[Bug 1829370] Re: Discuss further entries in essential which might instead be minimal

[Christian Ehrhardt ]

So it seems we have two optional tasks identified that could be done in this context:
- e2fsprogs
  - break fsprogs from e2fsprogs
  - then make the main e2fsprogs non essential
  - remove e2fsprogs from e.g. container images
- drop essential flag from bash
  - is dash considered compatible enough? could we drop bash in containers then?

What about #2 (diffutils):
- I assume it might be needed in the apt/dpkg context to diff show old/new config?
- If that is true could it detect if diff is missing and then fall back to not show the user the 
  delta of conffiles?
- Then this could be dropped as well from most minimal images

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Title:
  Discuss further entries in essential which might instead be minimal

Status in livecd-rootfs package in Ubuntu:
  New

Bug description:
  I was comparing and analyzing a recent docker image for more things we
  could maybe drop to be more minimal.

  I found a few which are in platform.git/required that we might be able
  to move to minimal.

  Not sure what the best practice is here to minimize the container
  images - put it to minimal as recommends and then remove it in livecd-
  rootfs? Anyway that would be up to you, the discussion first ...

  
  #1 e2fsprogs
  For a cloud image and anything bootable with disks - absolutely.
  But for a container which by definition already comes on its FS without disk access.
  I think this could be dropped.

  #2 diffutils
  There is no call to diff other than the references from its own docu and bzdiff/zdiff, ...
  Now while we need bzip2/gunzip and such, we don't need bzdiff/zdiff.
  Should that be split and removed along with diffutils?

  #3 dash
  The comment says "Much faster default shell" whicih is right, but bash+dash in essential.
  Again probably ok for cloud-images and everything bigger, but for minimal container images one should do - which of them I don't know.

  
  I just was curious on those three after checking the image if they might be removable.
  (Triggered by danwest asking about images sizes)

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