Bug#720489: gnome-shell: Please do not use --disable-ibus

[Osamu Aoki]

Source: gnome-shell
Version: 3.8.3-1
Severity: important

Request:
Please remove --disable-ibus in debian/rules

Back ground:
I know this is a bit controversial issue.  So please read this
carefully.

I have used FC19 and enjoyed new GNOME IM UI.  So now I know how GNOME
upstream likes to set the IM UI for the future GNOME despite it will
break backward compatibility and they have proved good UI results.

For wheezy, I knew this transition is going to be too much for Debian to
cope with under freeze. I advocated to keep ibus in older version to
make sure it works with older GNOME UI API.

That is why we have 1.4.1-9 (and s-p-u 1.4.1-9+deb7u1) despite of the
fact ibus upstream had newer 1.5 series as their default then.  Debian
GNOME release with wheezy did not integrate ibus. (FYI: despite the
package version name, actual content is essentially upstream 1.4.2)

Since then, GNOME upstream has gone to integrate ibus 1.5.  FC18 may
have been rocky (I did not test) but FC19 (GNOME 3.8) result is great as
I see.

This GNOME ibus integration should happen for new 1.5 series ibus to be
usable as I understand with GNOME 3.8.  Of course, NEW backward
incompatible change breaks things.  The other popular IM framework,
fcitx, may not be compatible.  

I am aware that initially people did not like negatives they faced with
this integrated IM code.

  http://bugs.debian.org/694301

Thus we have this deviation from upstream --disable-ibus.

FC19 uses configuration with ibus 1.5 integrated.  Their build script
does not use this build flag --disable-ibus.  It may have been good idea
with GNOME 3.6 but with GNOME 3.8 this really cripples main part of IM
UI (not just corner case packages which did not get updated for ibus
1.5).

I have not checked with updated gnome-shell without --disable-ibus but
I suspect this is the source of problem I faced with my experimental
ibus package.  http://bugs.debian.org/715568

(I also build another local ibus 1.5 package copying exactly the
equivalent configuration as FC19.  That package failed too with
gnome-shell with this build flag --disable-ibus.  Of course, this may be
multi-arch packaging bug.  If you know the reason. let me know.  Your
help is most appreciated. I am a bit short on time and skill, to be
honest, to cope with this complication.)

I do not think Debian GNOME team people like to keep Debian GNOME 3.8
without new integrated ibus 1.5  Right? I see no reason to keep
ibus in old 1.4 as now with GNOME 3.8 with --disable-ibus.

(ibus 1.4 requires to be started via im-config but now ibus 1.5 do not
need it.)

If you now try to select input method engin from GNOME 3.8 UI, it does
not work now.  Fcitx can start under such situation with a bit awkward
UI if ibus 1.5 fails like now.  But why we do this?  If other packages
wish to support GNOME, they should do so via the desktop file and
extensions.

The burden of support for fcitx should not be with GNOME upstream nor
should it hold Debian GNOME 3.8 in old UI with some unfunctional menu.

I am also wondering why girepository-1.0 is not multi-arch yet...

Regards,

Osamu

FYI: im-config can give up setting IM for GNOME.  I maintain it and that
should not be the reason to apply this patch as stated in #715568.

-- System Information:
Debian Release: jessie/sid
  APT prefers unstable
  APT policy: (500, 'unstable'), (500, 'testing'), (500, 'stable'), (100, 'experimental')
Architecture: amd64 (x86_64)
Foreign Architectures: i386

Kernel: Linux 3.11-rc4-amd64 (SMP w/8 CPU cores)
Locale: LANG=en_US.utf8, LC_CTYPE=en_US.utf8 (charmap=UTF-8)
Shell: /bin/sh linked to /bin/dash