Re: [PATCH] Add Fedora location of DejaVu SANS font

[Robbie Harwood <rharwood@redhat.com>]

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Nicholas Vinson <nvinson234@gmail.com> writes:

> On 12/8/21 12:58, Robbie Harwood wrote:
>> Nicholas Vinson <nvinson234@gmail.com> writes:
>>> On 12/7/21 15:04, Robbie Harwood wrote:
>>>> Nicholas Vinson <nvinson234@gmail.com> writes:
>>>>
>>>>> Wouldn't it be better to modify configure.ac so the location could
>>>>> be passed in instead of having one-off patches for alternate
>>>>> locations?  Something like
>>>>> --with-dejavu-font=/usr/share/fonts/dejavu-sans-fonts?
>>>>
>>>> That would mean that anyone using grub2 that wants the dejavu fonts
>>>> will have to figure out that the option exists and pass it to the
>>>> buildscripts.  That's a pretty bad user experience for anyone
>>>> building their own grub.
>>>
>>> On the contrary, it doesn't have to mean that at all. It could mean
>>> that when a path is given, configure would use the provided path;
>>> otherwise, it falls back to its default list to find the font.
>> 
>> But then we still have to keep the default list... and I'd still be here
>> as a distro maintainer wanting my distro's path in the default list.  I
>> don't see how this is any better.
>
> And you want it in the default path because? Most likely because you're 
> patching configure or using tools like sed or awk to change configure or 
> Makefile to use your path? You know that approach is brittle and you 
> want something better.

No, that's not it.  Don't put words in other people's mouths.

We're sitting on more than 220 downstream patches that I want
upstreamed.  The relative brittleness of this particular change is
*nothing* in comparison, believe me :)

The sheer number here means I'm starting with the easy stuff.  The
one-liners, simple conceptual things, *stuff that should be
non-contentious*.

> Adding your distro's choice location to a pre-defined list works until 
> the distro changes where it stores the font. At that point you are back 
> where you started. Manually patching GRUB until a version of GRUB is 
> released with your new path in the list.
>
> The same is true with any other distro that uses a location not in the 
> list. The approach you're suggesting is that submit a patch, get GRUB 
> updated.
>
> What I am asking for puts an end to that. Once the flag is in place, the 
> builder can pick whatever path is desirable, pass it into the configure 
> script, and have GRUB builds.  No need to craft a patch, send it to the 
> mailing list, and wait for the update to make it into a GRUB release.

But my point is this hurts everyone who's *not* the distro maintainer
but building their own grub.  That's the user experience issue I was
talking about.  Everyone developing on Fedora now has to remember
another flag or it won't work the same.

>>> Such an approach would mimic configure's current behavior for values
>>> such as bootdir and grubdir.
>> 
>> But those are *install* paths, not *detection* paths.  We're not
>> installing the font - we're figuring out where it is on the system.
>
> In the context of building GRUB, bootdir and grubdir are *not* 
> installation directories. They are simply default paths that get written 
> into the built code.

Right, that's what I mean by "install" path.  It's a place where you put
stuff, not a place where you find stuff.

> Effort is often times its own reward. I would not want to deprive you
> of it.

Wow, okay.

You know this comes across as rather hostile, right?  Is this really the
approach you want to take when someone *shows up with code* and asks you
to clarify your feedback?  Tell them to go away and RTFM?

Be well,
--Robbie

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