Re: [gentoo-dev] [RFC] New QA policy: Packages must not disable installing manpages via USE flags

[Michał Górny]

On Sat, 2019-07-20 at 23:04 +0300, Andrew Savchenko wrote:
> On Sat, 20 Jul 2019 20:28:39 +0200 Michał Górny wrote:
> > On Sat, 2019-07-20 at 20:50 +0300, Andrew Savchenko wrote:
> > > On Wed, 17 Jul 2019 15:25:10 +0200 Michał Górny wrote:
> > > > Hello,
> > > >
> > > > The QA team would like to introduce the following policy:
> > > >
> > > > """
> > > > Packages must not disable installing manpages via USE flags (e.g.
> > > > USE=man or USE=doc).  If upstream does not ship prebuilt manpages
> > > > and building them requires additional dependencies, the maintainer
> > > > should build them and ship along with the package.
> > > > """
> > > >
> > > >
> > > > Explanatory note:
> > > >
> > > > This applies to having USE flags that specifically control building
> > > > manpages.  It obviously does not affect:
> > > >
> > > > a. USE flags that disable building both a program and its manpage (e.g.
> > > > if USE=gui disables building gfrobnicate, not installing gfrobnicate(1)
> > > > is correct),
> > > >
> > > > b. use of LINGUAS to control installed manpages.
> > > >
> > > >
> > > > Rationale:
> > > >
> > > > Manpages are the basic form of user documentation on Gentoo Linux.  Not
> > > > installing them is harmful to our users.  On the other hand, requiring
> > > > additional dependencies is inconvenient.  Therefore, packaging prebuilt
> > > > manpages (whenever upstream doesn't do that already) is a good
> > > > compromise that provides user with documentation without additional
> > > > dependencies.
> > > >
> > > >
> > > > What are your comments?
> > >
> > > The basic foundation of Gentoo is freedom of choise for our users.
> > > If installing man pages means no additional dependencies, than
> > > proposed rule is ok. However if such dependencies are required it is
> > > up to users to decide if they wan them or not.
> > >
> > > Having USE=man (or USE=doc) for such purposes is fine. Having
> > > USE=man enabled by default in user profile is also fine. Forcing
> > > users to install unnecessary dependencies on minimal systems in a
> > > no go and turns Gentoo into something else.
> > >
> >
> > Could you please read the proposed policy?  It explicitly says you are
> > *not* supposed to force extra deps on users but build manpages for them.
>
> Could you please what the other developers have already replied to
> you on this matter? This will be a significant increase in
> maintenance burden for both developers and advanced users without
> much to gain.
>

Yes, I get it.  User experience is not important if it would mean
developers would actually do anything but the bare minimum to get
from one paycheck to another.  The usual Gentoo attitude.

-- 
Best regards,
Michał Górny