Re: Forcing reinstall in package.el

[Ted Zlatanov]

On Wed, 15 Dec 2010 13:06:30 -0700 Tom Tromey <address@hidden> wrote: 

>>>>>> "Ted" == Ted Zlatanov <address@hidden> writes:
PH> To be honest, I'd prefer it if overwriting were the default behaviour
PH> for all installations, but I hesitated to suggest a wide-sweeping
PH> change like that. =) 

Ted> I think that's reasonable, since the user chooses what to upgrade from
Ted> the package list.  Chong, Stefan, what do you think?

Tom> I think the current behavior is better.
Tom> Usually installing something that has the same or lesser version is a
Tom> user error.  Only a subset of users will actually want to
Tom> force-overwrite a package.

Tom> A prefix argument would be ok by me.
Tom> Or just a new command.

I thought Phil was talking about an upgrade situation (version is same
or newer), not an unconditional overwrite even if the version is older.
Sorry if I misunderstood.

I don't think it's an error to install the same version.  You could have
modified your local version accidentally, for instance.  In that case it
should maybe warn you, but it's still a good thing to be able to overwrite.

Ted