Hi, back from vacation, I'm working on my mail backlog.
I've been told that -release is not a discussion list. What would be a more appropriate list for discussing release goals and release strategies? Steve Langasek <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > On Wed, Jul 04, 2007 at 09:02:47AM -0700, Thomas Bushnell BSG wrote: >> On Wed, 2007-07-04 at 13:30 +0200, Florent Rougon wrote: >> > [Trying to reply for Frank, since he's on vacation...] > >> > Steve Langasek <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > >> > > This particular problem only exists because you're providing tetex-bin >> > > and >> > > tetex-extra packages that don't have the same semantics as previous >> > > versions. > >> > As Frank explained, it is impossible to provide "packages that don't have >> > the same semantics as previous versions". The only possible thing, since >> > teTeX is removed, is to provide "packages that provide a superset of the >> > functionality provided by tetex-* packages when teTeX was still in the >> > archive." > >> I think the problem is that the new packages aren't a superset; you >> can't reliably put in the new package and expect all the previously >> working bits to still keep working. > > Rather, the problem is that Frank's comments implied this was *not* a goal > of the TeX team. It was one goal, but there were others. These include to no longer force the installation of large, often unmaintained parts of tetex which have only a small user base. In an older mail: ,---- | Florent wrote: | | > Steve wrote | > | > > And frankly, the claim that tetex-bin and tetex-extra packages which | > > arbitrarily change which functionality they provide gives users "a smooth | > > upgrade experience" looks like total nonsense to me. | > | > Frankly, I don't think Frank wants to "arbitrarily change" the | > functionality provided by the tetex-* metapackages. If he changes this | > functionality, it is probably because he discovered a feature of the | > (old) real tetex packages that is not yet provided by the Depends of the | > metapackages, and he wants to fix this bug. `---- This, and of course the possibility to remove parts which slipped into the tetex-bin (and -extra) meta packages and either weren't in tetex, or were an unnecessary annoyance for tetex users already. I know that users find upgrades "unsmooth" when the package size increases a lot, or unnecessary things are done (see the numerous reports about running mktexlsr and updmap multiple times), so being small and fast is part of a smooth upgrade, too. And since texlive is going to be bigger than teTeX, anyway, we'd rather be as small as possible. > If it is, then the concerns about the user experience go away... as does any > urgency of trying to eliminate the references to these packages in the rest > of the archive, since the dependencies will be correctly satisfiable through > lenny and will not significantly interfere with the upgrade path post-lenny. It is not (because of the "remove" bit) - but still, what do you suggest? Note that the problem is not only with tetex-bin and tetex-extra, but also with the "texlive" metapackage. It was specifically designed to be the package which a standard LaTeX or ConTeXt user, or a beginner, should install to be able to work decently. This includes the possibility to remove obsolete stuff earlier than it is removed from the complete TeXLive distribution. For example, it might be that in TeXLive 2009 (probably not 2008), the pdfTeX binary will still be present, but no longer used by default (XeTeX and luaTeX instead). I'd rather remove it from what's pulled in by "texlive" by then. Other examples might be the removal from the default install of our copy of the PS base fonts once the TeX Gyre fonts, their improved successors, are available in Debian. Do you generally oppose such ideas? If not, which approach would you suggest? Regards, Frank -- Frank Küster Single Molecule Spectroscopy, Protein Folding @ Inst. f. Biochemie, Univ. Zürich Debian Developer (teTeX/TeXLive)
