Bug#196367: debian-policy: clarify what to do about priority mismatches

[Santiago Vila <sanvila@unex.es>]

On Mon, 21 Jul 2003, Josip Rodin wrote:

> On Fri, Jun 06, 2003 at 01:52:58PM +0100, Colin Watson wrote:
> [...]
>
> I propose this patch:
>
> --- policy.sgml~        2003-07-21 12:17:53.000000000 +0200
> +++ policy.sgml 2003-07-21 12:31:13.000000000 +0200
> @@ -779,11 +779,24 @@
>         </p>
>
>         <p>
> -         Packages must not depend on packages with lower priority
> +         Packages should not depend on packages with lower priority
>           values (excluding build-time dependencies).  In order to
>           ensure this, the priorities of one or more packages may need
>           to be adjusted.
>         </p>
> +
> +       <p>
> +         Note that actual priorities of packages in the Debian archive
> +         are set with the so-called override files, which are maintained
> +         by the archive maintenance team.
> +         <footnote>
> +           In practice, this means that even if the package maintainer
> +           uploads a "fixed" version of the package, the priority will
> +           still be wrong in the Packages file until an ftpmaster goes
> +           and changes the override. Thus, mass-filing bug reports
> +           against individual packages for this is strongly discouraged.
> +         </footnote>
> +       </p>
>        </sect>
>
>      </chapt>

I second the clarifying paragraph. I object to changing to "should".
We must fix the wrong priorities once and forever, and keep them sane
sane from release to release. If the *current* ftpmasters have not
achieved this goal yet, I can't imagine how much they will care if we
downgrade this to a simple "should". That will only ensure that we will
never have sane priorities.