Bug#587377: debian-policy: Decide on arbitrary file/path names limit
On Thu, Mar 03, 2011 at 03:58:59PM -0600, Jonathan Nieder wrote:
> Bill Allombert wrote:
> > On Wed, Mar 02, 2011 at 10:17:32PM -0600, Jonathan Nieder wrote:
>
> >> Another question: is Debian policy the right place to make a decisions
> >> like this? Ideally these maxima would be set using some cross-distro
> >> standard like POSIX or the FHS. Sadly:
> >
> > I do not think it is the purpose of Debian policy to limit file name and path
> > length without providing guidance.
>
> Could you expand on that? What sort of guidance could policy provide?
Guidance about how to fix a package that run afoul of the limit.
> I admit that I have much less interest in this now that I understand
> current packages are not butting against the practical limits. But I
> do think that an easily checkable "packages should not have absurdly
> filenames" (in their files list; I do not mean to say anything about
> files generated at runtime) could be helpful in communicating
>
> * what filesystems are usable for installing Debian?
> * how many characters of grace area can tools like dpkg-divert feel
> free to use?
> * when is enough enough and the current pathname scheme actually a
> bug that is going to prevent people from being able to install
> the package?
>
> > Most of the time, files path are not chosen by the packager
>
> This makes concrete, practically motivated advice about limits more
> useful, no?
Not really; the packager might not be able to change the filename without breaking either
FHS compliance, the interface or compatibility with upstream.
Cheers,
--
Bill. <ballombe@debian.org>
Imagine a large red swirl here.
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