install-info and LSB

[Chris Lawrence]

On Aug 31, Jeff Johnson wrote:
> On Sat, Aug 31, 2002 at 02:20:04PM -0500, Adam Heath wrote:
> > On Sat, 31 Aug 2002, Jack Howarth wrote:
> > 
> > >     Has there ever been any discussion of the binary
> > > /usr/sbin/install-info in terms of the Linux Standard
> > > Base? I ask because dpkg is providing a perl based
> > > version of this utility whereas all other distros
> > > appear to be using binary only version. This came up
> > > because the regex in perl 5.80 is buggy and breaks
> > > the perl install-info for building glibc now. As a
> > > workaround I rebuilt texinfo-4.2 with all of the redhat
> > > install-info related patches and substituted this
> > > binary only version for the one dpkg installs. While
> > > this version is sufficient for building the packages
> > > there does appear to be some incompatibilities related
> > > to installing glibc-doc with this version of install-info.
> > >     I am wondering if we aren't violating the spirit
> > > if not the letter of LSB by using a non-standard version
> > > of install-info. Wouldn't it be better to move install-info
> > > out of dpkg, add any required additional functionality
> > > to the texinfo version of install-info and push those
> > > changes upstream to the texinfo maintainers? Since
> > > install-info is being called at both the Makefile level
> > > in builds as well as at the packager level (eg rpm or
> > > dpkg) it seems that we would be much better off if the
> > > install-info used by debian was uniform with what
> > > everyone else is using (be it a perl or binary version).
> > > Any comments?
> > 
> > Yes.  you're a moron.
> 
> Well that's pretty much true for anyone who posts to lsb-discuss,
> including you and me. :-)
> 
> There are several issues that might be candidates for standardization:
> 
> 	1) path to install-info executable
> 	2) arguments to install-info
> 	3) content, both input and output, of install-info
> 	4) location (or possibly configuration to specify) of output
> 
> before we have to get back to feuding and fussing about uglix.

Well, the LSB does not standardize what install-info should do,
therefore Debian is not "violating" (failing to comply with) the LSB. 

I guess you could make the argument that Debian probably should call
its install-info something else, but then again we could have the same
arguments about GNU tar versus Joerg Schilling's tar versus *BSD's tar.

In the meantime, my suggestion would be to realize that Debian sid is
unstable and that things can and do break.  Unfortunately install-info
was one of those things (but it appears to be fixed now that perl
5.8.0-10 is installed).

(To put it another way, this has nothing to do with the LSB; if you
want to whine about your distribution's general breakage, do it on
their lists - which you have already done anyway - or on IRC.)


Chris
-- 
Chris Lawrence <cnlawren at phy.olemiss.edu> - http://www.lordsutch.com/chris/

Computer Systems Manager, Physics and Astronomy, Univ. of Mississippi
125B Lewis Hall - 662-915-5765