* Nirbheek Chauhan <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> schrieb: > Manuals, yes, documentation, not necessarily. Documentation is often > *built* from the source code, or it's source is included with the > package source code and docs are generated at compile-time.
ACK. But we first should define what's "just documentation" (things like readme's, changelogs, etc) and what's and separate manual (book). There's often no general answer for that. Individual package maintainers have to decide this. > > This has an major drawback: requires to do an complete rebuild/reinstall > > of the whole package if you just need the manual. When setting up an > > new server, you normally don't need the complete manual installed > > (assuming you're already confident w/ PQ), but you need it someday > > later when you have to look up something and other media (web access > > or printed out) are not convenient/available. > > Now, there are lots of similar examples where USE flags exist purely > to pull in run-time deps that don't require the package to be > recompiled for usage, and not being able to specify such deps in an > ebuild is a deficiency on the package manager side. The proper > solution is to fix the package manager, not to split out such things > into separate packages. It generates chaos and inconsistency in the > tree, and only delays the fixing of the package manager by giving > half-baked solutions. We have virtuals. Properly used they can be a great mechanism for solving this. One example, where it (IMHO) isn't done properly, is the X-server, where adding another driver (which *IS* an separate package, already from upstream) causes the whole server to be rebuild and also produces ugly circular deps (yes, I know of the PDEPEND workaround). x11-base/xorg-server SHOULD be an virtual. (I already sucessfully did this quite some time ago, but meanwhile its outdated) > > I, personally, don't *need* it at all, but having an separate package > > makes it more convenient. And I don't see any reasons against that > > split as long as people are willing to maintain it. > > One reason I can think of is that people expect USE=doc to give them > documentation. They expect that a "doc" USE flag on a package will > give them the documentation. Right, but again we're at the question, what really belongs to the docs. According your argumentation, the GCC programming guide should be also pulled in by the doc usflag. Do you really want this ? cu -- --------------------------------------------------------------------- Enrico Weigelt == metux IT service - http://www.metux.de/ --------------------------------------------------------------------- Please visit the OpenSource QM Taskforce: http://wiki.metux.de/public/OpenSource_QM_Taskforce Patches / Fixes for a lot dozens of packages in dozens of versions: http://patches.metux.de/ --------------------------------------------------------------------- -- gentoo-dev@lists.gentoo.org mailing list
