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Re: Why does doc packages need to contain gzipped files?



Hi,

On Sun, Jun 25, 2006 at 11:05:54AM +0200, Martin Wuertele wrote:
> * Eduard Bloch <edi@gmx.de> [2006-06-25 10:18]:
> 
> > * Martin Wuertele [Sun, Jun 25 2006, 08:09:57AM]:
> >
> > > file-roller does view pdf.gz and if e.g. firefox handels them incorrect
> > > it should be fixed in there. We don't change policy when programs are
> > > broken, we fix them.
> > 
> > What shitty kind of reasoing is that? "If it does not use my extra stuff
> > then it is incorrect?" "If Debian does not use RedHat Kickstart then it
> > is broken?"
> 
> Do you have some arguements beside the rant? 

See my other post.

> firefox definitely should
> handle .txt.gz and other gzipped plaintext documentation. I'm not
> talking about pdfs, as in the thread back then I still prefere to use
> the built-in compression available for pdfs.

Agree here on "the built-in compression available for pdfs".

Is there any external tool to convert PDF with better internal
compression?  I want to see ome PDF make file to use it to improve their
PDF.  Some PDF can still be compressed 50%, as I posted, which is bad.

> > > > then I do not understand why it is done.
> > > 
> > > See other mails in this thread, ther are good reasons to keep doc
> > > packages compressed, e.g. half a gig of space saving.
> > 
> > This extrapolation does hardly describe the real situation. Who install
> > all -doc packages available in Debian and does not use them?
>  
> That number was from a typical installation. I don't think pdfs should
> be gzipped but the built-in compression should be used. However not
> compressing anything is a real unnecessary waste of space. 
> 
> On my portable I have ~4.6K gzipped files in /usr/share/doc and only 39
> of them are pdfs, 4 are html files. 
> 
> I just copied the whole /user/share/doc (169M) to another lvm and
> uncompressed everything in there - a typical installation - and
> uncompressed all the gzipped files. That results in a total of 323M
> nearly doubling the required space. 

But it is a tiny difference considering your /usr may be as big as 2GB.

> I favour keepin plaintext documentation gzipped therefore.

I understand your point here.  We should not rush this nor unzipping
should be default even in the future for changelog etc.

Step should be:

 1. No more *.pdf.gz file. (That is now)

 2. Wait for smart dpkg which can do smart thing upon unpacking. (Such
    as dropping /usr/share/doc, /usr/share/info/,...)

 3. Ask for unzip option by user preference for text/man/info pages in
    usr/share/*/ by dpkg later as wishlist.  (Disk will be much cheaper then.)
    This will give you faster man/info/... if it is CPU bound.

Osamu



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