Bug#958487: inkscape: Inkscape v1.0 requires libcairo v1.17

[Simon McVittie]

On Wed, 22 Apr 2020 at 12:59:34 -0700, Ian Bruce wrote:
> One of the new features in Inkscape v1.0 is the ability to export PNG
> images with 16-bit colour depth:
> 
> https://wiki.inkscape.org/wiki/index.php?title=Release_notes/1.0#Export_PNG_images
> 
> However, this depends on the corresponding feature in the Cairo graphics
> library, which only became available in version 1.17.2, released over a
> year ago:
> 
> https://cairographics.org/news/cairo-1.17.2/

Cairo appears to use "odd/even" branch versioning, as used in Linux 2.x
and GNOME. In this versioning scheme, any version x.odd.z is considered
to be a development snapshot, while version x.even.z is a stable release.

Under that model, 1.17.x is a development release, so it would usually
only be available in experimental, if at all (similar to the glib2.0
and dbus source packages). So don't count on having 1.17.x in unstable
any time soon - the earliest this can happen is when there's at least a
release candidate for 1.18.x.

Updating to 1.17.x in experimental is a valid request, but the GNOME
team's top priority is GNOME, and the amount of developer time available
is limited, so development versions don't usually go into experimental
until their upstream developers are showing signs of heading towards a
stable release.

If cairo is a high priority for you, your help would be appreciated.
The cairo source package is maintained here:
https://salsa.debian.org/gnome-team/cairo

    smcv