Bug#298566: java-package: command-line parameter for make-jpkg to set priority

Markus Schaber Markus Schaber <markus@schabi.de>, 298566@bugs.debian.org
Thu Mar 31 09:24:17 2005


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Hi, Jeroen,

Jeroen van Wolffelaar wrote:
> On Tue, Mar 08, 2005 at 03:54:02PM +0100, Rico Schiekel wrote:
>> this patch add an command-line parameter to set an alternative priority for
>> update-alternatives.
>> 
>> ...
>>   --email EMAIL      email address used in the maintainer field of the package
>>   --changes          create a .changes file
>>   --priority PRIO    set the update alternatives priority level
>> ...
>> 
>> I primarily use this, cause I have installed sun's jdk 1.5, but want
>> ibm's jdk 1.4 as default sdk.
> 
> Priorities are not meant to be changed by the user, only by package
> maintainers. You can (should) use update-alternatives --set or --config
> to set alternatives as system administrator, rather than changing the
> packages so that the packages of your preference have the highest
> priority.

Well, as the make-jpkg users actually create the jdk packages, they
could be seen as the jdk package mainainers, and so have the right to
set the priorities for the jdk package.

Imagine a development department or university computer room, where the
admin does not want to have sablevm as the default JVM (which currently
uses 350), but his own self-generated SUN jdk deb. Usually, those have
their own central package repository, and run auto-upgrades via crontab
against this private server.

With the command line parameter, he just has to add this option on
make-jpkg, puts his jdk deb into the repository and everything is fine.
Without, he has to run update-alternatives for N machines and M
installed programs (java, javac, javah, jar etc.). Of course, this is
scriptable, but it opens a maintainance nightmare, especially as all
those alternatives are now switched to manual status, and he must
remember to reset them back to automatic or to his new manual preference
whenever he removes the package.

The admin does indeed create the packages, is fully responsible for the
users complaints and even has his own name and address in the maintainer
field of the package (--full-name and --email), but is not "the package
maintainer"?

Just my thoughts on this...

Markus

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