[xml/sgml-pkgs] Bug#519389: xmlto: Recommends will pull over 500M of dependencies

[Michael Biebl]

Package: xmlto
Version: 0.0.21-5
Severity: normal

Hi,

apt and aptitude both install Recommends by default. 
Doing a install of xmlto on a minimal system will pull over 500M!
of dependencies:

For the numbers:

# aptitude install --with-recommends xmlto
Reading package lists... Done
Building dependency tree       
Reading state information... Done
Initializing package states... Done
Writing extended state information... Done
The following NEW packages will be installed:
  apt-utils{a} dblatex{a} defoma{a} doc-base{a} docbook-xml{a} 
  docbook-xsl{a} docbook-xsl-doc-html{a} dvipdfmx{a} ed{a} file{a} 
  fontconfig-config{a} ghostscript{a} gs-common{a} gsfonts{a} 
  gsfonts-x11{a} lacheck{a} latex-beamer{a} latex-xcolor{a} lesstif2{a} 
  libcups2{a} libcupsimage2{a} libdb4.5{a} libexpat1{a} libfontconfig1{a} 
  libfontenc1{a} libfreetype6{a} libfreezethaw-perl{a} libfribidi0{a} 
  libgcrypt11{a} libgnutls26{a} libgpg-error0{a} libgs8{a} 
  libgssapi-krb5-2{a} libice6{a} libjpeg62{a} libk5crypto3{a} 
  libkeyutils1{a} libkpathsea4{a} libkrb5-3{a} libkrb5support0{a} 
  libmagic1{a} libmldbm-perl{a} libnewt0.52{a} libopenjpeg2{a} 
  libpaper-utils{a} libpaper1{a} libpng12-0{a} libpoppler4{a} libpopt0{a} 
  libsm6{a} libsqlite3-0{a} libt1-5{a} libtasn1-3{a} libtiff4{a} 
  libuuid-perl{a} libx11-6{a} libx11-data{a} libxau6{a} libxaw7{a} 
  libxcb1{a} libxdmcp6{a} libxext6{a} libxfont1{a} libxml2{a} 
  libxml2-utils{a} libxmu6{a} libxp6{a} libxpm4{a} libxslt1.1{a} libxt6{a} 
  lmodern{a} lsb-release{a} lynx{a} lynx-cur{a} mime-support{a} pgf{a} 
  preview-latex-style{a} prosper{a} ps2eps{a} psfontmgr{a} python{a} 
  python-apt{a} python-central{a} python-minimal{a} python-support{a} 
  python2.5{a} python2.5-minimal{a} sgml-base{a} sgml-data{a} tex-common{a} 
  texlive{a} texlive-base{a} texlive-base-bin{a} texlive-base-bin-doc{a} 
  texlive-common{a} texlive-doc-base{a} texlive-extra-utils{a} 
  texlive-fonts-recommended{a} texlive-fonts-recommended-doc{a} 
  texlive-generic-extra{a} texlive-generic-recommended{a} 
  texlive-humanities{a} texlive-humanities-doc{a} texlive-latex-base{a} 
  texlive-latex-base-doc{a} texlive-latex-extra{a} 
  texlive-latex-extra-doc{a} texlive-latex-recommended{a} 
  texlive-latex-recommended-doc{a} texlive-math-extra{a} 
  texlive-pictures{a} texlive-pictures-doc{a} texlive-pstricks{a} 
  texlive-pstricks-doc{a} texpower{a} texpower-manual{a} tipa{a} 
  ttf-dejavu{a} ttf-dejavu-core{a} ttf-dejavu-extra{a} ucf{a} whiptail{a} 
  x11-common{a} xfonts-encodings{a} xfonts-utils{a} xml-core{a} xmlto 
  xpdf{a} xpdf-common{a} xpdf-reader{a} xpdf-utils{a} xsltproc{a} 
0 packages upgraded, 132 newly installed, 0 to remove and 0 not upgraded.
Need to get 248MB/260MB of archives. After unpacking 529MB will be used.

vs

# aptitude install --without-recommends xmlto
Reading package lists... Done
Building dependency tree       
Reading state information... Done
Reading extended state information      
Initializing package states... Done
The following NEW packages will be installed:
  docbook-xml{a} docbook-xsl{a} libgcrypt11{a} libgpg-error0{a} libxml2{a} 
  libxml2-utils{a} libxslt1.1{a} sgml-base{a} sgml-data{a} xml-core{a} 
  xmlto xsltproc{a} 
The following packages are RECOMMENDED but will NOT be installed:
  dblatex docbook-xsl-doc-html docbook-xsl-doc-pdf docbook-xsl-doc-text 
  libpaper-utils 
0 packages upgraded, 12 newly installed, 0 to remove and 0 not upgraded.
Need to get 0B/3540kB of archives. After unpacking 19.0MB will be used.


This is just a bit too much for my taste. Certainly the list of
Recommends should be tuned a little ;-)
One is within xmlto itself, which recommends texlive, that itself
amounts to 300M of dependencies. I'm not too familiar with all those
different document processing tool chains, so I'll leave it to you and
others to decide, which of the depencies should be demoted to a
Suggests. I'm also aware that it's not xmlto's fault alone and other
packages should adjust their dependencies too. Please clone this bug as
you feel appropriate.

Cheers,
Michael

-- System Information:
Debian Release: squeeze/sid
  APT prefers unstable
  APT policy: (500, 'unstable'), (300, 'experimental')
Architecture: i386 (i686)

Kernel: Linux 2.6.28.7
Locale: LANG=de_DE.UTF-8, LC_CTYPE=de_DE.UTF-8 (charmap=UTF-8)
Shell: /bin/sh linked to /bin/dash

Versions of packages xmlto depends on:
ii  debianutils              2.31            Miscellaneous utilities specific t
ii  docbook-xml              4.5-6           standard XML documentation system,
ii  docbook-xsl              1.73.2.dfsg.1-5 stylesheets for processing DocBook
ii  libc6                    2.9-4           GNU C Library: Shared libraries
ii  libxml2-utils            2.7.3.dfsg-1    XML utilities
ii  sgml-base                1.26            SGML infrastructure and SGML catal
ii  xsltproc                 1.1.24-2        XSLT command line processor

Versions of packages xmlto recommends:
pn  dblatex                      <none>      (no description available)
ii  libpaper-utils               1.1.23+nmu1 library for handling paper charact

Versions of packages xmlto suggests:
pn  fop | xmltex                <none>       (no description available)
ii  lynx                        2.8.7dev13-1 Text-mode WWW Browser (transitiona
ii  w3m                         0.5.2-2+b1   WWW browsable pager with excellent

-- no debconf information