Re: Moving to the FHS: not right now!
Richard Braakman <dark@xs4all.nl> writes:
> That last sentence is an error. When all packages have moved to
> /usr/share/doc, we can drop the symlink handling code from the
> postinst and prerm, with no loss.
Er, no, not if the symlink handling is *in* the postinst/prerm. If
it's there, then we have to wait another release or two, in order to
support people doing partial upgrades.
> That is because at every upgrade, the symlink is removed by the old
> package and (possibly) reinstalled by the new package.
Ah, I see. If the symlink handling is all done by dpkg, and NOT by
postinst/prerm, then you may indeed be correct.
> When I realized this, my approval for Manoj's solution increased
> tremendously :)
I can't say that my approval increases, but my objections certainly
*decrease* if we don't need postinst/prerm hackery. :-)
> The only remaining technical objection I have to it is that it will
> fail for packages that have extra files in their /usr/doc directory,
> either due to package cruft or because the system admin put something
> there. Those packages can not make the symlink because there's still
> a real directory, and it will appear to the user that the
> documentation is simply missing.
Won't the files just disappear? The way the contents of /dev
disappeared recently? :-)
> > I'm not a fan, because it seems to consider unstable to be more
> > important than stable.
> I disagree with you on this. I think we've become too focused on
> releases. It is important that "stable" be stable, but the essense
> of Debian is much more in the vibrantly alive "unstable" than in
> what we end up putting on CDs.
Hmm, I don't quite know how to respond to that. All I can really say
is that the high quality of stable is what drew me to Debian in the
first place, and the one thing I really dislike about having become a
Debian developer is the fact that I'm now forced to run unstable, and
now my system requires constant nursemaiding. I'm forced to check the
package list every day and make judgements about whether I'm willing
to trust new releases. I have to check on IRC to see if anything is
going to kill my system before I dare do upgrades. I *hate* running
unstable!
Soon I'll have a second system, and I'll run unstable there, build my
packages there, and stick with stable on my main workstation. This
"essence" you speak of is to me nothing but a headache and a hassle.
If that's the real essence of Debian, then, IMO, we're in big trouble!
:-)
But, if some of us think that we're *too* focused on releases, and
some of us (like me) think that we're not focused *enough* on
releases, then maybe we're actually striking exactly the right
balance. I dunno. :-)
cheers
--
Chris Waters xtifr@dsp.net | I have a truly elegant proof of the
or xtifr@debian.org | above, but it is too long to fit into
http://www.dsp.net/xtifr | this .signature file.
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