Comment 29 for bug 42178

On 31 May 2013 15:46, B Bobo <email address hidden> wrote:
> According to the first comment (bug #42178#bug-branches-container) I see
> synaptic was changed to use /var/lib/synaptic/preferences instead of the
> global preferences file /etc/apt/preferences to make it less confusing.
>
> However, I think synaptic is actually much more confusing because of
> that change! It confsued me, and I wasted time trying to deal with it
> and filing bug #1166568. I agree with what Daniel Hartwig wrote in
> comment #27. I too would like to see the 2004 change reverted, so that
> synaptic uses the global preferences file in future. It seems better and
> more logical to do it that way.
>

Actually this would not be reverting that change. Synaptic uses the
apt-preferences system, and the referenced change only concerns which
file stored those. Preferences is not ideal for holding packages, so
we will change synaptic to use the dpkg holds system which is
available to all dpkg and apt tools.

This would be an interesting task for someone who wants to learn
apt/synaptic development. Otherwise I will tackle it shortly as it is
important to have all these tools using the same system for holds.