George Bonser <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes: > On 06-Oct-97 Raja R Harinath wrote: > >I'm thinking of a hamm-friendly bo (hbo? :-) -- which basically has all > >the `libc5' libraries from hamm. People using `bo' would upgrade to > >`hbo', which basically moves all the libc5 libraries from /usr/lib to > >/usr/lib/libc5-compat, and all devel tools into /usr/i486-linuxlibc1; > >leaving thing in a state most amenable to upgrading to `hamm'. This > >could be a mini-distribution, which just has the libraries, and maybe > >the `altdev's, and some packages that are closely dependent on the exact > >version of the shared libs (`bash' would be one, I guess). > > > >Such a distribution would help greatly in the Libc5 to Libc6 migration. > > Somehow I think this is a bad idea but I can understand the intent. > What it would do is force double the work on the developers and > maintainers. They will have bug reports for libc5 and libc6 versions > ... sometimes the bugs would be different. They would basicly be > maintaining two versions of the same package, possibly with completely > different sets of bugs ... 2.0 would NEVER get done.
Notice that I am talking only about `lib' packages, not all packages. We already have for `hamm' to do all the work of maintaining `libc5' and `libc6' versions of shared libs that exist both in `bo' and `hamm'. This work _has_ to be done if you're planning to support anyone upgrading from `bo' to `hamm', either from `stable' to `unstable', or from 1.3* to 2.0. My proposal is just to encode the `Libc5 to Libc6 Migration HOWTO' into a mini-distribution. Basically the existing procedure is this: - For each (problematic) lib 1. upgrade to a libc6-friendly libc5 lib. 2. Install the libc6 lib. The mini-distribution approach is as follows: 1. Upgrade en-masse to a libc6-friendly, but still libc5, set of libs. - Your machine will still be usable. Most other packages will work fine. If some don't, tough luck, this is a step-up distribution, hopefully it'll work with `hamm'. 2. Upgrade to `hamm'. No playing around with `dpkg' command lines. Everything is done with `dselect'. This mini-distribution probably doesn't even need to have all the libs -- just the essential ones -- definitely ld.so, libc5, libreadline (for bash), libgdbm (for perl?) and any other libs mentioned in the migration HOWTO. Of course, having this step-up distribution means more work for the ftp.debian.org maintainer. - Hari -- Raja R Harinath ------------------------------ [EMAIL PROTECTED] "When all else fails, read the instructions." -- Cahn's Axiom "Our policy is, when in doubt, do the right thing." -- Roy L Ash -- TO UNSUBSCRIBE FROM THIS MAILING LIST: e-mail the word "unsubscribe" to [EMAIL PROTECTED] . Trouble? e-mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED] .