Dale Scheetz writes ("PGP depends."): ... > Now, as it happens, I have also been reading the new Policy manual (BTW, > thank you Ian J. for this fine piece of work. It has been long needed and > I for one greatly appreciate your work) and it has some things to say > about this issue. In particular it says that packages that depend on > packages in non-free are to reside in contrib (or non-free if other > restictions apply). This makes it clear that mailcrypt should be in > contrib rather than the distribution proper. It isn't specific about those > packages that recommend or suggest a non-free package, but at least > recommend is strict enough to require special intervention with dselect in > order to install a package without it's recommends. The policy on these > conditions should be made more clear.
I have clarified the policy in 2.1.0.0 (dpkg 1.3.14), which will be out later today. Packages which Recommend non-free or contrib packages must (almost always) go in contrib. Ian.