Re: md5sum proposal
Michael Stone <mstone@itri.loyola.edu> writes:
> On Tue, May 25, 1999 at 04:42:13PM -0500, Manoj Srivastava wrote:
> > Putting things in the packaging system so that we can be sure
> > they have it in the system is really silly, seeing that we have this
> > marvelous dependency mechanism.
>
> Maybe, maybe not. How would it work as a dependency? Would it be
> installed at the time of the initial debian installation? Then how does
> it get updated when new packages are installed? If it updates
> automatically, how do you keep it from updating the signatures of files
> that were corrupted? If it doesn't update automatically, do we prompt
> the user after every install? I guess one approach would be to update
> any files that are in a newly installed package, but I think that would
> still take some integration with the packaging system.
It could set up hooks, as defined in my proposal on
ftp://mirjam.informatik.uni-tuebingen.de/pub/debian/proposal.txt
A Package can say that it will need reconfiguration every time package
foo changes. Adding wildchar support to that and you got what you
want.
The package would add an hook for * and it would be reconfigured every
time any package is changed.
> > (Do you know what it means when a package is deemed Essential?)
>
> Were you being condescending or did this come across badly?
>
> [snip]
> > If you want this to be on the system by default, make
> > the security package essential (I would object to that, though). This
> > is really a very poor argument for including stuff in the packaging
> > system when it does not belong there.
>
> I would never advocate this on security grounds; I think it's a good way
> to tell if a user accidently screwed something up, but I don't think
> trying to automate a security checksum is a good idea. (The removable
> media issue isn't something I'd want to get into for a default install.)
>
> Mike Stone
An alternative way would be to add an option/module to dpkg/apt. When
dpkg/apt gets configured, it would then ask if you want those features
or not. If you sayed no there and you get into a situation where need
them, its your own fault and you will enable it next time., :)
May the Source be with you.
Goswin
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