Re: [groff] Announcement and call for project submissions

[Ingo Schwarze]

Hi John,

John Gardner wrote on Wed, Jan 30, 2019 at 09:07:49PM +1100:

> I've created a Homebrew "tap" <https://docs.brew.sh/Taps> for *roff or
> man-related ports and packages which can be easily installed on macOS
> using Homebrew:
> 
> https://github.com/Alhadis/homebrew-troff

I'm not convinced that is a very good idea.  The whole concept of
Taps does not look sustainable to me.  Users won't know where to
find Taps, and even if they do find your Tap by accident (or by
Google), they won't know whether or not to trust you (unless by
chance, they already know you).  On top of that, a central package
repository is also superior to a fragmented landscape because in
package management, one major source of trouble is style inconsistencies
among different packages.  So a central repository with a community
maintaining a consistent packaging style accross *all* packages,
and also checking submitted packages for stupid errors and malicious
content, is a big win for users, even if not everybody will agree
with every style decision.

> My attempt to submit man-db to Homebrew's core package registry didn't
> go as planned, which is a polite understatement. I'll not waste time
> griping; those curious can find the thread's nadir here
> <https://github.com/Homebrew/homebrew-core/pull/36469#issuecomment-458474772>

That's a clear case of a cultural clash.  While i (not that surprising
for an OpenBSD developer) like a concise and direct communication
style that doesn't use polite circumlocutions, i do realize that
such a style can cause communication breakdown in practice and can
harm diversity because what is perceived as offensive communication
style differs among individuals - and among cultural contexts.

So when trying to collaborate with a given community, i recommend
trying to follow that community's style, even if one prefers a
more direct style (of course, that's not always easy).

> I've already added a formulae for Heirloom Doctools, and plan on adding
> one for Neatroff too.
> I hope to add @n-t-roff <https://github.com/n-t-roff>'s historical Troff
> ports, as well as any investigate the possibility of distributing
> `tmac` files through Homebrew. E.g., running `brew install
> mdn.tmac` would place `dn.tamc` in one's tmac path.

While i'm not convinced that installing man-db in /usr/local/ in
the PATH endangers build systems (then again, i'm not familiar with
MacOS), there is a technical argument against installing man-db (or
mandoc, for that matter) directly as man(1) into the default PATH:
Just because a user installs man-db or mandoc doesn't imply they
want to replace their system man(1) installation from day one.
Actually, i expect many users install a new piece of software to
inspect and test it - and if they like it, they may decide to make
it the system default much later.

So i think installing the binaries with a command prefix is a very
reasonable choice.  Which one to use amounts to choosing the colour
of the bikeshed.  Colin slightly dislikes "gman", so choosing that
one would possibly be unfortunate.  The name "dbman" may be acceptable
even though some might confuse it with "mandb".  Even though somewhat
lengthy, "man-db_man" would be very clear and explicit.  *That's*
your call as a package maintainer.

> If anybody knows of any package or ports they'd like to share, please do!
> It doesn't matter if they're modern or historical codebases, it'll
> be great to get as much Troff-related utilities out there. :D

For the reasons explained above, i prefer having mandoc here:

  https://formulae.brew.sh/formula/mandoc

Though of course anybody is allowed to redistribute it, the license is
free.

Yours,
  Ingo