[Soc-coordination] Declarative Diversions - Report 1

[Steve Langasek]

On Sat, Jun 04, 2011 at 07:29:02AM +0200, Luk Claes wrote:
> > -----------------------------
> > Details - Control File Syntax
> > -----------------------------
> > It will conform to RFC2822 style with the following format:
> >  * Divert-From:
> >  * Divert-To:
> >  * Blank lines and lines beginning with '#' will be comments
> >  
> > 'Divert-To' will be optional and if it is ommitted then files being
> > diverted 
> > will have their filename changed to 'file.distrib'

> Would it not be better to have the filename changed to
> 'file.<package_name>' if 'Divert-To' is not specified, so it's possible
> to support more packages diverting the same file?

If you do that, how do you keep track of which package's file was diverted
where, so that on *removal*, the files are put where they belong?

Why do you *want* to have parallel diversions of the same file by more than
one package?  It may seem the answer is obvious, but if you think about it I
believe you'll find those semantics aren't actually useful.  *Nested*
diversions can be useful (one package diverts foo to foo.distrib and wraps
it; another package diverts foo.distrib to foo.distrib.distrib and wraps it
again), but having two diversions happen in parallel, where the unpack order
determines which package ends up on top, isn't useful at all.

-- 
Steve Langasek                   Give me a lever long enough and a Free OS
Debian Developer                   to set it on, and I can move the world.
Ubuntu Developer                                    http://www.debian.org/
slangasek at ubuntu.com                                     vorlon at debian.org
-------------- next part --------------
A non-text attachment was scrubbed...
Name: signature.asc
Type: application/pgp-signature
Size: 828 bytes
Desc: Digital signature
URL: <http://lists.alioth.debian.org/pipermail/soc-coordination/attachments/20110604/656d211a/attachment-0001.pgp>