Ubuntu

Bug #905328
Comment #4

Comment 4 for bug 905328

Revision history for this message

Sergio Callegari (callegar) wrote on 2012-04-02:

I still see the needs-packaging as valid, following the reasoning below:

1) Most likely, TL2011 will not make it in precise. So, we gonna be stuck with 2009 until october. By that time we will get 2011... but texlive 2012 is goning to be out by june. Not a single linux distro has ever ever succeeded shipping an up to date texlive... Hence, saying that the bug is no longer valid does not feel very convincing.

2) As you mention, the issue is not TL2011, is remaining stuck with TL2011 until 2017... I do not blame the packagers at all... the problem is that TL is a huge thing. It is for a reason that they have incorporated its own package management into it in the end.

3) Is the debian TL really so much better than the original in terms of stability? Truly debian has a big patchset against texlive, but many things are indeed trivial (e.g. using the paper lib). The other way round older TL editions have many broken packages, which get progressively fixed. Staying with older TL, means that one ends up having tons of sty files scattered around to get desired behaviors. Furthermore, TL may be buggy, but is rather reactive at shipping the updated stuff when something broken is found.

4) Older TexLive means that no-one in debian/ubuntu is ever getting to testing and helping the progress of luatex

5) Is there any statistical information about people using TeX? TeX is already a rather techincal thing. So the percentage of people using TeX on ubuntu is already a small fraction of all ubuntu users and the fraction with higher programming skills. Can it be the case that a large fraction of this small fraction of users do not install the debianized texlive but rely on the original texlive to have the up-to-date thing?

6) Most important: and if you agree on this, please change the bug title accordingly. IMHO the biggest problem with the current TL packaging is package names and dependencies. Applications that should depend on some tex features (e.g. availability of latex, etc), end up depending on some specifix texlive debian package. This makes it quite difficult to set up ppa packages with an alternative tex distribution or an alternative packaging of texlive. Possibly, virtual packages should be used to provide tex features.

I still see the needs-packaging as valid, following the reasoning below:

3) Is the debian TL really so much better than the original in terms of stability? Truly debian has a big patchset against texlive, but many things are indeed trivial (e.g. using the paper lib).  The other way round older TL editions have many broken packages, which get progressively fixed. Staying with older TL, means that one ends up having tons of sty files scattered around to get desired behaviors. Furthermore, TL may be buggy, but is rather reactive at shipping the updated stuff when something broken is found.

4) Older TexLive means that no-one in debian/ubuntu is ever getting to testing and helping the progress of luatex

6) Most important: and if you agree on this, please change the bug title accordingly.  IMHO the biggest problem with the current TL packaging is package names and dependencies. Applications that should depend on some tex features (e.g. availability of latex, etc), end up depending on some specifix texlive debian package.  This makes it quite difficult to set up ppa packages with an alternative tex distribution or an alternative packaging of texlive. Possibly, virtual packages should be used to provide tex features.