Bug#1131136: sysvinit-utils does not need to be in Essential set

[Mark Hindley]

Gioele,

I think we might have a confusion in terminology. I apologise in advance if I am
already stating something you know.

By init-d-script I believe Andrew and I mean the init-d-script(5) library
installed at /usr/lib/init/init-d-script by sysvinit-utils that allows
declarative LSB initscripts. Any package that uses init-d-script(5) requires
sysvinit-utils be installed, as identified by Michael in #826215.

It seems as if packages using init-d-script(5) need to gain a dependency on
sysvinit-utils before the Essential bit is removed.

It is certainly true that when sysvinit-core in installed, the versioned
sysvinit-utils dependency should prevent breakage, although it falls short of
what is required by Policy.

However, there is a usage case for LSB initscripts in initless containers when
sysvinit-core is not installed and therefore neither sysvinit-utils. In such
containers I routinely run 'service <name> start|stop...'. Maybe that is just my
habit; I don't know how common such practices are.

Apologies again if I have misinterpreted what you wrote.

Best wishes

Mark