Re: Should su-to-root be shipped in a separate package?
On Sun, 03 Feb 08 15:26, Russ Allbery wrote:
> Armin Berres <trigger@space-based.de> writes:
> > On Sun, 03 Feb 08 13:20, Russ Allbery wrote:
>
> >> I don't think this is necessary. su-to-root falls back to su if none
> >> of the other packages exist, and su is essential. Similarly, under X,
> >> it falls back to x-terminal-emulator if none of the other packages
> >> exist, and any X environment should have x-terminal-emulator.
> >
> > The problem I see here is, that currently a lot of packages which use
> > su-to-root depend on something like "gksu | kdebase-bin |
> > kdebase-runtime | sux". Now that parts of KDE 4 are around the
> > dependency has to be changed to something like "gksu | kdebase-bin
> > (<<4:4.0.0) | kdebase-runtime". When KDE 3 is no more the dependency on
> > kdebase-bin can be completely removed and all the dependencies should be
> > changed sooner or later. Same happens if a new *su alternative is
> > around. It would be nice, if we would have a single place to change
> > this kind of dependency.
>
> My point is that I think such a dependency may be wrong and possibly
> shouldn't be included at all. Is it really necessary to have such a
> dependency when su-to-root has fallback behavior should none of those
> packages be available?
Good question.
At least for KDE 4 Apps there is no Problem -- kdesu from KDE 4 is
always around if kdelibs5 (the KDE 4 libraries) is installed.
When you have a KDE 3 Desktop kdebase-bin is normally around so kdesu
should be there.
What about Gnome? Or Xfce? Is gksu installed by default?
If yes I'd say programms should simply use su-to-root and not specify
any dependency like the above at all. I'd also say that packages which
just depend on a special *su implementation (just gksu and not
kdebase-bin e.g.) should be considered buggy. There is no reason for a
KDE user to install gksu and and no reason for a Gnome user to install
kdebase-bin if there is already a *su implementation around.
I don't know how many packages have this problem, but gparted just
depends on gksu for example. I bet it could also use kdesu, if su-to-root
would be used.
Greetings,
Armin
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