Bug#1078751: steam-devices: Add Appstream metainfo announcing HW support

[Simon McVittie]

Control: tags -1 = wontfix

On Thu, 15 Aug 2024 at 14:29:52 +0200, Petter Reinholdtsen wrote:
> Here is a patch to add Appstream metainfo XML announcing the hardware
> handled by this package.
> 
> Including this information in the package will ensure programs mapping
> hardware to packages using Appstream information, like the isenkram
> package, will know that this package is useful on machines where the
> hardware is discovered.

I don't think this is appropriate in this case. steam-devices sets up udev
rules so that ordinary users can create emulated input devices and get
"raw HID" access to game controllers, each of which is needed by some
Steam features - but that does reduce the extent to which users of a
multi-user system are protected from each other, so I think it would be
inappropriate to suggest it for installation just because (for example)
a Playstation 4 controller happens to have been detected.

Also, steam-devices doesn't have Appstream metadata of its own (the fact
that it's separated from Steam at all is a Debianism). The Appstream
metadata for which you proposed a patch is for (an installer for) the
Steam client itself (the installer is contrib, the client itself is very
much non-free), and as much as I enjoy being able to play games via Steam,
I don't think it's an appropriate thing to be suggesting for installation
just because some gaming hardware is present.

    smcv