Comment 59 for bug 14660

Message-ID: <email address hidden>
Date: Sat, 2 Apr 2005 23:04:35 +0200
From: Marc Haber <email address hidden>
To: Vincent Lefevre <email address hidden>
Cc: <email address hidden>
Subject: Re: Re: Re: Bug#301906: exim4: Mail messages sent to local addresses are lost

On Sat, Apr 02, 2005 at 10:21:26PM +0200, Vincent Lefevre wrote:
> On 2005-04-02 14:59:50 +0200, Marc Haber wrote:
> > On Sat, Apr 02, 2005 at 01:33:57PM +0200, Vincent Lefevre wrote:
> > > If this is an exceptional change (like here), then a dialog box
> > > should be displayed during the dpkg-reconfigure. Other packages do
> > > this.
> >
> > This is frequently condemned as Debconf abuse,
>
> Does the Debian Policy Manual say that?

No, it is only best current practice.

> > > This is often done like this (often with symbolic links, which I used
> > > to use... until some broken software incorrectly overwrote my config
> > > file following the symlink).
> >
> > So, the exim 4 packages are "broken software" from your point of view?
>
> Not necessarily. FYI, it was bug 177846.

Hm. A border case, IMO.

> > > Is there a policy for config files (concerning this and also the
> > > various problems above)?
> >
> > This is described pretty extensively in chapter 10.7 of Debian policy.
>
> It says:
>
> | 10.7.3 Behavior
> |
> | Configuration file handling must conform to the following behavior:
> |
> | * local changes must be preserved during a package upgrade, [...]
>
> As my netenv script overwrites the whole configuration file, the whole
> file was locally changed, and the whole file should have been preserved
> during the upgrade.

Policy doesn't mandate "if a file was touched by the local admin,
leave it alone completely". It does mandate that local changes to the
file must be preserved. Automatic changes are still allowed.

Greetings
Marc

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