dpkg handling of configuration files

[hilliard@metrolink.net (Robert D. Hilliard)]

     Chapter 9 of the Packaging Manual describes "Automatic handling of
configuration files by dpkg".  Essentially, this boils down to:

   If neither the user nor the package maintainer has changed the file,
   it is left alone. If one or the other has changed their version, then
   the changed version is preferred .  .  .
   If both have changed their version the user is prompted about the
   problem and must resolve the differences themselves.

     Almost every time I run dselect to upgrade, I get the message
about "confiles created by you or a script", and asking me to select
which to keep.  In many cases, these are files that have not been
changed since installation, in fact, in many cases they are files I
didn't even know existed.  As I understand the packaging manual,
dselect should silently leave this alone, or if the package maintainer
has changed the script, silently install the new one.  

     This is annoying, and I would like to file a bug when it occurs,
but I don't know if this a bug in dpkg or in the package being
updated.

Bob


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