Update section list and base system definition

Remove the base section; it's no longer used.  Remove contrib and
non-free sections which probably predate the category/section convention.
Revise the definition of the base system to use priorities instead.
Thanks to Colin Watson for verification and wording suggestions.
Closes #442070.

git-archimport-id: rra@debian.org--lenny/debian-policy--devel--3.7--patch-35

diff --git a/debian/changelog b/debian/changelog
index de0ca1d01f2064b160ddb9d55aa8418b023701be..2283ddddb1e6a30db8ace308bc81ad6f2bc15887 100644 (file)
--- a/debian/changelog
+++ b/debian/changelog
@@ -11,6 +11,9 @@ debian-policy (3.7.4.0) unstable; urgency=low
     Kurt Roeckx, and others                                  (Closes: #392362).
   * Bug fix: "Homepage field in debian/control undocumented", thanks to
     Mario Iseli                                              (Closes: #452105).
+  * Bug fix: "Policy inconsistent with reality: base subsection no longer
+    used", thanks to Magnus Holmgren, Bernd Zeimetz, and Colin Watson
+                                                             (Closes: #442070).
   * Bug fix: "Examples of dpkg frontends should mention apt now", thanks
     to Josh Triplett                                         (Closes: #455602).
   * Bug fix: "Minor typos and wording suggestions", thanks to Michael

diff --git a/policy.sgml b/policy.sgml
index e8ea2e4af259b6c1839d8fcfb9315aae4816ba96..d1be6228c462e5b80fe1f46c4fb77c97c2c0772d 100644 (file)
--- a/policy.sgml
+++ b/policy.sgml
@@ -640,14 +640,14 @@
        <p>
          The Debian archive maintainers provide the authoritative
          list of sections.  At present, they are:
-         <em>admin</em>, <em>base</em>, <em>comm</em>,
-         <em>contrib</em>, <em>devel</em>, <em>doc</em>,
+         <em>admin</em>, <em>comm</em>,
+         <em>devel</em>, <em>doc</em>,
          <em>editors</em>, <em>electronics</em>, <em>embedded</em>,
          <em>games</em>, <em>gnome</em>, <em>graphics</em>,
          <em>hamradio</em>, <em>interpreters</em>, <em>kde</em>,
          <em>libs</em>, <em>libdevel</em>, <em>mail</em>,
          <em>math</em>, <em>misc</em>, <em>net</em>, <em>news</em>,
-         <em>non-free</em>, <em>oldlibs</em>,
+         <em>oldlibs</em>,
          <em>otherosfs</em>, <em>perl</em>, <em>python</em>,
          <em>science</em>, <em>shells</em>,
          <em>sound</em>, <em>tex</em>, <em>text</em>,
@@ -1078,15 +1078,15 @@
        <p>
          The <tt>base system</tt> is a minimum subset of the Debian
          GNU/Linux system that is installed before everything else
-         on a new system. Thus, only very few packages are allowed
-         to go into the <tt>base</tt> section to keep the required
-         disk usage very small.
+         on a new system. Only very few packages are allowed to form
+         part of the base system, in order to keep the required disk
+         usage very small.
        </p>
 
        <p>
-         Most of these packages will have the priority value
-         <tt>required</tt> or at least <tt>important</tt>, and many
-         of them will be tagged <tt>essential</tt> (see below).
+         The base system consists of all those packages with priority
+         <tt>required</tt> or <tt>important</tt>. Many of them will
+         be tagged <tt>essential</tt> (see below).
        </p>
       </sect>
 

diff --git a/upgrading-checklist.html b/upgrading-checklist.html
index a6d6742d66797c002f8d374a6cda9ff386a90067..264e6a9f2cb11ed96bc425b4c4e75a6ca17b5c52 100644 (file)
--- a/upgrading-checklist.html
+++ b/upgrading-checklist.html
@@ -54,6 +54,9 @@ picking your way through this list.
 
 <pre>
 3.7.4.0                        unreleased
+     * The base section has been removed.  contrib and non-free have been
+       removed from the section list; they are only categories.  The base
+       system is now defined by priority.                        [2.4, 3.7]
      * Debian packages should not use convience copies of code from other
        packages unless the included package is explicitly intended to be
        used that way.                                            [4.13]