XPost: linux.debian.bugs.dist

Package: debian-policy
Version: 3.9.8

I use the `wrap-and-sort` tool to keep my list of dependencies neatly
sorted and wrapped. In particular, I use the `-t` flag to have a
trailing comma at the end of the list. For example

Build-Depends:
foo,
bar,
Homepage: …

There, notice how there is a comma after "bar", the last item of the
list.

I've heard several people in several forums assert that such syntax is
totally undocumented, despite being accepted by all tools I know of.
Indeed, policy doesn't explicitly allow (but AFAIK neither disallow)
such syntax. Nonetheless, I'd prefer if some tweaks could be done to
the policy to stop these annoying comments :)

I think such stuff belongs to § 7.1 "Syntax of relationship fields", but
I can't really image what to write and where.



FTR, this bug was triggered by <https://bugs.debian.org/760021#20>.

--
regards,
Mattia Rizzolo

GPG Key: 66AE 2B4A FCCF 3F52 DA18 4D18 4B04 3FCD B944 4540 .''`.
more about me: https://mapreri.org : :' : Launchpad user: https://launchpad.net/~mapreri `. `'`
Debian QA page: https://qa.debian.org/developer.php?login=mattia `-

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XPost: linux.debian.bugs.dist

On Mon, 4 Sep 2017 10:03:47 +0200 Mattia Rizzolo <mattia@debian.org> wrote:

Package: debian-policy
Version: 3.9.8

I use the `wrap-and-sort` tool to keep my list of dependencies neatly
sorted and wrapped. In particular, I use the `-t` flag to have a
trailing comma at the end of the list. For example

Build-Depends:
foo,
bar,
Homepage: …

There, notice how there is a comma after "bar", the last item of the
list.

I've heard several people in several forums assert that such syntax is totally undocumented, despite being accepted by all tools I know of.

I didn't even know this syntax was allowed, and now that I do I'd love
to use it.

Do you know how long this has worked, in apt and dpkg?

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XPost: linux.debian.bugs.dist

Andrey Rahmatullin <wrar@debian.org> writes:

On Wed, Sep 06, 2017 at 08:55:45AM +0200, Mattia Rizzolo wrote:

No idea about apt, but dpkg's maintainer told me (shortly after having
filed this bug) that dpkg supported it basically since ever; quoting
him:

<guillem> mapreri: the trailing comma syntax *must* be supported,
otherwise things like «foo, ${substvar}» with an empty
substvar would break havoc
<guillem> mapreri: well dpkg does not accept it but the perl code does
and remove it before generating the DEBIAN/control files so
it's all good
<guillem> mapreri: I'll clarify the deb-src-control man page

So the syntax is supported in source control files but not in the binary ones?

Yeah, I think that's the right interpretation. (Probably not in *.dsc
files either.) That means that it doesn't matter if tools that operate
only on the archive support it, since they won't see it; only package
building tools that operate on debian/control need to support it, and they
all seem to. (wrap-and-sort -t adds the trailing commas and is very
widely used, so if this didn't work, I think we'd know by now.)

--
Russ Allbery (rra@debian.org) <http://www.eyrie.org/~eagle/>

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XPost: linux.debian.bugs.dist

On Tue, Sep 05, 2017 at 10:28:37AM -0700, Josh Triplett wrote:

I didn't even know this syntax was allowed, and now that I do I'd love
to use it.

Happy to have confirmation that some clarity is needed :)

Do you know how long this has worked, in apt and dpkg?

No idea about apt, but dpkg's maintainer told me (shortly after having
filed this bug) that dpkg supported it basically since ever; quoting
him:

<guillem> mapreri: the trailing comma syntax *must* be supported,
otherwise things like «foo, ${substvar}» with an empty
substvar would break havoc
<guillem> mapreri: well dpkg does not accept it but the perl code does
and remove it before generating the DEBIAN/control files so
it's all good
<guillem> mapreri: I'll clarify the deb-src-control man page

--
regards,
Mattia Rizzolo

GPG Key: 66AE 2B4A FCCF 3F52 DA18 4D18 4B04 3FCD B944 4540 .''`.
more about me: https://mapreri.org : :' : Launchpad user: https://launchpad.net/~mapreri `. `'`
Debian QA page: https://qa.debian.org/developer.php?login=mattia `-

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XPost: linux.debian.bugs.dist

On Wed, Sep 06, 2017 at 02:51:34PM -0700, Russ Allbery wrote:

Andrey Rahmatullin <wrar@debian.org> writes:

On Wed, Sep 06, 2017 at 08:55:45AM +0200, Mattia Rizzolo wrote:

No idea about apt, but dpkg's maintainer told me (shortly after having
filed this bug) that dpkg supported it basically since ever; quoting
him:

<guillem> mapreri: the trailing comma syntax *must* be supported,
otherwise things like «foo, ${substvar}» with an empty
substvar would break havoc
<guillem> mapreri: well dpkg does not accept it but the perl code does
and remove it before generating the DEBIAN/control files so
it's all good
<guillem> mapreri: I'll clarify the deb-src-control man page

So the syntax is supported in source control files but not in the binary ones?

Maybe a better way to say that is that it is only supported in
debian/control, and not in files generated from it, including .dsc.

We already had this discussion in another bug report.

Cheers,
--
Bill. <ballombe@debian.org>

Imagine a large red swirl here.

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