[Slackbuilds-users] Please list all direct dependencies as dependencies

[Ruben Schuller]

Hi,

2026-04-28 Erich Ritz via SlackBuilds-users
<slackbuilds-users at slackbuilds.org>:

> I know that some like to "optimize" the dependency list of
> SlackBuilds by not listing dependencies that are already included as
> dependencies of dependencies.  I would humbly ask to please not do
> this.

Yes. Quoting the "Submissions" page:

> REQUIRES contains a space-separated list of all required build-time
> and run-time dependencies, each named exactly as listed on the
> SlackBuilds.org site. It should not contain anything that is part of
> Slackware itself. The content of REQUIRES should only be first level
> dependencies (i.e. no deps of deps).

I read it as "list every 1st level dependency, and ONLY those".

> 2) Slackrepo's rebuild logic depends on it.  When a package is
> updated, slackrepo builds it and then rebuilds all packages that
> depend on it.  It does not, however, rebuild packages that depend on
> rebuilt packages.

Having cooked up my own build tool: Listing _all_ and _only_ 1st level
dependencies works fine. When using a tool, you get a neat tree of what
needs to be rebuild, except very fringe cases. Trying to "detect", by
using timestamps or whatnot, if something needs to be rebuild, never
works reliably IMO. Don't be clever when the machine can handle it.
When building manually you aren't very likely to build the same thing
again because e.g. the SlackBuilds directory already exists. Mixing up
the levels of dependencies only makes things harder.

Cheers
Ruben