Bug#528453: debian policy: please discourage overly strict run-time version checks

[Jonathan Nieder <jrnieder@gmail.com>]

(culled cc list)
Bill Allombert wrote:

> Another similar warning: the dynamic loader sometime output a warning
> "symbol xxx size has changed, consider relinking"
> when a library is updated to a new minor version.
> (It was libreadline in etch IIRC).

Right, that sounds like a bug.

> While I agree that such warnings cause problems, this is an upstream issue
> and Debian policy is not very efficient at adressing upstream issues, because
> upstream are not bound by Debian policy.

This particular issue (program-specific version checks, not "size of
symbol") does seem to me to fall in the scope of Debian policy.
Consider:

Upstream has good reason to do what they do, to support platforms like
Windows without the ability to declare dependencies through the
package manager;

All that is needed for better integration in Debian is to _disable_
upstream's mechanism.  A patch to make it optional can be submitted
upstream.

Other distros would benefit from the result as well.

Jonathan