Bug#561756: lintian: [new check] Architecture dependent packages without architecture dependent files
Carl Fürstenberg <azatoth@gmail.com> writes:
> The best indication we could see would be "When a binary package can be
> used on every architecture, then it should be arch all".
Yes, that sounds right to me.
> Though if it should be policy or dev ref wasn't resolved (I think it
> should be in policy, but others disagree).
It seems more like a Policy thing to me, but I'm not sure what the
counterarguments are.
> But besides policy there might be a way to catch package which are
> clearly mislabeled. For example, if a package provides an
> non-arch-dependent executable script only, (i.e. perl script in */bin"),
> and no other binary files is distributed (i.e. only text files under
> share/etc), then it should be arch all?
Under nearly all circumstances (in other words, probably good enough for a
Lintian check), that's correct, but there would be some need for overrides
depending on what the Perl script does. There are arch-dependent Perl
scripts that use specific system facilities or use pack or unpack in
particular ways, but they are fairly rare.
--
Russ Allbery (rra@debian.org) <http://www.eyrie.org/~eagle/>
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