Bug#740894: gmsh: please make tetgen an optional feature for gmsh

[Francesco Poli (wintermute)]

Package: gmsh
Version: 2.8.4+dfsg-1
Severity: wishlist

Hello,
thanks a lot for maintaining gmsh in Debian.

I see that tetgen support was enabled in gmsh/2.8.4+dfsg-1, thus
creating the new dependency on libtet1.5 ...

I would like to point out that the current license of tetgen
is the GNU AfferoGPL v3, which is a highly controversial license:
despite being considered acceptable [1] for Debian main by Debian
ftp-masters, it is considered non-free by a number of people
(including me [2]...).

[1] https://bugs.debian.org/495721#17
[2] https://bugs.debian.org/495721#28

Please note that I am *not* a member of the Debian Project, I am
just an external contributor who's very interested (among other things)
in licensing issues.


Since I think the GNU AfferoGPL v3 is non-free, I would like to kindly
ask you to make tetgen support in gmsh an optional feature, so that
libtet1.5 may be downgraded from the Depends to the Recommends control
field.

In other words, I hope that there will again be the possibility to install
and use the gmsh Debian package *without* installing the tetgen or libtet1.5
Debian package and *without* unpacking AfferoGPL-licensed files onto the
system. That is to say, no strong dependencies on libtet1.5 or inclusion
of tetgen files into the gmsh package, please!

I really hope this can be done.
Thanks for your time and patience.