Bug#362553: apt: hiddeous syntax award for -oDPkg::Options::=

[Justin Pryzby <justinpryzby@users.sourceforge.net>]

On Mon, May 01, 2006 at 04:46:26PM +0200, Michael Vogt wrote:
> On Fri, Apr 14, 2006 at 12:59:59AM -0400, Justin Pryzby wrote:
> > Package: apt
> > Version: 0.6.43.3
> 
> Thanks for your bugreport.
Thanks for working on apt :)

> > Apt wins the hiddeous syntax award for the day:
> > 
> > apt-get -oDPkg::Options::=--force-overwrite install {debianutils,passwd}/stable
> > 
> > It doesn't work without the second pair of double-colons, which I
> > don't understand, haven't seen used anywhere else, thus undocumented,
> > is unintuitive, and well, ugly.
> 
> This second pair of double-colons indicates that the option should be
> added to a list (Dpkg::Options is a list of arguments passed to
> dpkg). I'll happily apply patches that document the apt configuration
> synatx.
Could you expand on what you mean by "added to a list"?  I guess I
understand what it means in the context of DPkg::Options, but what are
the other cases?  Once I think I understand, I'll write a patch.

Thanks
Justin