On Thu, Dec 11, 2003 at 09:31:49AM -0700, Paul E Condon wrote: > I've just read Policy on this issue again, and more carefully. I think > Policy is slightly broken, in its description of 'extra' > > 1. Extra can include packages that conflict with packages in > 'required'. How can such packages be useful, except that they correct > for the brokenness that results from removing the 'required' package? > There is something fishy here. If there is a work-around that allows > the a system to function with a 'required' package not installed, then > that package is not really required, and should not be designated as > such. If there is no work-around, then how was the 'extra' package > tested on a Debian system prior to release? Or was it just released, > because no one could ever install it, and discover/report bugs? ;-)
'required' packages are not a big deal. dpkg will remove them without fuss. Only packages with the 'Essential: yes' control field are really warranted to be installed. So you can indeed make a package conflict with a required package though usually it will provide the functionnalities of the conflicted package. > 2. Extra can include packages that conflict with packages in > 'optional'. How does one decide between two packages that conflict > with each other, and each, by itself, would be a candidate for > 'optional'? Choose one for optional and the other is forced to go in > extra. Perhaps, the older more established pachage simply has pride of Usually the package that is first in Debian don't have conflict declarated. The new package need to declare conflict with it so has to go in extra. But extra packages are not second class citizens, and this provides an incentive toward avoiding Conflicts and using better solutions which is good: the ability to install two packages at the same time is important. Look at the 'lilo vs grub' history. > For example, if there became available an alternative Windowing System > that conflicted with X, that would require demoting X form 'optional' > to 'extra'. No. Only if X were to declare conflict, but likely it will be the alternate WS that will. Also there are lot of ways to avoid conflicts. The main source of conflicts: 1) filename clash. Usually renaming the files is a possibility. 2) tcp port clash. This one is more problematic since all http servers will need port 80, e.g. Cheers, -- Bill. <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Imagine a large red swirl here.
