Bug#83669: Shared libraries

[Ian Jackson <ian@davenant.greenend.org.uk>]

Brian May writes ("Re: Bug#83669: Shared libraries"):
> You seem to imply that the versions of the libraries are incompatible,
> despite having the same major version. If this is really the case, I
> think the potential exists to break a lot more then just the build
> process.
> 
> Please give me a real life example of why distinguishing libraries
> solely by their major version number is not good enough...

In general, it's not safe to use a minor version of a library lower
than that with which the binary was compiled.

So you if you have a library L used by both an program S which you
want to compile for stable and a program U you want to try out from
unstable, then you have to install the L from unstable (because U is
compiled against it), and because the versions of L and L-dev have to
match, you have to have the L-dev from unstable, but then when you
compile S it ends up needing the L from unstable.

The net effect is that nearly all packages in Debian are compiled
against the libraries from unstable, and that it's hard for a
developer running mostly unstable to build packages for stable.

Ian.