[bt-devel] PDFs and other object files in source tarballs (was: Re: Committed English handbook pdf, r1829)

[Eeli Kaikkonen]

On Thu, 19 Nov 2009, Jonathan Marsden wrote:

> Martin Gruner wrote:
>
> > Am Dienstag, 17. November 2009 23:26:14 schrieb Jonathan Marsden:
>
> >> I'd prefer not, or I'll probably have to do extra work to create a
> >> special PDF-less tarball each time!  PDF is not the preferred source
> >> form of the information,
>
> > Who defines that?
>
> Whoever creates and edits the documentation.  If they actually edit it
> as PDF files using a PDF editing application, then sure, in that case,
> those PDFs are the preferred source form of that documentation!
> However, if they edit it as XML, docbook or whatever other schema they
> choose, then *that* is the preferred source form of that documentation.

Thanks for a lengthy response. I was writing my own when this arrived.

Basically I agree with Jonathan in evey point.

First, we should enhance our make system and not handle machine
generated files as source.

Second, qm files are binary files, not source. I have noticed this
sometimes but didn't think of it further.

Third, I don't see any need for shipping html or pdf with the source
package unless something is written directly in html. We can release a
documentation package if someone wants to build from source but for some
odd reason needs pdf files and can't set up his build environment to
build them (do such people even exist?) . If the build system is decent
it checks for needed programs and either builds the docs or tells that
the generators weren't available. Building the application shouldn't of
course be depended on availability of documentation generators.

BTW, I still would like to see a "make bin" and "make install-bin"
targets which compile the application but don't even try to compile or
install any documentation. Using ccache won't help with needless bunch
of installation messages when the documentation is checked/installed
every time even if I never need those docs in my development process.
Not a big deal but bugs me every time.

If we decide to continue shipping generated/binary formats with the
source package, maybe we can at least add a make target "make
minimal-source" which would delete all non-really-source files. The
debian maintainer wouldn't then need to remove them manually.


  Yours,
	Eeli Kaikkonen (Mr.), Oulu, Finland
	e-mail: eekaikko at mailx.studentx.oulux.fix (with no x)