Bug#601961: apt: wrongly thinks install-info is essential

[David Kalnischkies <kalnischkies+debian@gmail.com>]

Hi Lucas,

On Sun, Oct 31, 2010 at 12:40, Lucas Nussbaum <lucas@lucas-nussbaum.net> wrote:
> apt won't let me remove install-info, because it thinks that it is
> essential.
>
> grep depends on dpkg (>= 1.15.4) | install-info
> my dpkg is 1.15.8.5
> so I should be allowed to remove install-info without that:
>
> WARNING: The following essential packages will be removed.
> This should NOT be done unless you know exactly what you are doing!
>  install-info (due to grep)

APT uses "essential" here not in the "Essential: yes" sense but
in the essential tools and packages sense. APT considers all
packages priority "important" or higher as essential for a system
And prints this "AnalPrompt" (as the sourcecode puts it) to prevent
the user from doing something stupid as it is unlikely that the "normal"
user really wants to remove an important package - and all others tend
to know exactly what they are doing…
So, does this really need to be "serious" - or is it a bug at all?

The "due to" seems to be completely bogus through - looks like
it just looks at reverse dependencies without considering or-groups
but i haven't looked at the code so far.
(will check that later after recovering from post-uds jet-lag)


Best regards

David Kalnischkies