On Thu, 13 Dec 2012, Helmut Grohne wrote: > On Thu, Dec 13, 2012 at 06:50:00PM +0100, Santiago Vila wrote: > > As we don't support upgrades which skip releases (i.e. Debian 4.0 to > > Debian 6.0, or Debian 5.0 to Debian 7.0), why don't we remove all > > those obsolete dependencies on essential packages instead? > > That makes sense! I investigated the situation on sid amd64 hoping that > other architectures don't differ that much. > > bash depends on base-files (>= 2.1.12) > bsd-mailx depends on base-files (>= 2.2.0) > debian-edu-config depends on base-files (>= 5.3) > dict-foldoc depends on base-files (>> 4) > dict-vera depends on base-files (>= 4.0.0) > dpkg-dev depends on base-files (>= 5.0.0) > heirloom-mailx depends on base-files (>= 2.2.0) > kup-server depends on base-files (>= 6.4) > libgtk2-imageview-perl depends on base-files (>= 4.0.1) > libpam-mount depends on base-files (>= 6.4) > libpod-constants-perl depends on base-files (>= 4.0.1) > liblog4cxx10-doc depends on base-files (>= 4.0.4) > lib32nss-mdns depends on base-files (>= 3.1.10) > libnss-mdns depends on base-files (>= 3.1.10) > python-parsedatetime depends on base-files (>= 4.0.4) > rsync depends on base-files (>= 4.0.1) > speechd-el depends on base-files (>= 4.0.1) > speechd-el-doc-cs depends on base-files (>= 4.0.1) > trn4 depends on base-files (>= 2.2.0) > vera depends on base-files (>= 4.0.0) > weechat-scripts depends on base-files (>= 4.0.1)
Thanks for the research! > So what can we conclude from this list? > > 1) Most of these dependencies are not relevant anymore and indeed should > be deleted. Indeed. > 2) There are still useful dependencies on base-files such as kup-server > and libpam-mount. I see that those two packages depend on base-files because of /run. However, using /run directly is wrong, as clarified by Roger Leigh here: http://lists.debian.org/debian-devel-announce/2012/06/msg00004.html > 3) Getting rid of the dependencies which are no longer supported will > take time. I'd expect that we still have at least half of them in a > year. > > So I think the request to implement Multi-Arch for base-files is useful. Yes, unfortunately, as they are too many obsolete dependencies to remove. > Should I file wishlist bugs to remove dependencies lower than squeeze? Maybe. Or we could also (or instead) write a policy paragraph saying "Please remove versioned dependencies on essential packages after a stable release, as they just clutter the control file". -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to debian-bugs-dist-requ...@lists.debian.org with a subject of "unsubscribe". Trouble? Contact listmas...@lists.debian.org
