Bug#904886: lintian: Support "debhelper-compat (= X)" B-D as replacement for "debhelper (>= X~)"

[Niels Thykier <niels@thykier.net>]

Package: lintian
Version: 2.5.94
Severity: wishlist

Hi,

Please update the lintian code to support the new alternative way of
setting compat levels (supported in debhelper (>= 11.3~) and later).

Instead of having a debian/compat file and a simple Build-Depends on
"debhlelper (>= <COMPAT>~)", the maintainer simply Build-Depends on
the versioned virtual package "debhelper-compat"
e.g. "debhelper-compat (= 11)", which debhelper provides.

I have used mscgen and apt-file to test this in the archive if you
want a live example (other maintainers have started to pick it up as
well).  These packages should basically have no debhelper related
lintian tags.

Special cases / things that work differently from the original method:

 * maintainer *can* use "debhelper (>= 11.3.6~), debhelper-compat (= 10)"
   to use compat 10 but need debhelper 11.3.6 or later.

 * The virtual provides only supports compat 9 or later.

 * The virtual provides relation should *not* include the "~" in the
   version.

The two methods for setting the compat level (d/compat
vs. debhelper-compat) will mutually exclusive (enforced in debhelper
itself) but will co-exist in the foreseeable future.  I.e. there are
currently no plans to remove d/compat.

Thanks,
~Niels