RPM dependency rationale (and kernel packages)?

Jos Vos jos at xos.nl
Tue Aug 19 17:36:19 UTC 2003


On Tue, Aug 19, 2003 at 01:23:11PM -0400, Jeff Johnson wrote:

> Feature, or at least necessity for legacy compatibility.
> 
> Before rpm-3.0.2, only Requires: and Conflicts: permitted versions.
> 
> In order to implement versioning for PreReq:, Obsoletes: and Provides:,
> some way of not breaking backward<->forward compatibility had to be devised.

I now vaguely remember that this had been discussed years ago...
Despite the possible workaround in the case of the kernel package,
I still suggest to consider changing rpm's behaviour at some point
in time, as it is unlogical, IMHO.

Furthermore, the kernel package does not really use this "feature",
as far as I can see, it would be fine to have version-release in
the provides line too (Arjan: is this true?).

> Add a file requires on a file in the kernel package that has both the
> Version: and Release: appended as suffix, almost every file in the
> package as both V-R appended.

Great hack, thanks!  I should have thought of that myself... ;-).

-- 
--    Jos Vos <jos at xos.nl>
--    X/OS Experts in Open Systems BV   |   Phone: +31 20 6938364
--    Amsterdam, The Netherlands        |     Fax: +31 20 6948204





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