[Pkg-db-devel] Bug#435122: package renaming makes it hard to depend on a specific libdb-dev version

[Matthias Klose]

Package: db
Version: 4.6-1
Severity: important

Some issues with the package renamings:

 - Changing the source name to an unversioned name will make it
   impossible to build two sets of dbX.Y packages at the same time
   (which is required for database updates between two versions).  An
   upgrade from 4.6 to 4.7 with the same name scheme is impossible.  4.7
   can change back its source package name to db4.7, but why change it
   all for 4.6?

 - It is hard to build depend on a specific libdb4.6-dev version.
   Encoding something like 'libdb-dev (<< 4.7)' will break these
   packages if libdb-dev is upgraded.  Please consider to provide a real
   libdb4.6-dev package, plus a libdb-dev package, so packages do have
   the choice for the build dependency.

 - libdb4.6++-dev depending on libdb-dev will break on upgrades, so
   even for this reason, you need a libdb4.6-dev (or worse, a
   libdb++-dev).

The benefit to have a libdb-dev package is to make packaging simpler
for packages not using transactions, but it makes it much harder for
the other packages. Suggesting:

 - Rename the source package to db4.6.

 - Add a libdb4.6-dev package, with libdb-dev depending on
   libdb4.6-dev.