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Re: Debian packages now split off documentation
On Thu, Jan 26, 2006 at 12:11:45PM +0100, Jérôme Warnier wrote:
> Le mercredi 25 janvier 2006 à 23:33 -0600, Kenneth Pronovici a écrit :
> > This change was prompted by a Debian bug report originally asking me not
> > to distribute both the HTML and PDF versions of the documentation. I
> > rejected this request, under the premise that the two forms of the
> > documentation are both useful for different purposes (HTML for online
> > browsing, PDF for printing). However, I was convinced that it was worth
> > splitting the documentation off into a separate package so you don't
> > have to download the documentation if you don't want to.
> For the track, this is #344474.
> There are two issues (in no particular order):
> - generating this documentation including the screenshots requires a
> non-free utility.
This is incorrect, or at least misleading. You only need a non-free
utility (in this case, Sun's Jimi utility) if you want to generate PDF
output including graphics. You can generate the HTML or text output --
or for that matter the PDF output without the pretty "warning" and
"info" graphics -- using only tools that are in Debian proper.
Incidentally, I would prefer to replace Jimi with a free tool, but there
doesn't seem to be a viable alternative. Currently, everyone who
generates PDF documentation from docbook seems to have essentially this
same problem. If you know if a way to do it, I would be happy to
incorporate changes into Cedar Backup.
> So, the documentation should probably go into contrib until a solution
> is found. If the documentation is in the same package as the program,
> the full program should go into contrib.
I believe this to be a mis-read of policy. You seem to disagree, and
that's fine, as long as you understand that I'm not likely to change
anything unless I have a good reason to (i.e. like if I see a consensus
on the subject from knowledgable people on debian-devel or debian-legal).
Anyway, as I mentioned in the bug report, I think you may be referring
to Debian policy section 2.2.1, which states that software to be placed
in main "must not require a package outside of main for compilation or
execution".
By my read, the Debian packages for Cedar Backup meet the letter of
policy. Because the Cedar Backup Debian build process does not actually
rebuild the documentation based on the docbook sources -- choosing
instead to just pass on the HTML and PDF documentation provided in the
upstream tarball -- the only build dependency is python2.3. Since Cedar
Backup also only relies on python2.3 for execution, and python2.3 is in
main, there is no violation of policy.
Keep in mind that while you or someone else may want to build the
documentation using the Debian source package, there is no requirement
that the Debian package itself rebuild the documentation. There is only
a requirement that the source code be freely distributable per the DFSG,
and a requirement that source package must build correctly and use no
tools other than build-essential and its indicated build dependencies
during the process of creating a binary package.
> Later on, we could even think in splitting the documentation binary
> packages, one for each format.
This is unlikely to happen. I know of no other Debian package which
does this, and it doesn't seem worth it given that the documentation
package is only 600kB right now anyway. Counter-examples appreciated,
if you have them. :)
> > The upshot is that, after upgrading to 2.7.2-2, you will need to install
> > cedar-backup2-doc if you still want the documentation on your system.
> > (It's Recommended, so package managers like aptitude may pull it along
> > by default.)
> If it's done this way, it is usually not a problem at all.
> Thanks a lot for your change.
It's no problem. I haven't had a lot of time to think about this
lately, but I found a few hours last night. I'm just sorry it took me
so long to get around to it.
KEN
--
Kenneth J. Pronovici <pronovic@ieee.org>
http://www.cedar-solutions.com/
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