Re: Bug#50832: AMENDMENT] Clarify meaning of Essential: yes

[Jason Gunthorpe <jgg@ualberta.ca>]

On Wed, 8 Dec 1999, Ben Collins wrote:

> Ok, then the only complaint I have is the part that says to remove the
> Essential status if it cannot meet the requirements of being usable when
> unconfigured. In those cases, dpkg being able to have a check for

I think this clause should be used to enforce this extremely important
restriction. IMHO if a package cannot guarentee availablity it should not
be marked essential and it should be *clear* that it *cannot* be a crucial
part of the system until that is fixed.

Almost all of the essential packages presently have the property that if
they ever stop working the best case is that you cannot install more
packages without a rescue step, and the worst case is that your whole
system is foobar.

Basicaly, I would see it more as a contingent for becoming essential - if
we accept that right now nearly all the essential packages have this
properpty then a) new essential packages we decide to add must also have
this property and b) any upgrade to any existing package must preserve the
property.

Personally I would increase the strength of the wording to be more like:
  An essential package is one that can never stop working. This means any
  dpkg abort must leave the package properly functional.

IMHO just being able to live in the unpacked state is not good enough.

> the status of the essential packages would be good (with a proper --force
> to override the check). Removing the essential status would not solve the

<insert long rant about adding/removing dpkg ordering constraints>

Jason