[Python-modules-team] Bug#933347: -d option doesn't work as expected for gettext with -M

[Osamu Aoki]

Package: src:sphinx
Version: 1.8.4-1
Severity: normal

-M option doesn't work well except for a very simple case.  I faced this
problem while building multi-language source.

Let me illustrate most gross case with gettext.

Most simple case:
 $ sphinx-build -M gettext source build

This creates:
    new file:   build/gettext/.doctrees/environment.pickle
    new file:   build/gettext/.doctrees/index.doctree
    new file:   build/gettext/.doctrees/scope.doctree
    new file:   build/gettext/index.pot
    new file:   build/gettext/scope.pot

It forces to use build/gettext as destination and build/gettext/.doctrees
as cache directory.  Although not elegant, I can live with this for now.

I wanted to move the cache directory to a particular FOO, so I did:
 $ sphinx-build -M gettext -d FOO source build

This creates:
    new file:   FOO/gettext/environment.pickle
    new file:   FOO/gettext/index.doctree
    new file:   FOO/gettext/scope.doctree
    new file:   build/index.pot
    new file:   build/scope.pot

Hmmm... I didn't expect this.  Other command usually put these cached
files just under FOO/ not under FOO/gettext/ .  That is what -d option
works.

So I switched to use -b option instead of -M which behaves sanely.

 $ sphinx-build -b gettext -d FOO source build

This creates:
    new file:   FOO/environment.pickle
    new file:   FOO/index.doctree
    new file:   FOO/scope.doctree
    new file:   build/index.pot
    new file:   build/scope.pot

Yah, this is what I expects.

FYI:  I now use followings to share cached files for i18n build.
 $ sphinx-build -b gettext source/locales -d build/en source build/en
 $ sphinx-build -b html -d build/en source build/en/html
 $ sphinx-build -b epub -d build/en source build/en/epub
  ...

I attach example scripts as tared git repo with history.

-- System Information:
Debian Release: 10.0
  APT prefers stable
  APT policy: (500, 'stable')
Architecture: amd64 (x86_64)

Kernel: Linux 4.19.0-5-amd64 (SMP w/4 CPU cores)
Locale: LANG=en_US.UTF-8, LC_CTYPE=en_US.UTF-8 (charmap=UTF-8), LANGUAGE=en_US.UTF-8 (charmap=UTF-8)
Shell: /bin/sh linked to /bin/dash
Init: systemd (via /run/systemd/system)
LSM: AppArmor: enabled
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