Re: Removing obsolete configuration files on upgrade

[Bill Allombert <ballombe@debian.org>]

On Sat, Nov 30, 2013 at 12:03:53PM -0800, Jonathan Nieder wrote:
> Hi policy experts,
> 
> Since policy 3.8.5.0, section 10.7.3 says
> 
> 	Obsolete configuration files without local changes should be
> 	removed by the package during upgrade.
> 
> I was trying to apply this to the git package and ran into a little
> trouble.  Consider the following sequence of events:
> 
>  1. I install package hello-demo version 1, including a conffile
>     /etc/greeting with content 'hello'.
> 
>  2. I change /etc/greeting to 'hi'.
> 
>  3. I upgrade hello-demo to version 2, which dropped the customizable
>     greeting functionality.  /etc/greeting is obsolete now.  Since
>     my greeting was customized, it is retained in /etc/greeting.
> 
>  4. I change /etc/greeting back to 'hello'.
> 
>  5. I upgrade hello-demo to version 3, which still does not support
>     customizable greetings.
> 
> Should /etc/greeting be removed during the upgrade?  After all, it
> is both (a) obsolete and (b) without local changes from the version 1
> of the conffile.
> 
> My hunch is to say that a package may remove /etc/greeting in this
> case but by no means should.  That is, something like the following
> but hopefully less awkward:
> 
> 	Obsolete configuration files without local changes may be
> 	removed by the package during upgrade, and should be removed
> 	by the package during upgrade from the version before they
> 	were obsolete.
> 
> What do you think?

I htink policy is mostly concerned by upgrade between stable release, and
hence only one upgrade is considered.

Cheers,
-- 
Bill. <ballombe@debian.org>

Imagine a large red swirl here.