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Re: re buildd's resolver and package's build deps



On Tue, Feb 22, 2011 at 05:21:17PM +0000, Ian Jackson wrote:
> Roger Leigh writes ("Re: re buildd's resolver and package's build deps"):
> > Taking one of php5's dependencies as an example:
> > 
> >   libdb-dev (>= 4.7) | libdb4.8-dev | libdb4.6-dev
> > 
> > This dependency permits building against no less than *three* different
> > Berkeley DB versions.  Given that these versions are typically
> > incompatible, imagine if a new upload caused a version change.  It
> > could break all existing databases when the user upgrades and they are
> > no longer readable.  If could even be a downgrade.  The same applies
> > to any other libraries.
> 
> Packages are not only built as part of our own efforts to make the
> Debian distro as we have it on our own archive site.
> 
> They are also built by users, by our downstreams, etc.  The
> build-dependencies are important for these people too, and they are
> better served if we include the alternative dependencies (even if we
> don't test them very well).

I agree that these do serve a useful purpose for these uses, and that
ease of reuse backporting and other types of porting are important.
However, there is no way to know which of those alternatives applies
to which suite.  All of them are potentially going to be used for a
build in unstable, and it's this uncertainty which could potentially
lead to inconsistent builds.

Using the example above, imagine if that for wheezy the libdb-dev
metapackage is renamed, or removed in favour of explicit use of the
libdb-$ver versioned packages.  It's then going to choose libdb4.8-dev,
which may or may not be appropriate at that point in time.  If there's
a 4.9 or 5.0 release, it may well be inappropriate.


Regards,
Roger

-- 
  .''`.  Roger Leigh
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