[aur-general] ttf-google-webfonts{,-distilled,-git,-hg} mess

[Maxime GAUDUIN]

On Apr 2, 2013 12:16 AM, "Jason St. John" <jstjohn at purdue.edu> wrote:
>
> I am the current maintainer of the AUR package
> ttf-google-webfonts-hg[4], and I'm bothered by the mess of various
> packages there are for Google's Web Fonts project. It's not at all
> KISS in its current state.
>
> There are currently four different AUR packages[1][2][3][4] that
> essentially supply the same files, and all four packages conflict with
> each other. Around August of 2012, the package named
> ttf-google-webfonts[1] was orphaned, and user w0ng created a GitHub
> repository[5] that mirrors the Mercurial repository[6] on Google Code
> (why?). Then, the new maintainer changed the original
> ttf-google-webfonts package from a VCS-type package that simply lacked
> "-hg" in the name to a package that pulls tarballs from w0ng's GitHub
> repo[5].
>
> As you can see in the comments for ttf-google-webfonts[1], this has
> caused all sorts of confusion and messages about the package being
> out-of-date or having invalid checksums. To get around these issues,
> user epinephrine created the package ttf-google-webfonts-git[3] that
> clones w0ng's GitHub repo[5] instead of pulling tarballs from it,
> which significantly reduces the maintenance required on the package.
>
> Then, user Gently created a package named
> ttf-google-webfonts-distilled[2] that pulls a tarball from w0ng's
> GitHub repo[5] and only installs a small subset of the fonts therein.
>
> Shortly after ttf-google-webfonts[1] was changed from being a
> Mercurial-based package and not liking the direction that the package
> was taking, I reuploaded the original ttf-google-webfonts package as
> ttf-google-webfonts-hg[4] for people that simply wanted the old
> package back that uses the actual Google Web Fonts repository to
> download the files.
>
> To clean up this mess, I propose that ttf-google-webfonts-distilled[2]
> and ttf-google-webfonts-git[3] be deleted outright, for what should be
> obvious reasons. I also propose that ttf-google-webfonts[1] be deleted
> because of how frequently the Web Fonts project is updated and because
> the project lacks version numbers. If people really feel strongly
> about keeping that maintenance nightmare, then let them have it, but I
> really don't see what advantage it provides over the original
> ttf-google-webfonts-hg[4] other than one less makedepends.
>
> I apologize for the huge email, but this situation really is a mess.
>
> [1] https://aur.archlinux.org/packages/ttf-google-webfonts/
> [2] https://aur.archlinux.org/packages/ttf-google-webfonts-distilled/
> [3] https://aur.archlinux.org/packages/ttf-google-webfonts-git/
> [4] https://aur.archlinux.org/packages/ttf-google-webfonts-hg/
> [5] https://github.com/w0ng/googlefontdirectory
> [6] https://code.google.com/p/googlefontdirectory/
>
> Jason

I mostly agree with you, but I would still keep the git package because I,
and I believe most people, don't want to pull 2Gb from the mercurial repo
and keep them lying around. This is painfully slow and, even though 2Gb are
nothing today, it is silly to waste space like this. The git repo contains
only the relevant TTF files and I think it is the better choice for whom
wants to download the Google web fonts.

How do others feel about this?

--
Maxime