Re: Anyone Care to Critique my Apt Preferences? (was Re: apt-cacher as package rollback buffer)

[Osamu Aoki <osamu@debian.org>]

Hi,

On Fri, Feb 19, 2010 at 11:15:24PM -0800, Freeman wrote:
> On Mon, Feb 15, 2010 at 05:10:26PM -0800, evenso wrote:
> > On Mon, Feb 15, 2010 at 02:33:05PM -0600, Boyd Stephen Smith Jr. wrote:
> > > On Monday 15 February 2010 13:30:19 Freeman wrote:
> > 
> > > 
> > > > However, could a rollback represent an incursion on the priority system?
...
> The above preferences are for testing/unstable/experimental with a
> contingency for and emergency rollback a package to an obsolete package
> archived in my apt-cacher files. (My recent experience with the buggy
> xserver-xorg/mesa upgrade prompted this plan.)

In short, I do not like people asking this kind of question to casually
install mixed archive for their sake.  Especially things like experimental.

> I'd rather find out that the above Preferences are destructive here than
> during an install!

Your setting will install latest experimental of a package which you
insalled from experimental.  I see no reason to have stable or volatile
when you are basically tracking testing or unstable.

FYI:
The upcoming apt_preferences(5) manpage (e.g.: apt_0.7.26~exp2_i386.deb) states:

       Preferences are a strong power in the hands of a system administrator
       but they can become also their biggest nightmare if used without care!
       APT will not questioning the preferences so wrong settings will
       therefore lead to uninstallable packages or wrong decisions while
       upgrading packages. Even more problems will arise if multiply
       distribution releases are mixed without a good understanding of the
       following paragraphs. You have been warned.

(Hmmm... s/multiply/multiple/ .. time to make another bug report.)
 
> My ego may be the more delicately balanced but my system is the more
> precious. :)

This squeeze testing cycle has been rough because of major transitions.
My recent upgrade in one of the multiboot setup from stable to unstable
caused unbootable system.

If your ego ticks you, testing only (or with testing security if
available) is good idea.  If something broke, add unstable while keeping
testing as default (higher preference) to get fixed packages.  Right
now, stable and testing have too much gap usually to be useful.  I would
rather rely on my local package archive under /var/cache/apt/packages/*
for recent but working packages.  

(experimental's preference is set to 1 with reason.)

Osamu