[Fedora-packaging] Re: Fedora Alternatives (Re: [fab] build service)

[Nicolas Mailhot]

Le Lun 13 novembre 2006 09:12, Sarantis Paskalis a écrit :
> Hi,
>
> On Sun, Nov 12, 2006 at 09:29:51PM +0100, Michael Schwendt wrote:
>> [...]
>>
>> Example:
>>
>>   devel/hunky-fonts/hunky-fonts.spec
>>
>>   Conflicts:      fontconfig < 2.3.93
>>
>> There's no comment that explains this. Can we please require packagers
>> to explain such unusual things in the spec file?
>>
>> Either it's superfluous Conflicts information (overuse of an RPM
>> feature)
>> or at some point in time the package really conflicted with Core's
>> fontconfig. In that case, ouch.
>
> The same conflict applies to all font packages.  Its root is here
> http://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-extras-list/2006-January/msg00918.html

That's one reason but not the only one, font systems are fun.

>The introduction of the Conflict came instead of Requires: th
> e newer fontconfig).  The spec file change was copy-pasted from one font
> package to most (all?) others.

Probably from my dejavu-fonts spec

> I suspect the correct thing to do was to
> add a Requires: fontconfig >= 2.3.93 instead of the Conflicts:.
>
> Is that correct?

No. We don't want font packages to depend on fontconfig. However if
fontconfig is installed it better be a version compatible with the
fontconfig stuff the font package does (ghosting of cache files is one
thing, another is the conf files we drop in /etc/fonts/conf.d - I have no
idea how an older fontconfig would interpret the new syntax and frankly I
don't want to test it).

The conflict should be no problem as a font package should never conflict
with the fontconfig version of the release it's pushed for. It's only a
safety should a system update its fontconfig package without updating the
font packages at the same time.

Regards,

-- 
Nicolas Mailhot