Texinfo vs. Debian install-info

[karl@freefriends.org (Karl Berry)]

Hi Nicolas,

I am the maintainer of GNU Texinfo.  Norbert Preining and I worked for a
while on a scheme to rationalize the install-info mess.  Norbert
forwarded the recent mail on this topic to me.  I just had a couple of
comments, FWIW.

   - This install-info should support the current dpkg's install-info

Norbert wrote up some details for this; unfortunately I don't have his
email at hand right now, but we could probably dig it up.  My ideal
would be for Debian to use the install-info program from the Texinfo
package, and not have to modify it.

   - Add an update-info-dir script

In case it helps, there are several such scripts already in the util/
directory of the Texinfo source distribution.  (They are not installed
anywhere.)  I have never extensively used any of them, so don't have a
specific one to recommend, but maybe it would be worth looking at them.

   - Add support for multiple dir files in the info viewer.

It is already there, in both Emacs and standalone Info, and has been for
many years.  They merge together dir files from many directories.

   - These packages should just drop their info files in /usr/share/info,
     and call the update-info-dir script if present (postinst and prerm).

The GNU standards already say that install-info should be called as part
of make install.  So for packages complying with that, it doesn't seem
to me that any Debian-specific install action should be necessary.

I hope we can finally get this straightened out.

Best,
Karl