Re: #38544: Gettext solution (Was: Re: gettext packages)

[Julian Gilbey <J.D.Gilbey@qmw.ac.uk>]

> > Let's follow Joe User's example:
> > 
> > Suppose gettext is splitted into gettext and gettext-dev ("gettext-dev"
> > because you insist that a development package needs to be named whatever-dev).
> > 
> > Joe User wants to compile and install a package whose README file says
> > "you need gettext to compile this package".
> > 
> > Joe User would then complain "Ok, I have the gettext package installed,
> > but it still does not work. Why?".
> 
>  Long ago the gettext package contained a library, and the development
> utils. This has always been the `spirit' of the gettext package and you are
> right when you say this.
>  The library has moved to libc, and the gettext binary (which its name
> doesn't name the package) is just a little wrapper around a standard library
> call.
>  My proposal is to move the gettext binary to the libc6 package (or some
> othe essential package) and leave the gettext package for developers.

Interesting proposal, but non-trivial to implement: you'll need to
handle the message catalogs, the supporting library functions and the
like.  I think it doesn't stand that much chance of being implemented
upstream.

   Julian

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  Julian Gilbey, Dept of Maths, QMW, Univ. of London. J.D.Gilbey@qmw.ac.uk
        Debian GNU/Linux Developer,  see http://www.debian.org/~jdg