Bug#539389: 10.9.1 contains wrong sentence about postrm usage

[Russ Allbery <rra@debian.org>]

Patrick Schoenfeld <schoenfeld@debian.org> writes:

> 10.9.1 The use of dpkg-statoverride states:
>
> "The corresponding dpkg-statoverride --remove calls can then be made
> unconditionally when the package is purged."
>
> This is not true, because dpkg-statoverride fails, if no override
> exists, causing the purge to fail as well.
> Because the admin could remove an override the remove
> call should not happen, if the override does not exist.
> So it should be called somewhat like that:
>
> if dpkg-statoverride --list $file >/dev/null 2>&1 ; then
>  dpkg-statoverride --remove $i
> done

I've applied the following for the next release of Policy:

--- a/policy.sgml
+++ b/policy.sgml
@@ -7762,9 +7762,17 @@ do
   fi
 done
            </example>
-           The corresponding <tt>dpkg-statoverride --remove</tt>
-           calls can then be made unconditionally when the package is
-           purged.
+           The corresponding code to remove the override when the package
+           is purged would be:
+           <example>
+for i in /usr/bin/foo /usr/sbin/bar
+do
+  if dpkg-statoverride --list $i >/dev/null 2>&1
+  then
+    dpkg-statoverride --remove $i
+  fi
+done
+           </example>
          </p>
        </sect1>
       </sect>

-- 
Russ Allbery (rra@debian.org)               <http://www.eyrie.org/~eagle/>