Allow abort if a required prompt can't be answered

Allow, but caution against, maintainer scripts to abort if a required
prompt has no reasonable default and there is no controlling terminal.

diff --git a/policy.sgml b/policy.sgml
index 1e9934cd29e49b489cccca7584f84719c1637f09..3f6b82dde7321c17df2a5740dcc15166d946ea64 100644 (file)
--- a/policy.sgml
+++ b/policy.sgml
@@ -3566,6 +3566,15 @@ Files:
          assume that program will handle falling back to noninteractive
          behavior.
        </p>
+
+       <p>
+         For high-priority prompts without a reasonable default answer,
+         maintainer scripts may abort if there is no controlling
+         terminal.  However, this situation should be avoided if at all
+         possible, since it prevents automated or unattended installs.
+         In most cases, users will consider this to be a bug in the
+         package.
+       </p>
       </sect>
 
       <sect id="exitstatus">