Bug#645895: ftp.debian.org: epoch should be part of the .deb file name

[Johannes Schauer]

Hi,

On Fri, 24 Feb 2012 01:10:45 +0100 Ansgar Burchardt  wrote:
> Tollef Fog Heen  writes:
> > It's a bit confusing that the file names of .debs don't contain the
> > epoch.  I think we should change that.
> >
> > I would suggest %-encoding it, so foo-1:1 becomes foo_1%251_all.deb.
> > The reason to not include a : verbatim is it won't work correctly on all
> > file systems (: gets translated to / in the UI on Mac OS X and is
> > disallowed for at least FAT, I'm not sure about NTFS).  Also, : is
> > traditionally how you reference remote files and devices with tar and
> > scp (and probably more tools), so avoiding : in files names seem
> > prudent.
> 
> This will break some existing tools and I don't see what we gain from
> this, esp. when we still need to encode the : in some other way.  I'm
> therefore tagging this bug as wontfix.

being the author of such a tool (debrebuild, see #774415), I'm using the
following code snippet to go from source package name, version tuple to .dsc
filename:

my $srcpkg = Dpkg::Source::Package->new();
$srcpkg->{fields}{'Source'} = $srcpkgname;
$srcpkg->{fields}{'Version'} = $version;
my $dsc_fname = $srcpkg->get_basename(1) . ".dsc";

Should the encoding ever get changed, using above snippet will (hopefully)
prevent any breakage in my tool because I rely on libdpkg-perl doing the job
for me. Other tools relying on this mapping should consider doing the same
instead of re-implementing this.

Thanks!

cheers, josch


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Bug#645895: ftp.debian.org: epoch should be part of the .deb file name

[Tollef Fog Heen]

]] Ansgar Burchardt 

 This will break some existing tools and I don't see what we gain from
 this, esp. when we still need to encode the : in some other way.  I'm
 therefore tagging this bug as wontfix.

Which (known) tools would break because of this?  It's not like anything
should rely on package name / version → file name mapping except through
a Packages file anyway?

-- 
Tollef Fog Heen
UNIX is user friendly, it's just picky about who its friends are



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Bug#645895: ftp.debian.org: epoch should be part of the .deb file name

[Ansgar Burchardt]

Tollef Fog Heen tfh...@err.no writes:
 This will break some existing tools and I don't see what we gain from
 this, esp. when we still need to encode the : in some other way.  I'm
 therefore tagging this bug as wontfix.

 Which (known) tools would break because of this?  It's not like anything
 should rely on package name / version → file name mapping except through
 a Packages file anyway?

If you include source packages: dpkg-source complains about extracting
such packages:

  dpkg-source -x at_1:3.1.13-1.dsc
  dpkg-source: warning: extracting unsigned source package (at_1:3.1.13-1.dsc)
  dpkg-source: info: extracting at in at-3.1.13
  dpkg-source: error: unrecognized file for a v1.0 source package: 
at_1:3.1.13.orig.tar.gz

(I tries just renaming the files in the .dsc for this.)

Ansgar



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Bug#645895: ftp.debian.org: epoch should be part of the .deb file name

[Ansgar Burchardt]

severity 645895 wishlist
tag 645895 + wontfix
thanks

Tollef Fog Heen tfh...@debian.org writes:
 It's a bit confusing that the file names of .debs don't contain the
 epoch.  I think we should change that.

 I would suggest %-encoding it, so foo-1:1 becomes foo_1%251_all.deb.
 The reason to not include a : verbatim is it won't work correctly on all
 file systems (: gets translated to / in the UI on Mac OS X and is
 disallowed for at least FAT, I'm not sure about NTFS).  Also, : is
 traditionally how you reference remote files and devices with tar and
 scp (and probably more tools), so avoiding : in files names seem
 prudent.

This will break some existing tools and I don't see what we gain from
this, esp. when we still need to encode the : in some other way.  I'm
therefore tagging this bug as wontfix.

Regards,
Ansgar



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Bug#645895: ftp.debian.org: epoch should be part of the .deb file name

[Kurt Roeckx]

On Wed, Oct 19, 2011 at 01:42:06PM +0200, Tollef Fog Heen wrote:
 Package: ftp.debian.org
 Severity: normal
 
 (Cc-ed to debian-devel@l.d.o for their input in whether this would cause
 problems anywhere else in the toolchain.)
 
 It's a bit confusing that the file names of .debs don't contain the
 epoch.  I think we should change that.
 
 I would suggest %-encoding it, so foo-1:1 becomes foo_1%251_all.deb.

It seems that apt already saves those files with an epoch and %3a
in it, even when on the mirrors it doesn't have that in it.


Kurt




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Bug#645895: ftp.debian.org: epoch should be part of the .deb file name

[Tollef Fog Heen]

Package: ftp.debian.org
Severity: normal

(Cc-ed to debian-devel@l.d.o for their input in whether this would cause
problems anywhere else in the toolchain.)

It's a bit confusing that the file names of .debs don't contain the
epoch.  I think we should change that.

I would suggest %-encoding it, so foo-1:1 becomes foo_1%251_all.deb.
The reason to not include a : verbatim is it won't work correctly on all
file systems (: gets translated to / in the UI on Mac OS X and is
disallowed for at least FAT, I'm not sure about NTFS).  Also, : is
traditionally how you reference remote files and devices with tar and
scp (and probably more tools), so avoiding : in files names seem
prudent.

-- 
Tollef Fog Heen
UNIX is user friendly, it's just picky about who its friends are




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Bug#645895: ftp.debian.org: epoch should be part of the .deb file name

[Tollef Fog Heen]

]] Tollef Fog Heen 

| I would suggest %-encoding it, so foo-1:1 becomes foo_1%251_all.deb.

s/%25/%3a/

-- 
Tollef Fog Heen
UNIX is user friendly, it's just picky about who its friends are



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Bug#645895: ftp.debian.org: epoch should be part of the .deb file name

[Neil Williams]

On Wed, 19 Oct 2011 13:42:06 +0200
Tollef Fog Heen tfh...@debian.org wrote:

 Package: ftp.debian.org
 Severity: normal
 
 (Cc-ed to debian-devel@l.d.o for their input in whether this would cause
 problems anywhere else in the toolchain.)
 
 It's a bit confusing that the file names of .debs don't contain the
 epoch.  I think we should change that.

Is there any reason other than aesthetics to change this? There are a
lot of tools which have to build a .deb filename from debian/control
and debian/changelog or from a Packages file. Right now it is trivial
to strip the epoch where necessary - this change requires multiple
character substitution which is far more error prone.

(It would dramatically complicate all the tools I'm using / developing
for Emdebian.)

The epoch is fully visible in the pool/ and has no direct relevance to
the binary package version.

 I would suggest %-encoding it, so foo-1:1 becomes foo_1%251_all.deb.

... which then complicates any number of previously working regular
expressions in tools all over the place.

I think we should not have % characters in .deb filenames if at all
possible.

 The reason to not include a : verbatim is it won't work correctly on all
 file systems (: gets translated to / in the UI on Mac OS X and is
 disallowed for at least FAT, I'm not sure about NTFS).  Also, : is
 traditionally how you reference remote files and devices with tar and
 scp (and probably more tools), so avoiding : in files names seem
 prudent.

Avoiding unnecessary changes would also seem prudent. I for one don't
think this change would be at all helpful.

-- 


Neil Williams
=
http://www.linux.codehelp.co.uk/



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Bug#645895: ftp.debian.org: epoch should be part of the .deb file name

[Tollef Fog Heen]

]] Neil Williams 

| On Wed, 19 Oct 2011 13:42:06 +0200
| Tollef Fog Heen tfh...@debian.org wrote:
| 
|  Package: ftp.debian.org
|  Severity: normal
|  
|  (Cc-ed to debian-devel@l.d.o for their input in whether this would cause
|  problems anywhere else in the toolchain.)
|  
|  It's a bit confusing that the file names of .debs don't contain the
|  epoch.  I think we should change that.
| 
| Is there any reason other than aesthetics to change this?

The first and obvious one is to avoid file name clashes in the
archive. Another one is so the version number in the file name actually
is the version number of the package which makes it less confusing when
you need to download a package with an epoch by hand for whatever
reason.

| There are a lot of tools which have to build a .deb filename from
| debian/control and debian/changelog or from a Packages file. Right now
| it is trivial to strip the epoch where necessary - this change
| requires multiple character substitution which is far more error
| prone.
| 
| (It would dramatically complicate all the tools I'm using / developing
| for Emdebian.)

If it would dramatically complicate all the tools you're using for
Emdebian, your tools must be pretty simple and I'd suggest you move the
bits that generates debs into some sort of module.  Or your toolset
isn't particularly big.  :-)

Multi-character substitutions are not particularly hard to do, nearly no
matter which language you're talking about.

| The epoch is fully visible in the pool/ and has no direct relevance to
| the binary package version.

No, it's not visible in the pool.  That's what I'm suggesting we
change.

|  I would suggest %-encoding it, so foo-1:1 becomes foo_1%251_all.deb.
| 
| ... which then complicates any number of previously working regular
| expressions in tools all over the place.

You shouldn't trust the file name to contain the version number anyway.

| I think we should not have % characters in .deb filenames if at all
| possible.

Why not?  Are there any tools that have trouble with % characters in
file names?

-- 
Tollef Fog Heen
UNIX is user friendly, it's just picky about who its friends are



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Bug#645895: ftp.debian.org: epoch should be part of the .deb file name

[Tollef Fog Heen]

]] Henrique de Moraes Holschuh 

| On Wed, 19 Oct 2011, Tollef Fog Heen wrote:
|
|  The first and obvious one is to avoid file name clashes in the
|  archive. Another one is so the version number in the file name actually
|  is the version number of the package which makes it less confusing when
|  you need to download a package with an epoch by hand for whatever
|  reason.
| 
| It will also break random scripts out there, so we might actually want to
| have it very clear on how much benefit we'd get from this change.

Yes.  And some are probably broken because they think that the files are
named $package_$version_$arch.deb and don't strip the epoch.

|  You shouldn't trust the file name to contain the version number anyway.
| 
| What would be the point of it all, then?

That tools handling .debs can't trust the file name to match the package
and version doesn't mean we shouldn't generate packages where the name
matches the package and version.

| We have never had a filename version clash.  Even if it would
| eventually happen, it is best that the maintainer bring it up for some
| brainstorming, because it CAN cause a lot of annoyance (people are NOT
| often aware of epochs).

I'm not sure we've never had a clash.  The maintainer might well just
have worked around it silently.

|  | I think we should not have % characters in .deb filenames if at all
|  | possible.
|  
|  Why not?  Are there any tools that have trouble with % characters in
|  file names?
| 
| Well, while % is xml/xhtml/html-friendly, it is *not* http-friendly, and
| will require double-encoding.

Yes, that's somewhat ugly.  You already have to handle % encoded links
for anything pointing to packages with version numbers including ~
though, so this won't make any difference there.

Cheers,
-- 
Tollef Fog Heen
UNIX is user friendly, it's just picky about who its friends are



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Bug#645895: ftp.debian.org: epoch should be part of the .deb file name

[Eugene V. Lyubimkin]

On 2011-10-19 13:42, Tollef Fog Heen wrote:
 It's a bit confusing that the file names of .debs don't contain the
 epoch.  I think we should change that.

I would welcome this.

These epoch-related bugs/feature requests may be of interest too:
#551323 (dpkg), #551326 (www.debian.org).

-- 
Eugene V. Lyubimkin aka JackYF, JID: jackyf.devel(maildog)gmail.com
C++/Perl developer, Debian Developer



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Bug#645895: ftp.debian.org: epoch should be part of the .deb file name

[Ognyan Kulev]

На 19.10.2011 16:18, Henrique de Moraes Holschuh написа:

Well, while % is xml/xhtml/html-friendly, it is *not* http-friendly, and
will require double-encoding.


So we have encoding : anyway. What about using .. (horizontal :) 
- it looks much nicer than %-encoding.


Regards,
Ognyan Kulev



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Bug#645895: ftp.debian.org: epoch should be part of the .deb file name

[Henrique de Moraes Holschuh]

On Wed, 19 Oct 2011, Ognyan Kulev wrote:
 На 19.10.2011 16:18, Henrique de Moraes Holschuh написа:
 Well, while % is xml/xhtml/html-friendly, it is *not* http-friendly, and
 will require double-encoding.
 
 So we have encoding : anyway. What about using .. (horizontal
 :) - it looks much nicer than %-encoding.

Because that's a valid version in itself, and also a valid component of a
valid version.

-- 
  One disk to rule them all, One disk to find them. One disk to bring
  them all and in the darkness grind them. In the Land of Redmond
  where the shadows lie. -- The Silicon Valley Tarot
  Henrique Holschuh



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