Re: Version requirements for dependancies

["Steven M. Bellovin" <smb%cs.columbia.edu@localhost>]

On Mon, 10 Nov 2008 14:17:24 -0600 (CST)
"Jeremy C. Reed" <reed%reedmedia.net@localhost> wrote:

> The policy is a new version is required if the ABI changes, making 
> existing dependencies to no longer work with new packages (or new 
> dependencies to no longer work with old packages).
> 
> Also if an API changes (meaning it needs newer dependency), then that
> will be required too.
> 
> If you are always buildling from pkgsrc and don't use packages from
> others and are willing to try to troubleshoot problems on your own,
> you can use USE_ABI_DEPENDS?=NO -- note it is not recommended, but I
> have used it for years. (That won't help you in this case, because
> the BUILDLINK_API_DEPENDS.db4 was increased too.)
> 
> spamprobe has only been tested with db4 in pkgsrc. db4 currently has:
> 
> BUILDLINK_API_DEPENDS.db4+=     db4>=4.7.25.1
> BUILDLINK_ABI_DEPENDS.db4?=     db4>=4.7.25.1
> 
> Apparently, it was known or assumed that the previous db4-4.6.21 has 
> binaries that are incompatible.
> 
> I just checked and saw some official packages from earlier this year
> use libdb4-4.6.so.6 (from db4-4.6.21) specifically, but newer db4
> provides libdb4-4.7.so.7. (So mixing and matching these packages just
> won't easily work correctly.)
> 
It's a hard call.  When I create a package, I sometimes set the
dependencies to what I have on my system at that point -- that's what
I've built against, that's what I've tested against, that's what I know
works.  It might work with some earlier versions, but I can't easily
test that.


                --Steve Bellovin, http://www.cs.columbia.edu/~smb