Hi David, Thank you for taking the time to reply. I now that must be a low priority bug on apt's list.
On 6/2/20 4:48 PM, David Kalnischkies wrote: > Hi, > > On Sun, May 31, 2020 at 11:45:23AM +0200, Baptiste BEAUPLAT wrote: >> On Sat, 17 Dec 2011 15:56:22 +0200 =?utf-8?q?Martin-=C3=89ric_Racine?= >> <martin-eric.rac...@iki.fi> wrote: >>> The --fix-policy option is not documented in the apt-get man page. >> >> Please consider applying the following patch that documents the >> --fix-policy option. > > The problem with this option and hence the documentation is that > "policy" is a very bad word here. I said on IRC then I mentioned > & explained that option that it is 'apt-speak', but I meant that this is > something only the code & debug messages use – and even those aren't > uniformly using it as the code calls these dependencies also "important" > (vs. "critical"). In the code this makes sort of sense, but I wouldn't > like to expose a user to the notion of "important" as we use that word > for yet more other confusing things (which is probably why the code > isn't using it all the time either). > > From a user point of view "policy" refers to apt_preferences, at least > that is what we have taught them via "apt{-cache,} policy" for years and > the code happily uses it in that sense everywhere as well. > > A --fix-policy suggests hence it does something with apt_preferences > which it doesn't as the "configured policy" there is not at all about > Recommends/Suggests. I feel like I understand a bit better the issue here. Basically user and technical (in-code) definition of policy is different. That option should not be called like that. > So, instead of documenting, I would like to "remove" this option: > The functionality as-is is not that great as it is all-or-nothing which > is rarely useful. I would prefer a command which will act on given > packages instead (and only if non are given on all) with a more sensible > name. I do think there is a use case here. I'm sure some of Debian contributors run sid and end-up in the same situation I ran into, where you have a couple recommends that got removed and you wish to fix that. That feature specifically reminds me of fsck commands where it allows you to get back to a coherent system. I do agree that having the option to specify the package would be very nice, but I think removing the possibility to do that on all packages would be a loss. > Sadly I have no idea how to call it. > I would have called it 'reinstall' as that is sort-of what the code > does… but that should make it obvious that I shouldn't be naming things. > > (Famous last words: On the upside, the code for that shouldn't be hard) Here is a couple of idea on the option naming: --restore, I like this one as the option effectively restore the packages in the state that they should be. --ensure, same idea as behind restore. --check or --verify, Not so sure about that one, it implies that no action is done which is not the case. > Sidenote: "configured policy" suggests there is something you can > configure far above "install recommends". More like "install recommends > if they are related to bluetooth, not related to gnome and included in > the last stable release" – that would be a handy policy sometimes, but > I don't see us getting there any time soon. And even then --fix-policy > would need a few changes…. > > > Beste regards > > David Kalnischkies -- Baptiste BEAUPLAT - lyknode
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