Debian packages (maybe stupid) question
I followed some discussion here about problems with packages that share
common files, and would like to know what will be done: should any package
avoid to provide a file that any other package might provide, or (what I
would prefer) will the package installation tools tolerate such duplicates
(and of course remember their usage count so that one can delete a package
without disturbing another one with which it shares files).
Another question regarding the packages has to do with the handling of removed
files (and maybe renamed files): what about marking the importance of some
files in the package, like `Essential' (the default so that old packages
will work the same), `Optional', etc. and tolerate that optional files may
be deleted (the package could be marked okay but truncated, instead of
being marked unusable). And do the pakages support alternate names for files?
I mean, if a package installs a man page as `command.1' but I use a man
which supports gzipped and/or compressed files, the package could be
considered complete if command.1 (in its final place) does not exist but
command.1.gz or command.1.Z do (or maybe even if only a formatted copy exist,
but this is less important).
Are these dumb ideas, or may it be feasible?
Yves.
--
Yves Arrouye | arrouye@marin.fdn.fr | http://www-scope.imag.fr/~arrouye
7, av. Leon Bollee +-----------------------+---------+------------------------
75013 Paris | Home voice: +33 1 53 61 09 55 | Fax: +33 1 53 61 09 55
France | Please use these only between 8:00 AM and 11:00 PM, MET!
Reply to: