Bug#764448: mate-applets 1.8.1+dfsg1-1 tries to overwrite files in gnome-applets 3.8.1-1

[Axel Beckert]

Control: reassign -1 mate-applets,gnome-applets
Control: found -1 mate-applets/1.8.1+dfsg1-1
Control: found -1 gnome-applets/3.8.1-1

Hi,

Giacomo Mulas wrote:
> the new version 1.8.1+dfsg1-1 of mate-applets contains files with the same
> name as gnome-applets 3.8.1-1. As a consequence, it is uninstallable if one
> also installs gnome-applets.

Thanks for the report.

For the MATE maintainers: We also ran into that issue on Ubuntu 12.04
LTS Precise with the packages from MATE PPA, so after this is fixed in
Debian Sid, it should be fixed in the MATE Precise PPA, too.

> Suggested solutions:

There's a standard procedure for such cases:
https://www.debian.org/doc/debian-policy/ch-files.html#s-binaries

> 1) quick and dirty (unsatisfactory for me, but can be a temporary band aid):
> add a conflicts with gnome-applets

Yeah, that's usually discouraged.

> 2) optimal solution: change the names of the conflicting applets (possibly
> coordinating with the gnome-applets maintainer)

That's the officially recommended way.

> 3) less work than 2) but also less good: use the debian alternatives system
> to make mate and gnome applets with the same name coexist (definitely
> coordinating with the gnome-applets maintainer)

For that their API/ABI always needs to be same. Which likely isn't.
And it's also likely much more work than 2).

		Regards, Axel
-- 
 ,''`.  |  Axel Beckert <abe at debian.org>, http://people.debian.org/~abe/
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