Re: gripes about packages
On Fri, Sep 15, 2000 at 01:34:00PM -0700, Peter Jay Salzman wrote:
> dear all,
>
> there are 3 packages which work, but could be made **much** better,
> considering the flack that debian gets as being the 'hard'
> distribution.
>
> for instance, it's absurd to install xfstt and not give the user a
> heads up that they should:
>
> 1. install fonts in /usr/share/fonts/truetop
> 2. add (or at least THE USER) a FontPath to XF86Config
/usr/share/doc/xfstt/README.Debian First paragraph.
See also man xfstt and man xfs.
Most packages put a README in /usr/share/doc/<package>
> and god forbid xfstt should come with a startup script placed in
> init.d and symlinked to the relevant runlevels.
Funny, I got an init script. Maybe it was missing in potato. Doesn't
seem likely though.
> these things are so simple, and would save the newbie from heartache.
> plus, for people who are more experienced with xfstt, like me, it
> would be a good reminder of what needs to be done and especially where
> debian expects the fonts to go.
See FHS (http://www.pathname.com/fhs/). Debian Potato/Woody mostly
conform to this.
> i'm only picking on xfstt because it was the first package i noticed
> that really could be made MUCH better. i would also like to say that
> imwheel and netscape are also both deficient. i mean, look at this:
>
> for d in \ /usr/lib/netscape/base-4/wrapper.d \
> /usr/lib/netscape/$VER/wrapper.d \
> /usr/lib/netscape/$VER/$BIN/wrapper.d ;do for f in $(ls -1 $d |
> sort); do . $d/$f done done
>
> what's up with this? why write a script that makes the user have to
> see error messages every time they start up netscape? shouldn't we
> all KNOW where wrapper.d is? it's not like this script run on a suse
> system.
I don't KNOW what you mean... Variables allow programs/scripts to handle
variable situations. But yes, that script does kind of bug, since the
errors are really just warnings that aren't important.
> perhaps the maintainers don't know about stuff like this? my gripes
> aren't bug reports; they're just plain common sense.
Most of the maintainers are highly competent. Most things are done for
a reason. Finding out the reason, well...
> how can i find the email addresses of the maintainers of these
> packages?
dpkg -s <package>
--
/bin/sh ~/.signature:
Command not found
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