[64studio-devel] [64 Studio] #152: Drop terminatorx package from base install, remove dummy libmad

[Free Ekanayaka]

|--==> 64 Studio writes:

  6S> #152: Drop terminatorx package from base install, remove dummy libmad
  6S> ----------------------+-----------------------------------------------------
  6S>  Reporter:  daniel    |        Owner:  free    
  6S>      Type:  task      |       Status:  reopened
  6S>  Priority:  high      |    Milestone:  2.0     
  6S> Component:  packages  |      Version:          
  6S>  Severity:  normal    |   Resolution:          
  6S>  Keywords:            |  
  6S> ----------------------+-----------------------------------------------------
  6S> Changes (by daniel at 64studio.com):

  6S>   * priority:  normal => high
  6S>   * summary:  Drop terminatorx package from base install => Drop
  6S>               terminatorx package from base install, remove
  6S>               dummy libmad

  6S> Comment:

  6S>  The dummy libmad package is causing problems for other apps obtained from
  6S>  Debian, such as alsaplayer - we need to drop this dummy package too, then
  6S>  see what else is dependent on it.

As I stated earlier, dropping the dummy libmad0 package and rebuilding
each application that depend on it, it's rather laborious, especially
because you have to do that again once new versions of those packages
come out.

At the moment 64 Studio includes the following libmad-dependent
packages:

audacity kdebase-bin kdelibs4c2a khelpcenter libarts1c2a libmad0
libswfdec0.3 mpg321 rosegarden sox terminatorx

Furthermore running apt-cache rdepends libmad0 gives an idea of how
many libmad-dependent packages are there in Debian. If later we want
to include any of them we will have to rebuild and maintain it as
well.

For these reasons I still think that the libmad dummy package is a
good compromise, as it makes life easier for us (no need to rebuild)
and for the user (just install a single package if you want full mp3
support through libmad), while keep us legally clean.

As for now I've fixed the libmad dummy package version included in the
last 1.3.0 release, it now behaves better and both terminatorx and
alsaplayer will just think that an empty MP3 file was selected.

Other bugs might pop out, but I think it will be relatively easy to
fix again the libmad dummy package, at least easier than maintaining a
bunch of rebuilds.

We should probably state clearly in a very visible place that we are
supporting MP3 playback only via gstreamer, and include some
instructions on how to get the libmad0 package from Debian as well.

Generally speaking it could be a good idea to write a page (and
perhaps some ready-made script) indicating users what do they have to
do in order to get "unofficial" support for technologies that we can't
officially support, like ffmpeg, MP3, VST, etc.. I don't know if this
would be legally and morally acceptable, but it would probably make
the difference for many users that do actually need those things, and
can't use 64 Studio without them.

Ciao!

Free