Hi, David Kalnischkies: > > Apitude, too, *really* likes to choose 500 deletions rather than upgrading > > even a single package to a version with slightly-lower priority (as defined > > in /etc/apt/pref*), but at least you can tell it to try harder. :-/ > > I shouldn't, I really shouldn't, but well, I bite… > > This isn't trying harder, it is trying increasingly incorrect solutions > to the problem because aptitude assumes the users is not able to express > himself correctly. apt-get is treating its user as its god instead, aka: > user is always right, even if it makes no sense in apt's simple mind. > My main problem is that, whenever I install a "difficult" package, the first solution I get presented is always to simply not install the package in question. The next 2^n-1 "solutions" transitively remove everything that currently conflicts with installing the thing in question. Rejecting the removal of a few core packages then gets me the correct solution, e.g. upgrading two packages.
> Selecting one package in an or-group is a grand example of people not > understand their tools although the policy is simple and logic: If it > isn't impossible to let it win, the first alternative wins. If the > package manager would go for any heuristic based on simplicity of > installation instead everyone would have lsb-invalid-mta as MTA because > that is damn easy to install by any standard. Maintainers are very > heavily relying on this property while e.g. building packages. You don't have to drop that part of its logic. Choosing a different package as a dependency should of course be a "last resort" action (i.e. be heavily penalized). I'm not talking about changing that. I'm talking about the fact that aptitude treats upgrading to a slightly-lower-prioritized version of a package as a *way* worse solution than removing that package (and/or 500 others). Basically, this boils down to the fact that people shouldn't have to read a manpage about a complex priority scheme in an equally-complex resolver. All I want is for aptitude to behave in a sane way by default. Its current behavior is not. -- -- Matthias Urlichs -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to debian-devel-requ...@lists.debian.org with a subject of "unsubscribe". Trouble? Contact listmas...@lists.debian.org Archive: https://lists.debian.org/20141019073253.ga24...@smurf.noris.de
