Neil Williams wrote: > The problem is that with packages like gnome-devel and gnome-core-devel > (re: anjuta) >50% will require SOME of the Recommended packages. As a > long term anjuta user, I would estimate that <5% of all users need ALL > Recommended packages. > > What is the anjuta / gnome-devel maintainer meant to do in this > situation? S/He isn't psychic, there is no way to know which Recommends > are going to be a waste of space. That is up to the user, so let the > user decide - on a per-package basis. > Policy does not mandate that ALL Recommends: are to be installed. The > new default makes Recommends: disappear completely - there would be no > difference between Depends: and Recommends: just like there is a > perception of no real difference between Recommends: and Suggests: at > the moment. Look at what happens when I install anjuta with the new default enabled: joey@kodama:~>sudo apt-get install --install-recommends anjuta Password: Reading package lists... Done Building dependency tree Reading state information... Done The following extra packages will be installed: anjuta-common autogen automake bluefish doc-gnome-hig exuberant-ctags glade-gnome gnome-common gnome-core-devel gnome-devel gtk-doc-tools gtranslator libatspi-dev libgail-gnome-dev libgail-gnome-module libgbf-1-0 libgbf-1-common libgdl-gnome-1-0 libgtkhtml3.14-dev liboobs-1-dev libopts25 libopts25-dev libpango1.0-0 libpango1.0-common libpango1.0-dev libsoup2.2-dev libvte-dev libvte9 libxslt1-dev libxtst-dev x11proto-record-dev Suggested packages: libgtkmm2.0-dev libgnomemm2.0-dev devhelp-books glade-2 glade-gnome-2 automake1.10-doc weblint-perl weblint at-spi-doc ttf-kochi-gothic ttf-kochi-mincho ttf-thryomanes ttf-baekmuk libsoup2.2-doc Recommended packages: ctags The following NEW packages will be installed: anjuta anjuta-common autogen automake bluefish doc-gnome-hig exuberant-ctags glade-gnome gnome-common gnome-core-devel gnome-devel gtk-doc-tools gtranslator libatspi-dev libgail-gnome-dev libgail-gnome-module libgbf-1-0 libgbf-1-common libgdl-gnome-1-0 libgtkhtml3.14-dev liboobs-1-dev libopts25 libopts25-dev libsoup2.2-dev libvte-dev libxslt1-dev libxtst-dev x11proto-record-dev The following packages will be upgraded: libpango1.0-0 libpango1.0-common libpango1.0-dev libvte9 4 upgraded, 28 newly installed, 0 to remove and 92 not upgraded. Need to get 13.3MB/14.8MB of archives. After unpacking 42.8MB of additional disk space will be used. Do you want to continue [Y/n]? Since apt lists Recommends in its own area, they are not indistinguishable from Depends (or Suggests). Also, if I decide I don't want ctags, I can hit "N" and run joey@kodama:~>sudo apt-get install --install-recommends anjuta ctags- .... Need to get 13.2MB/14.7MB of archives. After unpacking 42.6MB of additional disk space will be used. Do you want to continue [Y/n]? Thereby saving that crucial .2 MB of disk space that all installers of GNOME IDEs certianly care about. ;-) > Recommends: because maintainers will lose any reason to put things in > Recommends: and will end up putting everything in Depends: just as many > current Recommends: are actually just Suggests: > Overlap between Recommends: and Suggests: is FAR LESS of a problem > than blurring the lines between Recommends: and Depends: as WILL > happen when people get used to the new default and assume that > everyone has all the Recommends: anyway. Don't these two statements contradict each other? > Has anyone even considered the extra bandwidth / code churn / mirror > requirements of adding hundreds of unwanted packages to every > new installation? To reiterate, recommended packages will not be installed by by d-i until all the recommends are sane. In d-i/tasksel we currently have to track recommends and hardcode the sane ones on while ignoring the other ones, which is tedious and failure prone. -- see shy jo
Attachment:
signature.asc
Description: Digital signature