Abstract The non-data packages currently having an absolute dependency on hicolor-icon-theme should consider downgrading it to Recommends: at the least. The list, and the explanation, are below.
Chapter I imagemagick Recently, Depends: hicolor-icon-theme was added to the imagemagick's control file, which triggered my curiosity: does it provide something that wasn't needed (or was missed) by the previous versions of the package, but is strictly necessary to run the newer ones? Indeed, it doesn't. To prove it, I've made a trivial control file for equivs-build(1): --cut: k1o7mjuxokuwghktzugfno8qib.ctl -- Package: k1o7mjuxokuwghktzugfno8qib Provides: hicolor-icon-theme Description: Pretend that hicolor-icon-theme is installed (dummy) A dummy package pretending to provide hicolor-icon-theme. --cut: k1o7mjuxokuwghktzugfno8qib.ctl -- Having hicolor-icon-theme removed and this one installed, I've proceeded to install imagemagick. Unsurprisingly, I've found /no/ issues with either installing or running it. (I've tried display(1), but I'm quite sure that there won't be any issues with convert(1), either.) Chapter II A few packages more Well, I've wondered, is this a singular issue with Depends: hicolor-icon-theme, somehow creeped into Debian Wheezy “just prior” to its scheduled release? Indeed, it isn't. I've examined the reverse dependencies of hicolor-icon-theme: $ apt-cache rdepends --no-suggests --no-recommends \ hicolor-icon-theme hicolor-icon-theme Reverse Depends: viridian tango-icon-theme synaptic rabbitvcs-core perlpanel oxygen-icon-theme openteacher kdelibs5-data imagemagick gnome-phone-manager gnome-icon-theme-symbolic gnome-icon-theme-extras gnome-icon-theme flush d-feet $ Well, it doesn't seem suspicious for anything *-icon-* and *-data to depend on an icon theme, but what about the rest? For a start, I've omitted rabbitvcs-core and viridian, and considered d-feet, flush, openteacher, perlpanel, and synaptic. Unsurprisingly, all of them were able to install and run, but while openteacher is seemingly unaffected by the absence of the data in question, the rest have had obvious issues: almost all of the icons were absent, resulting in blank space on the GUI, missing controls, and warnings to stderr (stdout?) Conclusion Since there're (as it seems) virtually no issues with running imagemagick without a “real” hicolor-icon-theme installed, my suggestion would be to downgrade the dependency to Suggests: (or Recommends:, if there's some point I've missed.) As for the other packages considered, my suggestion would be to downgrade the dependencies to Recommends: (or, for openteacher, to Suggests:, if it's indeed unaffected.) Unless there'd be any objections, I'll consider filing a bug against imagemagick, and perhaps the other aforementioned packages as well. Post Scriptum Curiously enough, the only “application” package having a Recommends: dependency on hicolor-icon-theme is cheese. -- FSF associate member #7257 http://sf-day.org/ -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to debian-devel-requ...@lists.debian.org with a subject of "unsubscribe". Trouble? Contact listmas...@lists.debian.org Archive: http://lists.debian.org/86ehn551jr....@gray.siamics.net