Re: Packages: an average 66321 bytes per line of description
On Wed, 25 Jun 2003, Joey Hess wrote: I dunno, but I am working on expanding uqm-content's 6 lines to something more appropriate to its number of files (11.5 thousand). Maybe .. 600 lines? Now I'm really glad uqm-voice (100+ mb) is not going into the archive anytime soon. I have more important books and/or epic poetry to write than a proper Description for that monster. Maybe transcribe all the text from the audio files into the description.
Re: Packages: an average 66321 bytes per line of description
Darren Salt wrote: I demand that Dan Jacobson may or may not have written... I was hoping that maintainers of multi-megabyte packages would do the package justice by giving an adequate description. I have here a 20K package. Should it have a 1/3-line description? I dunno, but I am working on expanding uqm-content's 6 lines to something more appropriate to its number of files (11.5 thousand). Maybe .. 600 lines? Now I'm really glad uqm-voice (100+ mb) is not going into the archive anytime soon. I have more important books and/or epic poetry to write than a proper Description for that monster. ;-) -- see shy jo pgpCAAYOlAG7q.pgp Description: PGP signature
Re: Packages: an average 66321 bytes per line of description
On Wed, Jun 25, 2003 at 07:46:19AM +0200, Thomas Viehmann [EMAIL PROTECTED] was heard to say: Daniel Burrows wrote: On Tue, Jun 24, 2003 at 04:15:29PM -0500, Steve Langasek [EMAIL PROTECTED] was heard to say: Not all of it, but you can't object to duplicating a single sentence saying what it is. When the sentence in question is the one that goes in the short description, and already fills the available space without prepending runtime files for foo ? Is the concern here with the short descs (I don't expect much from short descs of affiliate packages), or with the long descs? Long descriptions. See, eg, libchipcard20-dev So this should read like: This packages [sic] contains the development files for libchipcard20. . libchipcard20 provides an API for accessing smartcards. Examples are memory cards, as well as HBCI (home banking), German GeldKarte (electronic small change), and KVK (health insurance) cards. The upstream homepage is http://www.libchipcard.de/. ? That looks good with a little editing. (s/packages/package/ is the main thing I see) Daniel -- / Daniel Burrows [EMAIL PROTECTED] ---\ | I used to be indecisive, but now I'm not sure.| \--- (if (not (understand-this)) (go-to http://www.schemers.org)) /
Re: Packages: an average 66321 bytes per line of description
Daniel Burrows wrote: On Tue, Jun 24, 2003 at 04:15:29PM -0500, Steve Langasek [EMAIL PROTECTED] was heard to say: Not all of it, but you can't object to duplicating a single sentence saying what it is. When the sentence in question is the one that goes in the short description, and already fills the available space without prepending runtime files for foo ? Is the concern here with the short descs (I don't expect much from short descs of affiliate packages), or with the long descs? Long descriptions. See, eg, libchipcard20-dev So this should read like: libchipcard20 provides an API for accessing smartcards. Examples are memory cards, as well as HBCI (home banking), German GeldKarte (electronic small change), and KVK (health insurance) cards. This package contains all you need to develop for libchipcard20, namely includes etc. Upstream homepage is http://www.libchipcard.de/. ? I'll update the description, but I don't know what get's said there that hasn't been said before. Cheers T. pgpE3wa7ipwlT.pgp Description: PGP signature
Re: Packages: an average 66321 bytes per line of description
On Tue, Jun 24, 2003 at 03:17:27PM +0800, Dan Jacobson wrote: I was hoping large package developers would write longer descriptions. Read mine sometime. (You'd be one of the first to do so!) -- G. Branden Robinson| You are not angry with people when Debian GNU/Linux | you laugh at them. Humor teaches [EMAIL PROTECTED] | them tolerance. http://people.debian.org/~branden/ | -- W. Somerset Maugham pgpYEVRzVMAqe.pgp Description: PGP signature
Re: Packages: an average 66321 bytes per line of description
On Tue, Jun 24, 2003 at 09:12:06AM -0400, Stephen Frost wrote: * Dan Jacobson ([EMAIL PROTECTED]) wrote: I was hoping large package developers would write longer descriptions. Too bad. The two are not, should not, and should never be related. I wouldn't say they're strictly decorrelated. File count should be more closely correlated with description length, though. (Still, both are going to be pretty loose.) -- G. Branden Robinson| Debian GNU/Linux | Extra territorium jus dicenti [EMAIL PROTECTED] | impune non paretur. http://people.debian.org/~branden/ | pgpQ1foV1j8rl.pgp Description: PGP signature
Re: Packages: an average 66321 bytes per line of description
I was hoping large package developers would write longer descriptions.
Re: Packages: an average 66321 bytes per line of description
I was hoping that maintainers of multi-megabyte packages would do the package justice by giving an adequate description. The Packages file could very well be the source for decisions on what gets chosen or not for ones system.
Re: Packages: an average 66321 bytes per line of description
On Tue, Jun 24, 2003 at 03:29:23PM +0800, Dan Jacobson wrote: I was hoping that maintainers of multi-megabyte packages would do the package justice by giving an adequate description. File wishlist bugs with a patch for the long description then. Michael
Re: [devel] Packages: an average 66321 bytes per line of description
Re: Re: [devel] Packages: an average 66321 bytes per line of description [Dan Jacobson [EMAIL PROTECTED], Tue, Jun 24, 2003 at 03:17:27PM +0800, [EMAIL PROTECTED]] I was hoping large package developers would write longer descriptions. Where are the statistics for that? You only gave the average. Christoph -- Christoph Berg [EMAIL PROTECTED], 0681/9657944 http://rw4.cs.uni-sb.de/~cb/ Universität des Saarlandes, Compiler Design Lab pgpeNwBSMlouI.pgp Description: PGP signature
Re: Packages: an average 66321 bytes per line of description
Dan Jacobson writes: I was hoping that maintainers of multi-megabyte packages would do the package justice by giving an adequate description. While extremely short descriptions might be a cause for concern regardless of the size of the package, I don't see why larger packages should need longer descriptions. A one-of-a-kind special-purpose package is likely to need a much longer description than yet another Web browser. Why not go through your list, read all the descriptions that seem suspiciously short, and file bugs if justified? -- John Hasler [EMAIL PROTECTED] (John Hasler) Dancing Horse Hill Elmwood, WI
Re: Packages: an average 66321 bytes per line of description
* Dan Jacobson ([EMAIL PROTECTED]) wrote: I was hoping large package developers would write longer descriptions. Too bad. The two are not, should not, and should never be related. Stephen pgpiYTdDuqfg2.pgp Description: PGP signature
Re: Packages: an average 66321 bytes per line of description
* Dan Jacobson ([EMAIL PROTECTED]) wrote: I was hoping that maintainers of multi-megabyte packages would do the package justice by giving an adequate description. The description is adequate. The size of the package has nothing to do with it. The Packages file could very well be the source for decisions on what gets chosen or not for ones system. It probably is. Stephen pgpTFR8fC313L.pgp Description: PGP signature
Re: Packages: an average 66321 bytes per line of description
On Mon, Jun 23, 2003 at 09:10:09PM -0500, Steve Langasek wrote: On Tue, Jun 24, 2003 at 07:56:42AM +0800, Dan Jacobson wrote: Fellas, looking in the Packages files, some big packages have little descriptions, some little packages have big descriptions, and this package description went wee wee wee, all the way home. Why does this belong on debian-devel instead of debian-curiosa? because some packages have really crappy useless descriptions. the worst culprits are usually sets of binary packages from the one source file which have package descriptions like libfoo-dev = dev files for libfoo, libfoo-doc = documention for libfoo, and libfoo = runtime files for foo library, without bothering to describe what foo actually is. well, duh! like nobody would ever guess that a package called libfoo-doc was the documentation for libfoo. tell the reader something we DON'T know. a package description is supposed to tell someone who has never heard of foo before a little bit about it, not just multiple variations of foo's name. craig
Re: Packages: an average 66321 bytes per line of description
On Tue, Jun 24, 2003 at 11:56:03PM +1000, Craig Sanders wrote: the worst culprits are usually sets of binary packages from the one source file which have package descriptions like libfoo-dev = dev files for libfoo, libfoo-doc = documention for libfoo, and libfoo = runtime files for foo library, without bothering to describe what foo actually is. well, duh! like nobody would ever guess that a package called libfoo-doc was the documentation for libfoo. tell the reader something we DON'T know. But he knows what libfoo is - or at least he is just a $ apt-cache show libfoo away from that information. Do we need to duplicate the description of a library package in each and every supporting package? Greetings Torsten pgpq7kdiZI429.pgp Description: PGP signature
Re: Packages: an average 66321 bytes per line of description
On Tue, Jun 24, 2003 at 07:17:58PM +0200, Torsten Landschoff wrote: the worst culprits are usually sets of binary packages from the one source file which have package descriptions like libfoo-dev = dev files for libfoo, libfoo-doc = documention for libfoo, and libfoo = runtime files for foo library, without bothering to describe what foo actually is. well, duh! like nobody would ever guess that a package called libfoo-doc was the documentation for libfoo. tell the reader something we DON'T know. But he knows what libfoo is - or at least he is just a $ apt-cache show libfoo away from that information. Do we need to duplicate the description of a library package in each and every supporting package? Not all of it, but you can't object to duplicating a single sentence saying what it is. -- 2. That which causes joy or happiness.
Re: Packages: an average 66321 bytes per line of description
On Tue, Jun 24, 2003 at 10:41:59PM +0200, Josip Rodin wrote: On Tue, Jun 24, 2003 at 07:17:58PM +0200, Torsten Landschoff wrote: the worst culprits are usually sets of binary packages from the one source file which have package descriptions like libfoo-dev = dev files for libfoo, libfoo-doc = documention for libfoo, and libfoo = runtime files for foo library, without bothering to describe what foo actually is. well, duh! like nobody would ever guess that a package called libfoo-doc was the documentation for libfoo. tell the reader something we DON'T know. But he knows what libfoo is - or at least he is just a $ apt-cache show libfoo away from that information. Do we need to duplicate the description of a library package in each and every supporting package? Not all of it, but you can't object to duplicating a single sentence saying what it is. When the sentence in question is the one that goes in the short description, and already fills the available space without prepending runtime files for foo ? Is the concern here with the short descs (I don't expect much from short descs of affiliate packages), or with the long descs? -- Steve Langasek postmodern programmer pgpF1u9eloX6p.pgp Description: PGP signature
Re: Packages: an average 66321 bytes per line of description
On Tue, Jun 24, 2003 at 04:15:29PM -0500, Steve Langasek [EMAIL PROTECTED] was heard to say: Not all of it, but you can't object to duplicating a single sentence saying what it is. When the sentence in question is the one that goes in the short description, and already fills the available space without prepending runtime files for foo ? Is the concern here with the short descs (I don't expect much from short descs of affiliate packages), or with the long descs? Long descriptions. See, eg, bnlib1-dev (not the problem discussed above, but still has problems with its description) imlib1-dev libast2-dev libcdaudio0-dev libcelsius-dev libchipcard20-dev Daniel -- / Daniel Burrows [EMAIL PROTECTED] ---\ | I haven't lost my mind, | | I know exactly where I left it. | \-Evil Overlord, Inc: planning your future today. http://www.eviloverlord.com-/
Re: Packages: an average 66321 bytes per line of description
On Tue, Jun 24, 2003 at 04:15:29PM -0500, Steve Langasek wrote: On Tue, Jun 24, 2003 at 10:41:59PM +0200, Josip Rodin wrote: On Tue, Jun 24, 2003 at 07:17:58PM +0200, Torsten Landschoff wrote: the worst culprits are usually sets of binary packages from the one source file which have package descriptions like libfoo-dev = dev files for libfoo, libfoo-doc = documention for libfoo, and libfoo = runtime files for foo library, without bothering to describe what foo actually is. well, duh! like nobody would ever guess that a package called libfoo-doc was the documentation for libfoo. tell the reader something we DON'T know. But he knows what libfoo is - or at least he is just a $ apt-cache show libfoo away from that information. Do we need to duplicate the description of a library package in each and every supporting package? not much use when you're in dselect, wondering what foo is and whether it's a good or useful thing to install. also not much use when the description for libfoo just says runtime files for foo, and none of the other obviously associated packages bother to describe it either. the person who packages it knows what it is, but he/she has to assume that the reader doesn't and should therefore provide a brief but useful description. not everyone catches every single announcement on slashdot or freshmeat or sourceforge, not everyone is fully aware of every project in every niche. Not all of it, but you can't object to duplicating a single sentence saying what it is. When the sentence in question is the one that goes in the short description, and already fills the available space without prepending runtime files for foo ? Is the concern here with the short descs (I don't expect much from short descs of affiliate packages), or with the long descs? the concern is with package descriptions that assume that the reader knows what foo is. just having a brief description in one of 3 or 4 or more packages (and some i've seen don't even bother describing it in one) isn't good enough. each individual package needs that brief description. craig
Re: Packages: an average 66321 bytes per line of description
avg. bytes per description lines 66321.8 A Is that just a meaningless number, or is there actually a correlation A between package size and description length? Somebody with statistics experience might go further and see if little packages have big descriptions and visa versa etc. Anyway, one liner snob descriptions just have to go. $ apt-cache show emacs21 Description: The GNU Emacs editor GNU Emacs is the extensible self-documenting text editor. Oops, I see, it is self-documenting.
Re: Packages: an average 66321 bytes per line of description
On Wed, Jun 25, 2003 at 07:07:46AM +0800, Dan Jacobson wrote: Anyway, one liner snob descriptions just have to go. $ apt-cache show emacs21 Description: The GNU Emacs editor GNU Emacs is the extensible self-documenting text editor. Oops, I see, it is self-documenting. that's actually a perfectly adequate description. it tells someone who has never heard of emacs before that it is an editor. good enough. a description doesn't have to (and shouldn't!) summarise all of a package's features, all it needs to do is give someone a rough idea of what kind of beastie it is. for a package like emacs, it's basically impossible to summarise all of its features anyway. craig
Re: Packages: an average 66321 bytes per line of description
I demand that Dan Jacobson may or may not have written... I was hoping that maintainers of multi-megabyte packages would do the package justice by giving an adequate description. I have here a 20K package. Should it have a 1/3-line description? ;-) -- | Darren Salt | nr. Ashington, | linux (or ds) at | woody, sarge, | Northumberland | youmustbejoking | RISC OS | Toon Army | demon co uk | Retrocomputing: a PC card in a Risc PC B Integer out of range, 0:1
Packages: an average 66321 bytes per line of description
Fellas, looking in the Packages files, some big packages have little
descriptions, some little packages have big descriptions, but on the average,
11938 packages
avg size 510963
avg description 7.70431 lines
avg. bytes per description lines 66321.8
For instance, the prestigious emacs21 needs only one line, as
everybody who is anybody is supposed to know what it is all about.
Computed with
cd /var/lib/apt/lists/ ls -S|sed q|xargs awk '\
/^Size:/{size+=$2;packages++};/Description:/,/^$/{lines++};\
END{lines-=packages;print packages,packages\navg size,\
size/packages\navg description,\
lines/packages, lines\navg. bytes per description lines,\
size/lines}'
Re: Packages: an average 66321 bytes per line of description
* Dan Jacobson ([EMAIL PROTECTED]) wrote: For instance, the prestigious emacs21 needs only one line, as everybody who is anybody is supposed to know what it is all about. Yup. Don't see any problem with that either. Have a day. Stephen pgpQddrICotFS.pgp Description: PGP signature
Re: Packages: an average 66321 bytes per line of description
On Tue, 24 Jun 2003, Dan Jacobson wrote:
Fellas, looking in the Packages files, some big packages have little
descriptions, some little packages have big descriptions, but on the average,
11938 packages
avg size 510963
avg description 7.70431 lines
avg. bytes per description lines 66321.8
For instance, the prestigious emacs21 needs only one line, as
everybody who is anybody is supposed to know what it is all about.
Computed with
cd /var/lib/apt/lists/ ls -S|sed q|xargs awk '\
/^Size:/{size+=$2;packages++};/Description:/,/^$/{lines++};\
END{lines-=packages;print packages,packages\navg size,\
size/packages\navg description,\
lines/packages, lines\navg. bytes per description lines,\
size/lines}'
This has exactly what to do with your (sub-average) intelligence?
I say it relates to your intelligence at 98%.
Re: Packages: an average 66321 bytes per line of description
On Tue, Jun 24, 2003 at 07:56:42AM +0800, Dan Jacobson wrote: Fellas, looking in the Packages files, some big packages have little descriptions, some little packages have big descriptions, and this package description went wee wee wee, all the way home. Why does this belong on debian-devel instead of debian-curiosa? -- Steve Langasek postmodern programmer pgpncuAMR5rac.pgp Description: PGP signature
