Bug#930311: lintian: Possible exception to package-contains-documentation-outside-usr-share-doc

[Niels Thykier <niels@thykier.net>]

Package: lintian
Version: 2.15.0
Severity: normal

Hi,

I noticed that the dh-r package by default creates an override for
package-contains-documentation-outside-usr-share-doc when the R
package puts documentation in usr/lib/R/site-library:

"""
    my $check_for_docs = `find debian/$dh{FIRSTPACKAGE} -type f -name "*.md" -o -name "*.Rmd" -o -name "README" -o -name "README.md" | grep -v 'usr/share/doc'`;
    if ( $check_for_docs ) {
        say "Create lintian-override for package-contains-documentation-outside-usr-share-doc due to $check_for_docs";
        open(my $lintian, ">>", "debian/lintian-overrides");
        say $lintian "# The documentation is where it is expected by GNU R users";
        say $lintian "$dh{FIRSTPACKAGE}: package-contains-documentation-outside-usr-share-doc usr/lib/R/site-library/*";
        close $lintian;
    }
"""
(source: https://sources.debian.org/src/dh-r/20190121/dh/R.pm/?hl=3#L268)

My question is: Should we move this exception to lintian itself and
stop having people automate overrides or should something else be
done?  (To be explicit: The latter is an open question as I am not
sure what the "proper something else" would be in this case)

Thanks,
~Niels