Re: Don Armstrong > > I understand the perl group maintainer scripts switched to using the > > /usr/bin/file-rename name. We could investigate rdeps of rename and > > see what they use, and/or change them. > > This problem goes beyond reverse dependencies; there are also a > not-insignificant number of user scripts which on Debian expect > /usr/bin/rename to be the perl version (and probably a similar number on > other distributions which expect the opposite). > > Not impossible to change, of course, but an ideal transition would avoid > breaking currently working scripts and installs.
We were discussing the bug in last week's tech-ctte meeting, and the gist of the discussion was that, in a ideal world, Debian would be shipping the util-linux version as /usr/bin/rename to match what other distributions are shipping, but that since we have been shipping the Perl rename for the past 20 years, a proper transition would be very hard. Especially in the light that this is an end-user tool and not something we can control by a MBF and a lot of patches. Unfortunately the current defaults seem to be that we have neither, none of my systems has any "rename" command. OTOH that might indicate there's a head-start on a transition introducing u-l's rename as /usr/bin/rename. Chris, would u-l be willing to reintroduce rename, or do you rather want to reduce the number of commands? Maybe if alternatives are not the correct tool, moving the u-l rename to a separate package, and conflicting with the perl rename is better? (Still ugly, but the situation isn't ideal.) Christoph