Am 13.04.98 schrieb schwarz # monet.m.isar.de ... Moin Christian!
CS> From reading the latest mails on the current discussions here on CS> debian-doc, I got the impression that we are not making any progress. I don#t think so. We#re on a good waking to get one file format and one structure. That#s a good beginning. CS> Note, that we had these discussions a few times already, including the Where? CS> this is wanted, I could send a public announcement to debian-user CS> and debian-devel that we are discussing these topics on debian-doc CS> now, and that everyone is welcomed to join our discussion. (Please CS> tell me if this is wanted.) Not at the moment. CS> A: I made several attempts (in private email) to either merge dwww CS> and dhelp or at least have them support a unique package ? CS> interface, at the time when dhelp was introduced. Unfortunately, If#ve asked several times to get one format and I#ve never got a real answer. CS> all these attempts failed. (I think the current discussions makes CS> the reasons for this quite obvious.) I don#t think so. CS> Q: Why doesn't current policy at least `suggest' the use of dwww or CS> dhelp? A really good question for Hamm. CS> - people take policy suggestions very seriously CS> (i.e., people would start filing bug reports against packages that CS> don't follow these suggestions) And where#s the problem? That show that the people think that we need such a system. CS> - if policy would suggest that packages support two different CS> types of _Debian native_ packages for the same purpose, this CS> would be considered as a `bug in the Debian policy' Why? Packages support for example Motif and lesstif. Where#s the bug? But I#m really interested in one format. CS> (for example, we had this problem with the `md5sums' files that CS> have been invented by debstd--a tool which has never been approved CS> by the developers) Most "standards" are not improved by the developers but only by some few people. CS> A: In all discussions about this topic we noticed, that people don't CS> want us to ship a single documentation format, but to give the CS> user a maximum of flexibility. However, a lot of people run Debian Great. CS> a) ship all possible formats in Debian packages CS> ==> would generate a lot more packages--but we already have CS> too many packages from the `default' user's point of view That#s a problem of dpkg. For example you could add all documents to one package and delete some after the installation. CS> ==> would make the Debian distribution a lot larger (IMO, we CS> are already to big) To big? Other distributions are sold on 4 CDs (SuSE). CS> b) make different formats available on our ftp server CS> ==> for some users (e.g., most people in Europe) Internet CS> access is expensive, so these people would not have easy CS> access to all documentation That#s not right, we could add this files to our CD. CS> ==> it would be a lot of additional work for our maintainers That#s right, but quality is one of the arguments to buy Debian Linux. CS> d) ship plain HTML files _AND_ the document source format in CS> the packages In one package? CS> ==> the users who want some special format (e.g., PostScript CS> for printed documentation) can easily generate these CS> formats, either at installation time or at any time later Ok. Maybe a solution. But I#m note sure, if that is the best solution. Maybe we could try this solution. CS> A: No. Perl is fast enough for our purposes here--even on slow CS> computers. Sorry, but that is nonsense. CS> As Perl has proven to be a very useful language for such tasks, CS> we've decided (with the necessary majority under all developers), CS> to include a subset of the Perl package, `perl-base,' in the base CS> system and tag it `Essential.' This guarantees, that Perl and a CS> subset of its modules is installed on all Debian systems. That#s right, but this is not the problem. Perl is to slow for a lot of systems, especially if you install hundrets of packages. On slow machines it takes some seconds to start the Perl interpreter. And I don#t see, why we need Perl. cu, Marco -- Uni: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Fido: 2:240/5202.15 Mailbox: [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://www.tu-harburg.de/~semb2204/ -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of "unsubscribe". Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]
