XEmacs/PSGML and missing catalogs
Hi,
A minor, possibly crazy wishlist (?) item, from a Debian newbie.
Executive summary: I think XEmacs (because of PSGML) really should
recommend that sgml-base be installed, but it doesn't. As a result,
using XEmacs to edit an HTML file results in errors when trying to
load the DTD.
Longer version:
I visited an HTML file this evening, and PSGML mode complained about
not being able to find the DTD. I've never seen that happen with
XEmacs before (I usually build it from source on Solaris at work, and
I've never had to install DTD/catalog files). A little investigation
showed that sgml-catalog-files was pointing at /usr/lib/sgml/... and
so on, and I did not have the sgml files installed. It was obvious to
me that Debian's XEmacs does not use the catalog/DTDs that come with
the PSGML code that is bundled with XEmacs.
Not being sure about what to do, on a hunch I looked up 'dpkg -p
psgml' which indicated that the psgml package only applied to Emacs
and not XEmacs. However, the 'suggests' lines for psgml indicated a
way out, so I installed it and everything else dselect recommended on
the conflict screens. XEmacs/PSGML now works for me like it should,
and I *really* like the way the whole thing is structured (actually,
like about most other things in Debian, I'm seriously impressed).
However, I'm just surprised that I had to install the Emacs psgml
package to have XEmacs psgml work out of the box (yes, all I should
have done was to install sgml-data, but since I'm a newbie, it took me
a while to figure it out ;-)
Maybe this is not really an issue, but since XEmacs includes PSGML, it
might be nice to suggest (but perhaps not force the installation of)
enough packages so that PSGML would work out of the box with
XEmacs?. Or at any rate, somehow inform the user that PSGML in Debian
XEmacs, unlike straight XEmacs builds, does recommend the installation
of sgml-base.
Or am I just crazy?
Cheers!
Shyamal
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