Just want to lay out some ofthe technical issues we've kicked around
on #fink. It seems like there are two workable solutions here if we
are going to be removing -shlibs pkgs from the Depends field:
1. Add the new {SHLIB_DEPS} token to the Depends field.
2. Switch to Info3, and implement RuntimeDepends (with {SHLIB_DEPS})
or AutoShlibs:true.
The underlying aim is to make sure that the Depends of these new-style
.info is not be processable by old fink, and that the result in this
situation gives users some useful clue about what is going on. By #1,
users of older fink who get a new .info might get a "cannot resolve
pkg {SHLIB_DEPS}", so we document that this means "install a newer
fink". By #2, users of older fink will get indexer warnings that their
fink is too old, or at least that there is something wrong with the
.info (which is how the whole InfoN system is designed).
If we remove things from Depends and do not make that line
unprocessable, we cause problems for users who have existing
uninstalled .deb: 'fink install foo' looks in the .info not the .deb
for dependencies (I believe this will change in the new fink), so it
will not know to install the -shlibs dependencies and then "dpkg -i"
will crash with unresolved dependencies. That's a much less (IMO)
useful error message about what's really wrong ("old fink") and less
fink-like (one of fink's strong points is that it avoids dropping
users into dependency hell). Note that adding a BuildDepends on the
new fink will not work, because the pkg is already built.
Adding a Depends on the new fink would "work" from a fink perspective,
but it's overly-restrictive on users. And the problem isn't a .deb
compatibility issue, but a .info one.
dan
--
Daniel Macks
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
http://www.netspace.org/~dmacks
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