Re: Using GNU's install-info in Debian instead of dpkg's install-info

[Ian Zimmerman]

Ian> But, for me to consider it a solution, it would have to be run by
Ian> packages in their post-installs, which means manual edits would be
Ian> overwritten.

Karl> Am I understanding right?  You want `make install' for every
Karl> package to regenerate the dir node from scratch, based on *every
Karl> installed info file*?  I hope not ...

Yes, that is precisely what I am proposing.  According to Joey Hess
(you do see the whole thread, right?) it isn't too time consuming.
And it relects what Debian does for other things, like menus.

Karl> My assumption was that install-info would continue to just read
Karl> INFO-DIR-SECTION from the given file and install the given dir
Karl> entries in the given sections, and not try to look at any other
              ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
Karl> info file.  That's what it (the GNU version) does now, and this
Karl> seems right to me.

The highlighted part is the catch - you're keeping the broken parsing.

Ian> Maybe another idea: keep a part of the file explicitly reserved for
Ian> manual additions, delimit it with some markers.

Karl> Well, the manual changes I personally make are typically fixing
Karl> packages which install themselves wrongly, so a separate part of
Karl> the file wouldn't help.  

Isn't that need exactly what we're trying to eliminate?

-- 
A true pessimist won't be discouraged by a little success.