Bug#87828: [PROPOSAL] Deprecate confusing Build-Depends arch syntax

[Julian Gilbey <J.D.Gilbey@qmw.ac.uk>]

Package: debian-policy
Version: 3.5.2.0
Severity: wishlist

I would like to deprecate one very confusing part of the Build-Depends
et al syntax.  Currently, policy says (section 7.1):

     All fields that specify build-time relationships (`Build-Depends',
     `Build-Depends-Indep', `Build-Conflicts' and `Build-Conflicts-Indep')
     may be restricted to a certain set of architectures.  This is done in
     brackets after each individual package name and the optional version
     specification.  The brackets enclose a list of Debian architecture
-    names separated by whitespace.  An exclamation mark may be prepended
-    to each name.  If the current Debian host architecture is not in this
     list and there are no exclamation marks in the list, or it is in the
     list with a prepended exclamation mark, the package name and the
     associated version specification are ignored completely for the
     purposes of defining the relationships.

This allows things like [!i386 m68k], which is equivalent to [!i386]
but is just plain confusing.  So I'd like to deprecate this and allow
only [arch1 arch2 arch3 ...] or [!arch1 !arch2 !arch3 ...].  The
wording will become:

     All fields that specify build-time relationships (`Build-Depends',
     `Build-Depends-Indep', `Build-Conflicts' and `Build-Conflicts-Indep')
     may be restricted to a certain set of architectures.  This is done in
     brackets after each individual package name and the optional version
     specification.  The brackets enclose a list of Debian architecture
+    names separated by whitespace.  Exclamation marks may be prepended
+    to all of the names.  (It is not permitted for some names to be
+    prepended with exclamation marks and others not.) If the current
+    Debian host architecture is not in this
     list and there are no exclamation marks in the list, or it is in the
     list with a prepended exclamation mark, the package name and the
     associated version specification are ignored completely for the
     purposes of defining the relationships.


And just to let people know, there are precisely zero packages in
unstable which will be affected by this change.

   Julian

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         Julian Gilbey, Dept of Maths, Queen Mary, Univ. of London
       Debian GNU/Linux Developer,  see http://people.debian.org/~jdg
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