On Wed, 18 Feb 2015 11:57:26 +0000, Tim Waugh wrote: > On Wed, 2015-02-18 at 12:49 +0100, Jean Delvare wrote: > [...] > > rpm-4.12.0.1 > > rpm-4.12.0.1/beecrypt-4.1.2 > > rpm-4.12.0.1/beecrypt -> beecrypt-4.1.2 > > rpm-4.12.0.1/db-4.8.30 > > rpm-4.12.0.1/db -> db-4.8.30 > [...] > > If we can no longer patch files through symbolic links, that means we > > have to include the version number in all paths in such patches, and > > update the patch whenever the version number changes. That would be a > > maintenance pain as you can imagine, which is why we would like to > > avoid it. > > Or use -p, like this: > > pushd rpm-$rpm_version/beecrypt-$beecrypt_version > # apply beecrypt patches > patch -p2 -i ... > popd > > pushd rpm-$rpm_version/db-$db_version > # apply db patches > patch -p2 -i ... > popd
I suppose that would work, however we are heavily using quilt to maintain our packages and with your proposal, "quilt setup" will create separate patch series for the different subdirectories. This means it is no longer possible to apply all patches with a single "quilt push -a". Instead one would have to change directories and repeat the process several times. Navigating through the patch series would be more difficult, especially if some patches depend on each other. Also if a single patch touches several subdirectories (or the main working directory and one subdirectory) then your trick no longer works. Your approach would require some changes to the way we work, so this only qualifies as a workaround IMHO. I'll discuss this with the maintainer of the rpm package, maybe we can use that temporarily until the patch utility is fixed to properly handle symbolic links again, but for the mid term I think we need a real fix. Thanks, -- Jean Delvare SUSE L3 Support