[Pkg-tcltk-devel] Bug#775635: chiark-tcl: FTBFS in jessie: build-dependency not installable: tcl8.4-dev

[Ian Jackson]

Lucas Nussbaum writes ("Bug#775635: chiark-tcl: FTBFS in jessie: build-dependency not installable: tcl8.4-dev"):
> Source: chiark-tcl
> Version: 1.1.2
> Severity: serious
....
> > The following packages have unmet dependencies:
> >  sbuild-build-depends-chiark-tcl-dummy : Depends: tcl8.4-dev but it is not installable
> > E: Unable to correct problems, you have held broken packages.

The actual build-depends line is this:
  Build-Depends: libadns1-dev (>= 1.2), nettle-dev, libcdb-dev | tinycdb
    (<= 0.75), tcl8.4-dev | tcl8.3-dev | tcl8.2-dev | tcl-dev, debhelper (>= 5)
(It's a shame that Tcl no longer provides a `tcl-dev' virtual package.)

Anyway, I'm a bit puzzled.  I uploaded a new version of this package
in November 2014 and it built fine.  tcl8.4-dev seemed to be available
then.  I deliberately did not update it to build-depend on 8.5 because
I wanted to avoid perturbing what was in testing by potentially
introducing depedencies on 8.5-specific aspects of the Tcl ABI.

But according to
  https://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/bugreport.cgi?bug=737104
tcl8.4-dev was removed in January 2014.  How did I and the buildds
manage to build chiark-tcl 1.1.2 using tcl8.4-dev in November ?
  https://buildd.debian.org/status/logs.php?pkg=chiark-tcl

I guess, unless the explanation for this conundrum contains a reason
not to do so, that I will have to update it to build-depend on 8.5.

Thanks,
Ian.