Re: exif --remove not idempotent, and a Debian man page bug
On Sat 24 Sep 2022 at 12:13:09 (+1200), Alex King wrote:
> On 24/09/22 03:32, Greg Wooledge wrote:
> > On Fri, Sep 23, 2022 at 11:22:31AM -0400, The Wanderer wrote:
> > > 'man bash' cites Brian Fox and Chet Ramey as the authors, and gives an
> > > E-mail address for each. (It's possible that they may be the active
> > > upstream maintainers, as well.)
> >
> > Chet Ramey is the current upstream bash maintainer. Brian Fox has not
> > been involved with bash development for decades. Nevertheless, removing
> > Brian's email address from the AUTHORS section is neither necessary nor
> > desirable. Everyone knows it's a historical section.
> >
> I've been using Debian as my main OS since 1997 or earlier. I've
> spent 100s of hours reading man pages. Although it's a reasonable
> assumption (since there are a lot of man pages with outdated AUTHORS
> sections), I didn't know the AUTHORS section is supposed to be an
> historical record.
>
> Have you got a reference to that somewhere? After all (some) man
> pages have a HISTORY section for historical information.
Unless you come up with a patch to do this, and maintain it to cope
with upstream modifications, you're at the mercy of the upstream
and, of course, the Author.
> > In the case of the bash(1) page, it's actually followed by a BUG REPORTS
> > section, telling you how to submit bug reports to the upstream maintainer.
> > That's not common in man pages, but clearly not unheard of either.
> >
> > As a Debian user, however, one is expected to know how to file bug reports
> > correctly. It is NOT done by trudging through the man page looking for
> > the first email address one can find. It's done by using the reportbug
> > tool, or by following the instructions on the <https://bugs.debian.org/>
> > web site.
>
> Again, I sometimes report bugs to Debian and sometimes to upstream,
> and occasionally email maintainers directly, especially if I can't
> work out if any upstream still exists and especially if the software
> is not (any longer) in Debian.
>
> How is it expected that a new user will have learnt "how to file bug
> reports correctly?" What is the typical path for a Debian user to
> pick up that knowledge? What even is the correct way to report bugs,
> and where is that documented? I see
> https://www.debian.org/Bugs/Reporting, which mentions "Don't file bugs
> upstream, if you file a bug in Debian" Perhaps you can point to some
> documentation discussing whether to report a bug to Debian or through
> other channels. Or perhaps a statement recommending (particularly
> newbies) to report all bugs direct to Debian. It seems to be implied,
> but I didn't see where it was stated explicitly.
Typically, the maintainer is given in several places, like the Bugs
page, the Packages page, the Tracker page, and the Packages file.
The last of these gives the URL of the software's home page as well.
> I see at https://www.debian.org/support, that after IRC, this list is
> the second channel mentioned for people seeking support with Debian.
>
> I believe using phrases like "Everyone knows it's a historical
> section." when the OP didn't seem to know that, and "one is expected
> to know how" is not particularly helpful. Especially on the channel
> that is the first (usable) point of contact for new users seeking
> support, if they are not familiar with IRC.
>
[ … ]
>
> In relation to man pages, perhaps everyone could agree that ideally
> historical email addresses could be removed from the AUTHORS section
> and moved to a HISTORY section. I'm sure we can all agree this should
> not be mandatory, but those who feel most strongly about it could
> contribute patches...
Good to see that they're identifying themselves here :)
Cheers,
David.
Reply to: