Bug#728375: libjetty8-java-doc: Questionable dependencies

[Jan Henke]

Am 09.10.2014 um 10:06 schrieb Mauro Molinari:
> Il 09/10/2014 09:47, Jan Henke ha scritto:
>> Hi, I do think it is reasonable to assume that installing an optional
>> documentation package of one component normally also installs the
>> documentation for other related packages. Especially it does seem to
>> be logical to have default-jdk-doc installed when you install the
>> documentation of jetty. As such I am in favour of keeping the current
>> recommends. For sure the default behaviour does not suit every use
>> case, but I do not think changing the default should be done. I still
>> think the current default is the expected behaviour. 
>
> Just to say that my opinion was based on the fact that I am an
> experienced Java developer. I really don't need the JDK docs just to
> read the Jetty 8 Javadoc.
> I would assume that if one needs to use the Jetty API in its own
> application already knows what a "String" or an "IOException" is, just
> to mention the first two JDK classes that come into my mind.
>
> So, it's just a "logical" vs "practical" approach. Maybe "suggests"
> would keep the logical relationship between packages without
> unexpected practical consequences on the weight of the size on disk
> (almost 8x) and download (almost 12x).
>
> After all, the Jetty 8 Javadoc is self-contained, as it is viewable
> online at: http://download.eclipse.org/jetty/stable-8/apidocs/
> Even if references towards JDK classes didn't work, they won't limit
> the usability of the documentation in a substantial way.
> By the way, I was wondering if inter-javadoc package references work
> if I install all of those 300 MB of packages (do the downloaded HTML
> files contain file:// absolute paths to get to the proper Javadoc
> files in the Debian filesystem structure? I can't test now).
>
> Mauro
Hi,

you say yourself you are an experienced Java developer, thus I strongly
feel your use case and expectations are different from what the default
should provide. You know you do not need the openkdk-doc, so nothing
stops you from preventing the installation of it (with the apt parameter
you mentioned) or removing it again.

I strongly feel the requirements and expectations of experienced people
should *not* set the default. The default should be chosen to
accommodate the need of the novice and average user. When you are an
advanced user you normally also have knowledge to modify the default to
fit your need, something the average or novice user might not have.

I see your point and understand it from my personal use case as well.
But I strongly think our use case should never set the default.
Therefore I vote for keeping the recommends instead of a merely suggests.
-- 
Best Regards,
Jan



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Bug#728375: libjetty8-java-doc: Questionable dependencies

[Mauro Molinari]

Il 09/10/2014 09:47, Jan Henke ha scritto:
Hi, I do think it is reasonable to assume that installing an optional 
documentation package of one component normally also installs the 
documentation for other related packages. Especially it does seem to 
be logical to have default-jdk-doc installed when you install the 
documentation of jetty. As such I am in favour of keeping the current 
recommends. For sure the default behaviour does not suit every use 
case, but I do not think changing the default should be done. I still 
think the current default is the expected behaviour. 


Just to say that my opinion was based on the fact that I am an 
experienced Java developer. I really don't need the JDK docs just to 
read the Jetty 8 Javadoc.
I would assume that if one needs to use the Jetty API in its own 
application already knows what a "String" or an "IOException" is, just 
to mention the first two JDK classes that come into my mind.


So, it's just a "logical" vs "practical" approach. Maybe "suggests" 
would keep the logical relationship between packages without unexpected 
practical consequences on the weight of the size on disk (almost 8x) and 
download (almost 12x).


After all, the Jetty 8 Javadoc is self-contained, as it is viewable 
online at: http://download.eclipse.org/jetty/stable-8/apidocs/
Even if references towards JDK classes didn't work, they won't limit the 
usability of the documentation in a substantial way.
By the way, I was wondering if inter-javadoc package references work if 
I install all of those 300 MB of packages (do the downloaded HTML files 
contain file:// absolute paths to get to the proper Javadoc files in the 
Debian filesystem structure? I can't test now).


Mauro

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Bug#728375: libjetty8-java-doc: Questionable dependencies

[Jan Henke]

Am 09.10.2014 um 09:27 schrieb Mauro Molinari:
> Il 06/10/2014 12:09, Emmanuel Bourg ha scritto:
>> libjetty8-java-doc already recommends default-jdk-doc, maybe you
>> meant "suggested" instead? 
>
> I may have used the wrong terms here, sorry. What I find questionable
> is that, as I said in my original report, if I try to install
> libjetty8-java-doc, APT by default says it will install other Javadoc
> packages as well, for a total of almost 300MB of data... I don't think
> these dependency Javadoc packages are actually needed for me to read
> the Jetty 8 documentation. They might be "useful" in some cases, but
> nothing more.
>
> I just learnt I can use --no-install-recommends apt-get parameter (I
> expect aptitude to have something similar) to filter out recommended
> packages, but that's not what I would expect by default.
>
> This is just my opinion. Thanks for your feedback!
> Mauro
>
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> Please use
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Hi,

I do think it is reasonable to assume that installing an optional
documentation package of one component normally also installs the
documentation for other related packages. Especially it does seem to be
logical to have default-jdk-doc installed when you install the
documentation of jetty. As such I am in favour of keeping the current
recommends.

For sure the default behaviour does not suit every use case, but I do
not think changing the default should be done. I still think the current
default is the expected behaviour.
-- 
Best regards,
Jan



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Bug#728375: libjetty8-java-doc: Questionable dependencies

[Mauro Molinari]

Il 06/10/2014 12:09, Emmanuel Bourg ha scritto:
libjetty8-java-doc already recommends default-jdk-doc, maybe you meant 
"suggested" instead? 


I may have used the wrong terms here, sorry. What I find questionable is 
that, as I said in my original report, if I try to install 
libjetty8-java-doc, APT by default says it will install other Javadoc 
packages as well, for a total of almost 300MB of data... I don't think 
these dependency Javadoc packages are actually needed for me to read the 
Jetty 8 documentation. They might be "useful" in some cases, but nothing 
more.


I just learnt I can use --no-install-recommends apt-get parameter (I 
expect aptitude to have something similar) to filter out recommended 
packages, but that's not what I would expect by default.


This is just my opinion. Thanks for your feedback!
Mauro

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Bug#728375: libjetty8-java-doc: Questionable dependencies

[Emmanuel Bourg]

Le 31/10/2013 14:47, Mauro Molinari a écrit :

> I see, but couldn't these dependencies just be "recommended"?

libjetty8-java-doc already recommends default-jdk-doc, maybe you meant
"suggested" instead?

> Anyway, I'm not so presumptuous to suggest to change a convention used
> for all the Debian packages for javadoc documentation sets, I just
> wanted to give my 2 cents on this.

Well so far libjetty8-java-doc complies with the Java policy which
requires that *-java-doc packages recommend the other documentation
package they are linked to.

Questioning a policy in the light of real use cases is definitely a sane
way to make it evolve. I have personally no strong opinion on this
topic, the *-java-doc packages have a very low popcon and I find them
more cumbersome than useful. So I wouldn't mind lowering the relation to
"Suggests", but this is a debate that should be open on the debian-java
list.

Emmanuel Bourg

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Bug#728375: libjetty8-java-doc: Questionable dependencies

[Mauro Molinari]

Il 31/10/2013 14:07, Emmanuel Bourg ha scritto:

The JDK documentation alone uses about 240 MB. Almost all Java
documentation packages depend on this, but you have to pay the price
only once. The dependency is necessary to have nice links between the
Javadoc of the package specific classes and the Javadoc of the core Java
classes.


I see, but couldn't these dependencies just be "recommended"?

I know it's a stupid reason, but if you install jetty8 and 
libjetty8-java-doc and you configure Jetty to start, a welcome page for 
Jetty in Debian is deployed in the server instance with a link to the 
Jetty 8 Javadoc. Even if we assume that this link works (I just reported 
another bug for that), it means that to just have that "example webapp" 
working correctly you'll have to download 240 MB of documentation which 
I doubt would even work from within the Jetty instance itself, because 
links to JDK or Servlet Javadocs would point to files outside the Jetty 
8 configured directories (I didn't try, though).


Also, if you just install the jetty8 package without the 
libjetty8-java-doc one, you'll get a default welcome page in Jetty with 
a link to some missing contents (=> the Javadoc documentation, as said). 
This however doesn't justify a strong dependency between jetty8 and 
libjetty8-java-doc just for a simple hyper-linking issue.


Anyway, I'm not so presumptuous to suggest to change a convention used 
for all the Debian packages for javadoc documentation sets, I just 
wanted to give my 2 cents on this.


Mauro

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Bug#728375: libjetty8-java-doc: Questionable dependencies

[Emmanuel Bourg]

Hi Mauro,

The JDK documentation alone uses about 240 MB. Almost all Java
documentation packages depend on this, but you have to pay the price
only once. The dependency is necessary to have nice links between the
Javadoc of the package specific classes and the Javadoc of the core Java
classes.

Emmanuel Bourg

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Bug#728375: libjetty8-java-doc: Questionable dependencies

[Mauro Molinari]

Package: libjetty8-java-doc
Version: 8.1.3-4
Severity: important

Dear Maintainer,
if I try to do the following on my system:
aptitude install libjetty8-java-doc
the system says (I'm translating from Italian):

The following NEW packages will be installed:
  default-jdk-doc{a} libgnuinet-java{a} libgnujaf-java-doc{a}
  libgnumail-java-doc{a} libjetty8-java-doc libservlet2.5-java-doc{a}
  openjdk-6-doc{a}
0 updated packages, 7 installed, 0 to remove and 0 outdated.
It's necessary to download 23.6 MB of archives. After extraction, they will use 
274 MB.
Continue? [Y/n/?]

Well, 274 MB to install a package which just contains some HTML pages (the 
Javadoc for Jetty 8) seems quite too much to me...
After all, I don't think I need any of those packages to simply browse that 
documentation.

I'm still a novice for Debian, so please don't blame on me if my report is not 
appropriate.

-- System Information:
Debian Release: 7.1
  APT prefers stable-updates
  APT policy: (500, 'stable-updates'), (500, 'stable')
Architecture: amd64 (x86_64)

Kernel: Linux 3.2.0-4-amd64 (SMP w/1 CPU core)
Locale: LANG=it_IT.UTF-8, LC_CTYPE=it_IT.UTF-8 (charmap=UTF-8)
Shell: /bin/sh linked to /bin/dash

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