Man pages & documentation, optional?

TheSaint · 2012-09-22 15:21:46

Hello,
I'm using localepurge every after update/installation and megabytes trown out are countless (with all respect for all other languages). Isn't waste?
Furthermore Lot of html docs are laying around and I merely read one of them. Nearly 100 Mb.

Now-a-day the internet is at the finger tips, what reason enforce to have documentation enclosed with the packages?
We may just read them online. See this site

I'd consider only the core man pages for the time one has to setup a new installation. Perhaps because some information is needed in a particular case. However it could have to consider some other mean to go online during that problem.

Mostly the crowd leaning to have clouds and other stuffs off-box, generally is moving to a global storage, what for moving these bytes?

WonderWoofy · 2012-09-22 15:36:23

I personally like having the man pages readily available. I agree that there is the necessity of 'core' for installation. But I think also, if you were to package w/o man pages, you are simply assuiming that everyone is using their computer with internet access. I cringe to think about computer use w/o internet, but I thnk that is an assumption that cannot be made by our devs.

I see your point though in how everything is available on the internets.

Trilby · 2012-09-22 15:41:36

WonderWoofy wrote:

I cringe to think about computer use w/o internet

So do I, but I often pull out my netbook while out and about to get some work done in down times I cringe quite often. I'd cringe even more if I couldn't check out documentation for what I was working on because the area I found myself in didn't have wifi.

karol · 2012-09-22 16:17:17

TheSaint wrote:

Furthermore Lot of html docs are laying around and I merely read one of them. Nearly 100 Mb.

If that 100 MB means that much to you, purge them. You don't have to include them in the packages you build yourself (ABS, AUR).

It's easier for people who don't want them to remove the docs, extra locales and whatnot than to rebuild the packages if you do want the docs.
IIRC Crux http://crux.nu/ doesn't include non-English locales and (most of the?) docs, Arch used to build w/o docs but it has changes quite a while ago.

Last edited by karol (2012-09-22 16:17:32)

falconindy · 2012-09-22 16:34:42

TheSaint wrote:

Hello,
I'm using localepurge every after update/installation and megabytes trown out are countless (with all respect for all other languages). Isn't waste?
Furthermore Lot of html docs are laying around and I merely read one of them. Nearly 100 Mb.

Yes. It is a waste of time to worry about a trifling amount of disk space being taken up by useful documentation.

DSpider · 2012-09-22 17:21:17

Do they really take up 100 MB?

With a distribution like Arch Linux, it should be mandatory.

Heck, even Ubuntu doesn't have them separate.

Last edited by DSpider (2012-09-22 17:22:51)

cfr · 2012-09-22 22:36:35

I only wish there were *more* man pages and while I often have internet access, it isn't uncommon for me not to. Nor is it uncommon for the internet access on campus to disappear in a puff of smoke for a few hours or even days.

I especially wish KDE had man pages...

Trilby · 2012-09-22 23:05:56

cfr, I'm not familiar with kde, but many packages include html documentation. I've lost track of how many times I've been googling for the doxygen pages for some lib or another only to realize they are installed on my system with those libraries. *That* can come in handy.

TheSaint · 2012-09-23 13:09:33

Thanks for your comments.
Maybe my vision is a little ahead of the time. For me is easy to be connected, docs could be an option. I use often to read man pages, but, as much as I writing online, I can get them easily online.

In terms of traffic I just need to estimate where would be the least traffic.
I don't mean to eliminate the docs, most sure they're online.

Would be fine to know what is the percentage of whom like to have docs locally and those don't.

Try this out

find /usr -name "*.htm?" -exec ls -lt {} \; | awk -F " " 'BEGIN { sum=0 } { sum+=$5 } END { print sum }'

Last edited by TheSaint (2012-09-23 13:30:51)

karol · 2012-09-23 13:12:23

TheSaint wrote:

Would be fine to know what is the percentage of whom like to have docs locally and those don't.

What for?
If the devs prefer to have the docs, they build packages with docs included. Those who don't want them can use ABS or purge the docs in another way.

Last edited by karol (2012-09-23 13:12:48)

jakobcreutzfeldt · 2012-09-23 13:46:38

I much prefer having documentation on my computer. I can browse it and it looks exactly how I want (ie according to the theming/fonts I've selected for my terminal or in emacs).

More importantly, I'm always guaranteed to find the documentation that corresponds to the exact version of the software that's installed on my computer. Online, you have to double-check everytime to make sure you're not reading something outdated.

karol · 2012-09-23 13:59:31

jakobcreutzfeld wrote:

More importantly, I'm always guaranteed to find the documentation that corresponds to the exact version of the software that's installed on my computer. Online, you have to double-check everytime to make sure you're not reading something outdated.

Upstream can forget to update the documentation too. Sometimes there's not much documentation at all. Rarely, but it happens.
I use

help $@ || $@ -h || $@ --help || man $@ || $BROWSER "http://www.google.com/search?q=$@"

to get to the docs w/o pulling my hair out.

The good thing about sites like e.g. http://man.cx is that all you need is a browser. You can be using Windows at that moment and still help somebody with deciphering sed hieroglyphics.

cfr · 2012-09-23 20:34:49

Trilby wrote:

cfr, I'm not familiar with kde, but many packages include html documentation. I've lost track of how many times I've been googling for the doxygen pages for some lib or another only to realize they are installed on my system with those libraries. *That* can come in handy.

Thanks. I always forget about this - maybe because I've never found a really good way to search it. (I tend to find it online and later realise it is also locally installed somewhere.)

KDE provides some documentation via a sort of dedicated help application. I just miss having it at my fingertips...

TheSaint · 2012-09-24 06:12:39

karol wrote:

Those who don't want them can use ABS or purge the docs in another way.

I don't think it would achieve traffic reduction, just try to build the kernel
It would have less impact, if one offers a mirror with all documentations stripped off, or locales in separated package.

TheSaint · 2012-09-24 06:42:06

I also keen man pages with included examples, they bring something to try and modify in a what-if try context.
I don't deny the documentation usefulness, I appreciate Wikis, manuals, and all efforts to let other know/learn about open source.
In the other hand, I see a great increase on travelling bit when a huge portion is, practically, not even taken a look. Beside this I would also consider the volume caused to repeatedly download the same document for several times . Which is a personal option. I mean that I probably read many times these documents.
I like computer because I like to make some programming, then I frequently consult some doc, to learn something more. This usually goes by browser and looking for somebody made similar example.
The concern for this thread is just to have a slim installation on the first place and who likes to have all wirstle&bells will go on for all of them.
Imagine KDE or libreoffice that packing up all the languages, who will want afford it?
Even Mr Judd, I believe, was for this diet. Therefore we have a makepkg.conf with all strip options in there.

ngoonee · 2012-09-24 07:37:12

You are taking your use case and extrapolating from there. Arch can do what you want, but you need to realize that it IS a niche case, and so you're responsible for that yourself.

You like to consult documentation online. Others have already mentioned situations where that is not possible.

You want a slim installation. Great, do it yourself, you've already run localepurge at least. Arch does not split out headers (read up on why), documentation is pretty much in the same boat.

And appealing to Mr Judd's supposed opinion is just nonsensical....

Awebb · 2012-09-24 08:26:39

ngoonee wrote:

And appealing to Mr Judd's supposed opinion is just nonsensical....

Especially when said opinion was discussed in the very stone age of Arch history.

Arch Linux

#1 2012-09-22 15:21:46

Man pages & documentation, optional?

#2 2012-09-22 15:36:23

Re: Man pages & documentation, optional?

#3 2012-09-22 15:41:36

Re: Man pages & documentation, optional?

#4 2012-09-22 16:17:17

Re: Man pages & documentation, optional?

#5 2012-09-22 16:34:42

Re: Man pages & documentation, optional?

#6 2012-09-22 17:21:17

Re: Man pages & documentation, optional?

#7 2012-09-22 22:36:35

Re: Man pages & documentation, optional?

#8 2012-09-22 23:05:56

Re: Man pages & documentation, optional?

#9 2012-09-23 13:09:33

Re: Man pages & documentation, optional?

#10 2012-09-23 13:12:23

Re: Man pages & documentation, optional?

#11 2012-09-23 13:46:38

Re: Man pages & documentation, optional?

#12 2012-09-23 13:59:31

Re: Man pages & documentation, optional?

#13 2012-09-23 20:34:49

Re: Man pages & documentation, optional?

#14 2012-09-24 06:12:39

Re: Man pages & documentation, optional?

#15 2012-09-24 06:42:06

Re: Man pages & documentation, optional?

#16 2012-09-24 07:37:12

Re: Man pages & documentation, optional?

#17 2012-09-24 08:26:39

Re: Man pages & documentation, optional?

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