Bug#758234: it's actively harmful
I'd say this policy is not only not bringing anything good, but is
actively harmful. It does cause a data loss: neither we nor the tools know
what a package's real priority should be as it's overwritten by the max
priority of its dependencies.
Problem 1: non-default user wishes
debootstrap --exclude systemd will still install all of systemd's
dependencies.
Problem 2: obsolete packages
libdb5.1, libboost-iostreams1.54.0, etc get installed as part of important.
Problem 3: clouded analysis
when pondering reducing standard (a recent debian-devel thread), a package
cannot be analyzed based on its merits alone if it's a dependency.
Thus, I propose not merely removing this policy requirement, but also
replacing it with the opposite:
# A package should not (must not?) elevate its priority just because it's
# depended on unless it has extra functionality that itself warrants a given
# priority.
An example:
* udev is depended on by P:important packages, yet creation of /dev/ nodes
is something that by itself matches the definition of P:important[1]
* libudev1 does nothing but serve packages that depend on in
Thus, udev should have a high priority, libudev1 should not. The moment
nothing depends on the latter (like due to a soname bump) it should lose its
priority. With status quo, this requires human action and can't even be
detected via automated means.
[1]. Probably even P:required, but not essential as it's useless in vservers
and in chroots.
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