On Sat, Oct 31, 2015 at 01:02:00AM +0100, Axel Beckert wrote:
> Him
>
> Bjarni Ingi Gislason wrote:
> > The word "(il)legal" is too often used in a wrong sense, both in
> > documentation, diagnostic messages, and in a code as a part of a name
> > of an identifier.
> [...]
> > "Lintian" should therefor search for this text string in every file
> > and report it. Files with all correct use of "(il)legal" can then
> > later be put on the "overrides" list, if they are unchanged from the
> > last run of "lintian".
>
> I think that "every file" is a little bit overzealous.
>
> I'd restrict it to packaging (i.e. the debian/ directory) and
> explicitly exclude the file debian/copyright as any appearance of the
> word "legal" or "illegal" in there is very likely a valid (sic!)
> usage.
>
The "copyright" file deals with legal matter so its use of the words
"(il)legal" should be correct.
It is not enough to check just the Debian part of a package. The
part that comes from upstream should be scrutinized.
Example for manuals in "/usr/share/man/man1" (CentOS 6.7), number of
man-pages that contain each word.
number
lines from "ls" 2050
with "valid" 354
with "legal" 105
Binaries in "/usr/bin":
number
lines from "ls" 1737
with "valid" 659
with "legal" 212
From "/usr/share/info":
number
lines from "ls" 195
with "valid" 139
with "legal" 112*
*)
Misuse is lower as legal matter is also there, but the word is used
in both meanings in some files.
--
Bjarni I. Gislason
