Re: Bug#220838: ITP: verbiste -- a french conjugation system

[Florent Rougon <f.rougon@free.fr>]

Joe Drew <hoserhead@woot.net> wrote:

> A better formula would be "$PACKAGE (is|contains|provides) [a[n]]
> $SHORTDESC." which satisfies me. There is no need to have indefinite
> articles in the short description; just about every package will use
> them, and so their prescence can be inferred. The definite article
> ('the', for those wondering) implies something different, so I can
> understand the desire for its inclusion (although I dislike having
> articles included at all).

So, you don't intend the "formula" to be actually useful (i.e., without
any | or []).

> What absolutely, definitely is wrong for a description is something
> which doesn't even remotely fit into this mould, i.e.
>
> alien - install non-native packages with dpkg

So, your wish is to have (at least) 70% of the package descriptions to
start with "program for" or "program that". And to achieve this goal,
you are ready to drop the "a "s because they cause redundancy in package
descriptions. Don't you see a contradiction?

(also, as Steve pointed out, dropping the "a "s causes a loss in
grammatical consistency).

-- 
Florent