Bug#496247: libpango1.0-0 depends on libx11-6 although it claims to be able to render for other means of output

[Olaf Schulz]

Package: libpango1.0-0
Version: 1.20.5-1
Severity: important


I need libpango as a dependency of librrd4 to generate
graphics from rrdtool for output on a (monitoring) web server.

Installing the current version of libpango1.0 would start introducing
X11 libraries on to the system which would be completely unnecessary
otherwise. I admit that I'm afraid to have a complete gnome system
within 2 years of package upgrades.

Either the description 
" four different font backends:
...
- Direct rendering of scalable fonts using the FreeType library"

or the dependency from libx11-6 and libxrender1
(and libx11-6 depending on x11-common in turn) seems to be at least bloating
in some uses of the package.

If the X11 dependency of some packages is achieved only by letting them depend
on libpango, would there be some other way? (yes, I guess that this is not a
package specific issue but rather a conceptual one).

Or do I completely misunderstand something?

regards
Olaf

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

Kernel: Linux 2.6.18
Locale: LANG=de_DE.UTF-8, LC_CTYPE=de_DE.UTF-8 (charmap=UTF-8)
Shell: /bin/sh linked to /bin/bash

Versions of packages libpango1.0-0 depends on:
ii  libc6                   2.7-5            GNU C Library: Shared libraries
pn  libcairo2               <none>           (no description available)
ii  libdatrie0              0.1.1-4          Double-array trie library
ii  libfontconfig1          2.4.2-1.2        generic font configuration library
ii  libfreetype6            2.3.5-1+b1       FreeType 2 font engine, shared lib
ii  libglib2.0-0            2.14.4-2         The GLib library of C routines
pn  libpango1.0-common      <none>           (no description available)
pn  libthai0                <none>           (no description available)
pn  libx11-6                <none>           (no description available)
pn  libxft2                 <none>           (no description available)
pn  libxrender1             <none>           (no description available)
ii  zlib1g                  1:1.2.3.3.dfsg-8 compression library - runtime

libpango1.0-0 recommends no packages.

libpango1.0-0 suggests no packages.