Concern about using pkg_delete -r

[Josh Rickmar]

On Thu, October 23, 2008 10:05 pm, Stephen Montgomery-Smith wrote:
> Josh Rickmar wrote:
>
>> I'm hoping that this list covers port tools as well as the usual
>> discussions about the actual ports.  If not, please CC this to the
>> proper list.
>>
>> I want to use pkg_delete to remove an installed port, but also want to
>> remove its orphaned dependencies along with it.  After looking at the
>> pkg_delete(1) man page, the -r flag seems to be the option to use for
>> this job.  My concern, though, is about the wording:
>>
>>> In addition to specified packages, delete all
>>> packages that depend on those packages as well.
>>
>> Does this mean that if I pkg_delete -r pkgA, than pkgB (a dependency)
>> will be removed with it, even though it is dependency of pkgC?  Or is
>> pkg_delete (or pkg_deinstall) smart enough to understand this
>> dependency and keep pkgB installed?
>>
>> If in this scenario pkgB would be deleted, should an extra warning be
>> added to the man page so that users know that using this flag could
>> potentially break their other ports?
>
> I think you have the dependency relationship the wrong way around.
>
>
> If you do "pkg_delete -r pkgA", and pkgA is a dependency of pkgB (not
> the other way around as you have it), then pkgB will be deleted.
>

Ah, my bad.  Yeah, after re-reading the wording it seems that is the case.

What about for pkg_deinstall (part of portupgrade)?  According to its man
page, it has two options, --recursive (-r) and --upward-recursive (-R). 
Maybe it's just a little bit late, but what /exactly/ is the difference? 
It sounds like the --upward-recursive option would be better called
--downward-recursive, since it will remove the ports/packages "below" it.

So, if that is the case, would pkg_deinstall -R pkgA remove pkgB or not?

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