Re: Perl 5.005 in potato

[Jim Lynch <jim@laney.edu>]

Mike Stone said:
> Perl is just another app.

For most distributions, this is true. Proof: you can run those dists without
perl.

For debian, however, Mike's statement is not valid. Proof: try to release
debian without perl in any form. You're gonna find that perl happens to have
been made essential to debian, not due to any intrinsic quality, but because
some developers have chosen to use perl and perl scripts in maintainer scripts.

This means that upgrading perl (whenever it is done) will need the same degree
of care applied as for dpkg, dselect, boot-floppies, debian-cd and all other
essential parts of debian infrastructure, and -not- that of "just another app".

-Jim