Bug#959891: postgresql-client-12: pgbench is in the wrong package

[Ben Harris]

Package: postgresql-client-12
Version: 12.2-4
Severity: normal

Dear Maintainer,

The "pgbench" program doesn't seem to be in the postgresql-client-12
package, being instead in postgresql-12, the server package. I think
this is probably a mistake: pgbench is listed as a "client application"
here:

https://www.postgresql.org/docs/12/reference-client.html

If I install postgresq-12, I can use pgbench against a remote database,
so it looks like it does indeed work correctly as a client.

I think this came about because pgbench used to be part of
postgresql-contrib-10, and it got merged into the wrong package when
postgresql-contrib-10 was abolished.

-- System Information:
Debian Release: bullseye/sid
APT prefers testing
APT policy: (500, 'testing'), (1, 'experimental')
Architecture: i386 (i686)

Kernel: Linux 5.6.0-1-686-pae (SMP w/8 CPU cores)
Locale: LANG=en_GB.UTF-8, LC_CTYPE=en_GB.UTF-8 (charmap=UTF-8),
LANGUAGE=en_GB.UTF-8 (charmap=UTF-8)
Shell: /bin/sh linked to /bin/bash
Init: systemd (via /run/systemd/system)
LSM: AppArmor: enabled

Versions of packages postgresql-client-12 depends on:
ii libc6 2.30-4
ii libedit2 3.1-20191231-1
ii libpq5 12.2-4
ii postgresql-client-common 214
ii sensible-utils 0.0.12+nmu1
ii zlib1g 1:1.2.11.dfsg-2

postgresql-client-12 recommends no packages.

Versions of packages postgresql-client-12 suggests:
ii postgresql-12 12.2-4
pn postgresql-doc-12 <none>

-- no debconf information

--
Ben Harris, University of Cambridge Information Services.

[Christoph Berg]

Re: Peter Eisentraut
> pgbench is in the postgresql-client-common package [0], but the actual
> per-version binaries are in the server package, e.g., postgresql-16 [1]. If
> you try to call pgbench without installing the server package, it tells you
>
> Error: You must install at least one postgresql-client-<version> package
>
> but that is wrong advice in this situation.
>
> Is there are reason for this arrangement?

https://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/bugreport.cgi?bug=959891

Mostly a historical mistake that has been difficult to fix because of
the update-alternatives trees for the manpages, where moving "slave"
links from one tree to another is quite hard. I think it's possible to
revisit that now that the client and server manpage trees have been
merged.

> (The same confusion applies to vacuumlo.)

Ack.

Christoph