What to do with "base"???

[Mark Phillips <mark@ist.flinders.edu.au>]

My system is now uptodate with the newly released Slink, but there are
now a number of obsolete packages.  In particular, there are two
_required_ packages listed as obsolete:

    ------- Obsolete/local Required packages in section base -------
 *__ Req base     base         1.1.0-14    <none>
 *** Req base     slang0.99.38 0.99.38-6   <none>

When dselect attempts to delete base, it complains that

    This is an essential package - it should not be removed.

Now I could use dpkg to force its removal, but when I asked about this
on the list earlier, George Bonser told me:

    NO!!!!!!!! DO NOT REMOVE BASE! IT WILL KILL YOUR SYSTEM!!!

    Just wait, that is a known bug and is on the list of bugs that must be
    fixed. Leave it until there is a solution for the
    problem. Otherwise you will remove several vital packages.

But now that Slink has been officially released, has this bug been
fixed?  Is there a way to safely remove base?  (Not to mention
slang0.99.38)

Thanks,

Mark.




_/~~~~~~~~\___/~~~~~~\____________________________________________________
____/~~\_____/~~\__/~~\__________________________Mark_Phillips____________
____/~~\_____/~~\________________________________mark@ist.flinders.edu.au_
____/~~\HE___/~~\__/~~\APTAIN_____________________________________________
____/~~\______/~~~~~~\____________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________________
        "They told me I was gullible ... and I believed them!"