Re: [Review - not yet] Re: [ITP] gtypist-2.7

[Igor Pechtchanski <pechtcha at cs dot nyu dot edu>]

Umm, Yaakov, line wrap, please...

On Tue, 9 Dec 2003, Yaakov Selkowitz wrote:

> Igor Pechtchanski wrote:
>
> > I don't have time for a functionality review, but I've taken a look at
> > the packaging.  The README lists 'emacs' as a runtime requirement.
> > Is it really required?  I understood that it was optional...  It does
> > seem to be a build-time requirement, though.
>
> I myself debated for a while whether to include emacs as a requirement.
> Configure looks for emacs and decides in which directory to install the
> relevant files.  If a system didn't have emacs I guess it would continue
> anyway--it's not needed for the program itself--it just wouldn't install
> those files.

Yes, but the detection will happen on the *packager's* system, and the
files will be installed (or not installed) on the *user's* system.  So, if
you want to re-create the full package, you better have emacs on your
system, but emacs is not needed to install and use the package.  So, it's
a build-time requirement, but not a run-time one.  Does this make sense?

> Similarly there's typefortune, a perl script for creating new lessons.
> Also optional, and I don't think that configure looks for perl.

It's your call on this.  IMO, since typefortune is more of a "development"
tool (i.e., "normal" users will probably never need it), it probably
doesn't make sense to drag the whole perl in...  But ultimately you, as
the packager, decide.

> In the README, emacs and perl could be listed as optional for runtime
> and emacs required for build.  But what about setup.hint?

Leave emacs out of setup.hint.  Those who'll want to use the emacs mode
will have emacs installed anyway.  See above for perl.

> > Also, shouldn't this be in the "Games" category as well ("Text" is
> > ok)?
>
> I don't think of it as a game really.  It's a real typing tutor; my wife
> started using it here to learn to touch-type.  I'll take input on this
> though.

Well, I've been expecting it to be a game from the days of the old DOS
typing tutor...  I'll let other people speak up on this.

> > In the source package script, the 'install' step will not stop if 'make
> > install' fails.  Neither will the 'mkpatch' step if source archive
> > decompression fails.  The output of 'strip' is redirected to the bit
> > bucket, so if anything goes wrong, there will be no clues (and there are
> > two 'find' commands when one will suffice, as someone [Gareth?] noticed).
> > Also, strip may fail, which isn't caught.  I've inlined a patch below.
>
> Thanks.  I 'borrowed' this script from GraphicsMagick with some
> modifications, but I think some of these patches Howard Hunt may want to
> note also.

Yeah, I saw the "generic-build-script" message...  Perhaps the mods could
be propagated back to it, somehow.

> > The source build fails for me with the following error:
> >
> > /bin/bash: line 1: help2man: command not found
> > make[2]: *** [gtypist.1] Error 127
> > make[2]: Leaving directory `/tmp/apps/gtypist/src/gtypist-2.7/.build'
> > make[1]: *** [all-recursive] Error 1
> > make[1]: Leaving directory `/tmp/apps/gtypist/src/gtypist-2.7/.build'
> > make: *** [all] Error 2
> >
> > But 'help2man' is not listed as a build requirement.  There is also no
> > 'help2man' script in the source distribution.  I noticed that other
> > packages (e.g., fileutils, gperf, sed, texinfo) do include a version of
> > this script in the sources.  Perhaps it would be a good idea here as
> > well, as there is no 'help2man' Cygwin package...
>
> WHOOPS!  This is a good example of getting ahead of oneself.  I made a
> package of help2man-1.29 (if you used setup.exe on my website it's
> there) and installed it a while ago, so it worked fine for me.  I never
> noticed that it used help2man, and I'm pretty sure configure doesn't
> look for this either.

No, it doesn't (it defines GEN_MAN unconditionally as "help2man ./gtypist
-o gtypist.1" -- yuk!).

> My package 'd' also needs help2man to build, but it comes with the
> sources.  In this case, I could either include a copy in CYGWIN-PATCHES,
> or (as was suggested last time) get a help2man package added to the net
> distro.

Judging by the above list of packages that distribute help2man, just stick
it in the source distro.  It's not that large.  Although I would put it in
the regular source dir, not CYGWIN-PATCHES...  Oh, and you'd need to
change GEN_MAN in configure.in and configure to something like
"$(srcdir)/help2man ./gtypist -o gtypist.1", anyway).

> The problem with the latter is that the newest versions of help2man
> require a perl module, Locale::gettext, and even then by me it doesn't
> build.  Version 1.29 is the last version that didn't need this perl
> module, so I packaged it for myself a while ago.  I know that some
> packages here are older because newer versions just don't build or work
> on Cygwin, but I didn't want to propose it so fast because it's not the
> newest version.
>
> Any comments on the above would be appreciated.  Thanks for your review!
> Yaakov

IMO, there's nothing wrong with help2man being dependent on perl.  But
again, I think you can simply include the script in the source distro.
	Igor
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