Am 2014-12-16 um 12:36 schrieb Patrick Erdmann:
> I agree with that post!
>
> But this could make it necessary to patch aptitude / apt /dpkg...

I still don't see why. (Perhaps I need better glasses?)

Let's assume Devuan's first repository only contains deb packages that
need changes. A good strategy for getting started and growing calmly.

Let's assume the distro is called "jessied".

Now, to make apt* tools prefer jessied packages over jessie packages,
all we need is to "pin" it accordingly, via ...
/etc/apt/preferences.d/pin
... and a paragraph like this:
Package: *
Pin: release n=jessied
Pin-Priority: 65535


>>> Another possibility might be to change the package name.

There is no need to change the packages' names.

And I strongly advice against doing so. Many of use have debian's
package names "burnt" in our brains, and more importantly in dependency
definitions in 100s of debian/control files of private projects.


There is also no technical necessity to change the version, but a
version postfix is common, easy, painless, and shows right away if an
installed package is Devuan-ized or not.

For example Debian's
cups-daemon 1.7.5-4
once freed from the libsystemd0 dependency, would become
cups-daemon 1.7.5-4-0devuan0
or something like that.


>>> If the version numbers are going to be that long, we're going to have
>>> to change the layout of the interactive mode of aptitude. Just so we
>>> have a chance of seeing them.

aptitude has an interactive mode?

Kidding. Bazinga. ;-)

But are we veterans or not?

To be honest, pin-ning apt to Devuan's distro name should make sure
nobody gets surprised with a Debian package when a Devuan counterpart
exists.

Of course there might be situations where one prefers the Debian package
despite the presence of a Devuan package. Imagine a major security fix
that conflicts with Devaun's anti-systemd-patch, slowing down the Devuan
port of the security fix.

In those cases one can pin that package to Debian, or use apt -t jessie
or so.


Just my 2 cents. Or 3?

Regards,

Christoph