Bug#934463: initscripts: consider taking over hwclock policy machinery

[Mark Hindley]

Andreas,

Thanks for your thoughts on this.

On Thu, Aug 24, 2023 at 06:16:08PM +0200, Andreas Henriksson wrote:
> Since initscripts will need (and has) Breaks/Replaces: util-linux-extra
> the circular nature of util-linux-extra having the same makes me think
> this is something which might be useful to think about a second time.
> Additionally, util-linux-extra might not even be installed on users
> system now that it's no longer pseudo-essential.... If we want to
> prevent (sysvinit) users from partially upgrading util-linux-extra
> and lack the hwclock machinery, then we likely also want to prevent
> them from deinstalling util-linux-extra which would have the same
> result.

I don't think the hwclock machinery is universally required on non-systemd init
systems: all of my systems are non-systemd and none have util-linux-extra
installed but run one of the time-daemon providers.

Bin:initscripts is installed on all non-systemd systems by being a dependency of
sysvinit-core and runit-init and itself depending on sysv-rc | openrc.

I see 2 scenarios we need to enforce with the dependencies:-

 1) Avoid dpkg attempting installation of packages with conflicting files

 2) Ensure users who might use the hwclock machinery (i.e. currently have
 util-linux-extra installed) continue to have it available

I think 1) is covered by the Breaks/Replaces. 2) is addressed by apt's
preference to upgrade rather than remove packages.

Despite the circular nature of both util-linux-extra and initscripts having
reciprocal breaks that you identify, it is the recommendation in the Package
Transition Wiki[1]. I think we are dealing with scenario #9.

With best wishes.

Mark

[1]  https://wiki.debian.org/PackageTransition