[Debian-science-sagemath] gap packages [+ LaTeX]

[Ximin Luo]

Jerome BENOIT:
> Hello,
> 
> On 08/08/17 04:23, Ximin Luo wrote:
>> Hey, I have moved these to Suggests: instead. My reasoning is that they are sage "optional" packages:
>>
>> https://git.sagemath.org/sage.git/tree/build/pkgs/gap_packages/type?h=develop
>> https://git.sagemath.org/sage.git/tree/build/pkgs/gap_packages/SPKG.txt?h=develop
>>
>> and it is not necessary for them to be installed, for the standard tests to pass.
> 
> I have nothing against, nevertheless I think that a clear policy must be set up here
> because `Sage optional' may gather `Debian Recommends: and Suggests:'.
> 

By "standard" vs "optional" I mean the spkgs whose "type" file in build/pkgs/$package/type says "standard" or "optional". You can see them on our status page:

https://people.debian.org/~thansen/debian-sage-status.html

I'd suggest that packages in "optional" we put in Suggests:, and packages in "standard" we put in Depends: or Recommends:. At the moment we only have a few Recommends and it is fairly arbitrary, but I think it is a good choice so far:

- sagemath-jupyter - some people might only want to run the CLI, e.g. people that might be using the "sage" program in scripts
- sagemath-doc-en - it's very very big
- sagetex - I seem to remember, this was to break a cyclic dependency?
- texlive-latex-base - not sure, see below. configure.ac says it's "recommended, but not required"

https://www.debian.org/doc/debian-policy/ch-relationships.html#s-binarydeps

Depends: This declares an absolute dependency. A package will not be configured unless all of the packages listed in its Depends field have been correctly configured [..]
Recommends: This declares a strong, but not absolute, dependency. [..]
Suggests: This is used to declare that one package may be more useful with one or more others. [..]

> We may also consider a gap-sage package to gather gap packages expected by Sage. 
> 
> Furthermore, I suggest to perform standard tests with them to check the good behaviour
> of libgap-sage, which is mainly used by sage: as during the zeroth-packaging period,
> specific bug may emerge.
> 

I am not sure I understand you here. By "standard tests" I meant the tests that run when you give --all but not --optional. To test sage with these other gap packages, we would have to give --optional={gap packages} and also revert d1-test-optional.patch or part of it.

> 
> Otherwise, if SageMath only deals with LaTeX through SageTeX then texlive-latex-base
> should be removed from the Recommends: list.
> 
It seems that src/sage/misc/latex.py and some other files call pdflatex and other binaries in that package, in which case we should probably keep it in Recommends. I am not sure though, perhaps you'd like to take a look.

$ echo $(dpkg -L texlive-latex-base | grep /usr/bin/ | cut -b10-) | sed -e 's, ,\\|,g'
dvilualatex\|latex\|lualatex\|mptopdf\|pdfatfi\|pdflatex
$ git grep "!!"
[..]

> 
>>
>> sagemath is quite large already and it is nice to allow users to install only parts of it, in case they don't have much disk space.
> 
> I did not check, but I guess that this package are relatively small.
> 

Right, this was only a side point, and meant more to apply to potential other future packages.

X

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