> >The *real* solution is to fix dpkg. Checking for being root is a broken > >test. Checking if the current user has the appropriate access is a more > >flexible and portable test. > > NO NO NO NO NO!!! It is absolutely needed. You don't get it. It is > needed during the final packaging stages because when the built > binaries are tar'd up, THEY HAVE TO BE OWNED BY ROOT because this tar > is then extracted directly into the filesystem when that package is > installed later on someone's machine. You do not want programs being > installed into /usr/bin owned by some random user that had the same uid > as some random developer. THEY HAVE TO BE OWNED BY ROOT!
If the current user has "the appropriate access" as I believe the previous poster defines it, the packager can easily give the files the correct ownership. But really, isn't it silly to demand privileges just to write the correct uids to an archive? It's not like the OS forbids you to create archives with any contents you like. This hokus pokus is just because we want to use the standard tar command, isn't it?
