On 01/03/2026 at 23:39, Cyril Brulebois wrote:
I'm not saying the current situation is ideal (see Jeremy's reply
regarding the “subtle difference” for example), but it would seem
reasonable to me to start by having some kind of before/after analysis.
Reminder: "subtle difference" = language desktop tasks are selected only
if the "desktop" task (displayed as "Debian desktop environment") is
selected and not if only specific desktop environment tasks (GNOME,
KDE...) are selected.
In addition, it appears that language tasks are selected only during the
initial installation. So if a desktop environment is selected by running
tasksel after the initial installation, then associated desktop language
tasks are not selected.
Also there is a possible issue related to web browser and libreoffice in
desktop tasks.
A typical task-$LANG-desktop package recommends firefox-esr-l10n-$LANG,
libreoffice-l10n-$LANG, libreoffice-help-$LANG which depend on
firefox-esr and libreoffice-core. This makes sense only if all desktop
environment tasks are expected to install firefox and libreoffice. Are
they ?
AFAICS in unstable, most do but there are exceptions:
- task-gnome-flashback-desktop does not install libreoffice
- task-cinnamon-desktop does not install firefox any more after commit
eb7854986 (not uploaded yet)
- task-phosh-desktop installs neither but epiphany-browser
- task-lomiri-desktop and task-lomiri-tablet install morph-browser but
also firefox-esr due to dependencies
Is all this intended ?
Other issue: task-lomiri-tablet depends on task-desktop but is not in
its Recommends alternative list. As a result, another desktop
environment (task-xfce-desktop) is also installed to satisfy this
dependency.
