[oe] [RFC] opkg conffiles force overwrite

[Koen Kooi]

On 03-04-09 05:59, Tick wrote:
> Hi All,
>    I am pondering that let conf->force_overwrite in opkg enable
> resolve_conffiles overwrite any conffiles. Now opkg will not overwrite
> the conffiles even if you set force_overwrite. It will cause opkg ask
> user to choose what to do to the conffiles if they are changed.
>
> Adding another flag e.g. force_overwrite_conffile seems a little bit
> superfluous and not orthogonal to force_overwrite. But it will not
> change current opkg behavior.
>
> Letting force_overwrite can overwrite conffiles will cause logical
> change of this flag.  This will make opkg-cl asking nothing when
> upgrade some conffiles if you set force_overwrite. It may cause users
> lose their own setting without a second chance to save them?
>
> In my own opinion, I prefer let force_overwrite flag can overwrite
> files including conffiles, because it has to be set manually. But this
> will change the behaviour of opkg, and may have some impact on other
> projects. Such as OE. That makes me consider again and again.
>
> My proposal is if conffiles been overwrited because force_overwrite
> was set.
> The old conffile XXXX will be move to XXXX~, and adding a warning
> message of "overwriting conffile XXXX".
> Is that a good solution?

It's not a good solution since people use 'force-overwrite' to get 
around packages that don't (or can't) have RREPLACES set. If I do an 
opkg upgrade now, I don't want util-linux-ng-mount and busybox to start 
fighting over /etc/mountall, but I do want opkg to prompt me about fstab 
changes.

regards,

Koen