On Nov 29, 2010, at 5:56 PM, Philip Brown wrote: > On Mon, Nov 29, 2010 at 1:59 AM, Dagobert Michelsen <[email protected]> wrote: >> ... >> Ok then, so you say identical prios are an error. That means >> sendmail would get 100 and postfix 200 (or vice versay, doesn't >> matter for the moment). User installs sendmail and configures it. >> Than much later postfix is installed and everything breaks. >> Does this sound better to you than my proposal? > > Thank you for bringing up that example. We should definitely augment > our documentation to cover it. > > I have two comments. > > #1: What you describe is, unfortunately, an example of another way to > incorrectly implement 'alternatives' in a package. A package should > not trigger 'alternatives', until what is referenced, is actually > functional. We should document use of 'alternatives' to be clear about > this. > > > #2: here's the biggest thing: . > If you dont like the fact that the user will automatically get a > different implementation inserted underneath things, when they install > a higher priority implementation, I can understand that. > But ***this is exactly how they (LINUX alternatives) were designed to > work***! > > So if you dont like the way that feels as a user, then please make a > formal proposal suggesting we stop trying to emulate "linux > alternatives", and start using "Dagobert's Special Program > Switcher(tm)" instead :-D
How does the alternatives mechanism handle package upgrades of an existing package in the Linux world? If I recall, the RPM and Debian package managers have the concept of "upgrade" rather than "Uninstall" followed by "Install". I would assume therefore that the initial package installation order determines in perpetuity what package is preferred. This would certainly be the behavior that I would expect from the OpenCSW tools. _______________________________________________ maintainers mailing list [email protected] https://lists.opencsw.org/mailman/listinfo/maintainers .:: This mailing list's archive is public. ::.
