XPost: linux.debian.bugs.dist 
 From: wferi@fsfe.org 
  
 Guillem Jover  writes: 
  
 > On Mon, 2025-08-11 at 22:10:34 +0200, Ferenc W€€gner wrote: 
 > 
 >> "man dpkg" says: 
 >> 
 >>   DPKG_ROOT 
 >>       [...] When installing packages into a different instdir, dpkg 
 >>       normally invokes maintainer scripts using chroot(2) and leaves 
 >>       this variable empty, but if --force-script-chrootless is specified 
 >>       then the chroot(2) call is skipped and instdir is non-empty. 
 >> 
 >> The above would make more sense to me if the "instdir" reference in the 
 >> last line was "DPKG_ROOT", so I suspect a typo here.  Please fix the 
 >> documentation or my confusion. 
 > 
 > This would be the directory that is being set when using --instdir, 
 > which --root ends up setting as well as --admindir. 
 > 
 > Perhaps if that read closer to `--instdir` that would have been more 
 > clear? 
  
 Hi Guillem, 
  
 What I miss here is when dpkg sets the DPKG_ROOT variable to something 
 non-empty.  From the text I understand that dpkg sets DPKG_ROOT to the 
 empty string when --root and --instdir are not set (so "normally"). 
 Furthermore, dpkg also sets DPKG_ROOT to the empty string when --root or 
 --instdir is set, *unless* --force-script-chrootless is also specified 
 (because the maintainer scripts are run in a chroot then).  So it would 
 seem sensible if dpkg set DPKG_ROOT to the value of --instdir (or 
 --root) if either of them is specified, *and* --force-script-chrootless 
 is also specified.  But the text does not say that, instead it contrasts 
 DPKG_ROOT being empty with instdir being non-empty.  This is unexpected, 
 and I don't even understand instdir in the "Internal environment" 
 context where this paragraph resides. 
  
 I'm not sure I managed to express my difficulty any better now... 
 -- 
 Thanks, 
 Feri. 
  
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