Re: versioned dependency on base-files

On 2026/05/29 20:12, Antonio Terceiro wrote:
>> I guess that when taking advantage of that by shrinking
>> debian/copyright files to only reference some of those texts,
>> that we should then declare a versioned dependency on
>> base-files >= 14.1, right?
> 
> While we can and probably should remove license text in favor of the
> licenses included in base-files, I would say that introducing such
> versioned dependency (or tracking it the future to eventually remove) is
> not useful use of developer time. There is no functional dependency
> between the packages, it's only "look over there for the full text",
> inside free-form text. No upgrade will ever require that dependency to
> work properly.
> 
> As long as the upload that makes this reference comes after base-files
> actually contains the license, I would advocate us to *not* recommend
> such versioned dependency, or even to advise against it.

I agree with everything said in this thread so far. It strictly speaking 
seems like a "right" way to do it, but on the other hand it also seems 
like an unnecessary constraint, and another thing to keep in mind when 
backporting.

As an aside, would it be possible to add these license texts to stable 
(base files version 13) as well? Then at least anyone with an up to date 
stable or newer will have those files.

-Jonathan