Bug#196582: Upgrading severity.
From: Tore Anderson <tore@linpro.no>
Subject: Bug#196582: Upgrading severity.
Date: Tue, 15 Jul 2003 20:25:28 +0200
> By default, users who do not want (or do not understand what the question
> is all about) a Debconf-maintained configuration file, will be relegated
> to a quagmire where he will not have any indication that updates to this
> file is requred, when installing an additional TeX addon package.
>
> Should the user choose to give up the control of his configuration file,
> he will loose control of his own system and will be unable to edit the
> file directly, as a HOWTO might instruct him to, without being safe from
> update-texmf killing off his modifications.
Some misunderstanding here, I guess. update-texmf didn't kill
off user's modifications. Users modify files in /etc/texmf/texmf.d/
and every modifications are restored after update-texmf'ing.
How different it is to edit /etc/texmf/texmf.cnf and files in
/etc/texmf/texmf.d/ ?
> There's a perfectly good proof-of-concept patch which eliminates all
> the disadvantages, yet retains all the advantages of having the
> configuration file automatically generated. This has, however, not
> spurred the maintainer to even bothering to comment on the patch.
I was a bit tired to discuss this issue, sorry for that.
I think it is not good to provide /etc/texmf/texmf.cnf by default
because even if we put it under a control of ucf, a user's answer
will be uniquely "yes, please replace it" when an additional TeX
package modifies it. It is useless to ask here.
My rough idea is -- update-texmf distinguishes two cases:
one is when /var/lib/texmf/web2c/texmf.cnf is a real file
and then it will do in the same way as it does now.
the other is when /var/lib/texmf/web2c/texmf.cnf is a symlink
then it will put /etc/texmf/texmf.cnf under a control of ucf
as the patch does (I'm not sure if this is possible or not yet.)
This is only auxiliary service and theoretically there is
no need to provide /etc/texmf/texmf.cnf at all.
But I think it is not bad to provide /etc/texmf/texmf.cnf
as a last resort.
Anyway, this will be my long term goal and my short time goal
is to change the default answers of debconf questions to "yes"
(I plan to do it within this week at present)
> This package is not alone in asking too many questions, a fact that
> makes me look at this abuse of Debconf as an alarming trend which
> might be a serious defect in Debian as a whole if it is allowed to
> continue. Hence, I'm upgrading this bug's severity to 'important', and
> hope this will incite some response from the maintainers regarding
> the proposed solution as discussed earlier.
Thanks for your interest and sorry for late (delayed?) response.
2003-7-16(Wed)
--
Debian Developer & Debian JP Developer - much more I18N of Debian
Atsuhito Kohda <kohda@debian.org>
Department of Math., Univ. of Tokushima
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