Missing files in /etc

[Karolina Lindqvist <pgd-karolinali@algonet.se>]

I have a problem with files in /etc
As I understand, they are marked as "conffiles". The problem is if such a file 
is missing, it won't be reinstalled. How to tell the package system that this 
file should be reinstalled if it is deleted?
i.e. The file is essential, and can't be missing.

This has happened a few times, when upgrading packages, possibly from an 
eariler version. So I at least thought about a check, saying "file XXX is 
missing, it is an essential file, reinstall by doing YYY', or something like 
that.
Only that I don't know what to tell apt-get to reinstall such files. And then, 
if another file should not be reinstalled, only the essential ones, how to 
deal with that?

There does not appear to be any option to apt-get that does a --force-confmiss

When doing a

dpkg -i --force-confmiss 
/u/apt/archives/libkdecore-data_4%3a3.1.0+rc6+kl-1_all.deb

I got the following messages:

Configuration file `/etc/kde3/colors/Web', does not exist on system.
Installing new config file as you request.

Configuration file `/etc/kde3/language.codes', does not exist on system.
Installing new config file as you request.

Configuration file `/etc/kde3/system.kdeglobals', does not exist on system.
Installing new config file as you request.


That is clearly unacceptable. I wonder how many users of my packages that have 
missing files, and get unexpected errors due to that.  I have gotten bug 
reports from more than one person regarding missing files. So I want some 
system so that this does not happen unless intentional.

Karolina