On Tue, Jun 20, 2006 at 07:52:01PM -0700, Thomas Bushnell BSG wrote: > Stephen Gran <sgran@debian.org> writes: > > > This one time, at band camp, Thomas Bushnell BSG said: > >> Wouter Verhelst <wouter@debian.org> writes: > >> > >> > Sbuild explicitely, by design, only looks at build-depends. So in order > >> > for build-depends to be useful at this time if you want a package to > >> > build, you need to list mostly everything in build-depends right now > >> > anyway. > >> > >> Isn't it sbuild's job to comply with policy, not the other way round? > > > > Isn't it policy's job to reflect best current practice, not dictate it? > > Whenever this has been asked in the past, sbuild has simply declared > "this is how I want to do it." I have no idea why. The only reason why we need sbuild in the first place is that we want to build architecture-dependent packages on all architectures, not just the one the original developer uploaded a package for. For that, we need to install build-dependencies. We don't explicitely need all build-dependencies; we don't care about those that don't get used in a "dpkg-buildpackage -B" run, but we do need all those that do. Thus, there is a need for a split between build-dependencies that are needed to build architecture-dependent packages, and build-dependencies that are needed to build architecture-independent packages. Policy currently tries to explain that without explicitly mentioning the above call. I think it does so properly, but that may not be the case--and I'm not a native English speaker, so that may be playing with me a bit, too. However, since all this was invented and written precisely to accomodate sbuild, it would be madness to suddenly change everything because it seems more aesthetic (or so), and then require that sbuil jump through hoops to accomodate the aestethic feelings of one particular developer. That would be the world upside-down. > If there is no technical reason for sbuild to behave this way, and if > it does not in fact conform to policy, how about making it do the > right thing? It does do the right thing. -- Fun will now commence -- Seven Of Nine, "Ashes to Ashes", stardate 53679.4
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