the time to figure out
what that is (patches definitely welcome).

In the meantime, I think the best solution for this particular problem
is to skip this test if the package depends on python-support.  Does
that sound okay to you?  (I think checking all the rest of the
information you mention is probably overkill in most circumstances.)

> - The long description says:
>   ..."and no Python-Version control field"
>   This king of control fields was introduced by python-central and is only
>   used by python-central, which we're trying to get rid of (in the
>   python-modules/apps teams at least). python-support doesn't use them (and
>   does a lot of other things just right, but that's not the place to discuss
>   this).

Now modified as follows:

--- a/checks/fields.desc
+++ b/checks/fields.desc
@@ -883,14 +883,14 @@ Severity: normal
 Certainty: certain
 Info: This package appears to be an architecture-independent Python module
  but has a dependency on a version of python less than a particular
- version and no Python-Version control field.  This normally means that
- the package isn't using the current Python policy; most
- architecture-independent Python packages will work with any future
- version of Python if they follow the new policy.
+ version, doesn't use python-support and no Python-Version control field.
+ This normally means that the package isn't using the current Python
+ policy; most architecture-independent Python packages will work with any
+ future version of Python if they follow the new policy.
  .
  If this package really does require only a particular range of Python
- versions, add a Python-Version control field (as described in 2.3 of the
- Python policy) to resolve this warning.
+ versions and uses python-central, add a Python-Version control field (as
+ described in 2.3 of the Python policy) to resolve this warning.
 
 Tag: malformed-dm-upload-allowed
 Severity: important

-- 
Russ Allbery (rra@debian.org)               <http://www.eyrie.org/~eagle/>