Re: Why Does bind Have So Many Dependencies

On Sunday, 17 March 2024 at 15:13:47 +0900, lain. wrote:
> On 2024年03月16日 16:36, the silly Tim Daneliuk claimed to have said:
>> On 3/16/24 15:54, robert@rrbrussell.com wrote:
>> .
>>>
>>> To rebuild the manpages and other documentation from source requires groff and a few other tools. Portmaster can uninstall build dependencies that aren’t in the run dependencies list after installation of the port. ```pkg autoremove``` will also remove unneeded build dependencies. The last option is using poudrière. ```pkg install``` will only pull in the needed runtime dependencies.
>>>
>>> I am assuming don’t want to use the default package repository.
>>
>> Yes, I've deleted the offending unneeded dependencies with "pgk autoremove".
>>
>> I think my central question is really why the port installation even attempts
>> to install these if I indicate that I do not want docs in the initial config menu.
>
> The simple answer to any software with a lot of dependencies is very
> simple: because this software is made by amateurs who don't understand
> software development.

Yes, this is a very simple answer.  It reminds me of a couple of
quotes, but not well:

  "Nothing is difficult for somebody who doesn't have to solve the
  problem himself".

  "For every difficult problem there is an answer that is simple,
  elegant, and wrong".

In this case, it seems that you have no solution to offer, but you
know details of one of the central pieces of software that keeps the
Internet running, in particular that it was written by amateurs.

> In general, unless it's something massive like a 3D modelling tool,
> there's always a more lightweight and less buggy alternative that
> (obviously) require way fewer dependencies.

Which, of course, you neglect to mention.

My take on this issue (also, admittedly, without looking at the port)
is that there are two issues:

1.  Relatively harmless things like the documentation pull in a tree
    of dependencies which may not even be needed in this context, but
    the way the Ports Collection works means that they get pulled in
    anyway.

2.  In this particular case, this even happens if the primary
    dependency isn't needed.

The second issue is relatively easy to fix, while the first might be
more difficult.  But you have access to the sources.  Can we expect
patches soon?

Greg
--
When replying to this message, please copy the original recipients.
If you don't, I may ignore the reply or reply to the original recipients.
For more information, see http://www.lemis.com/questions.html
Sent from my desktop computer.
See complete headers for address and phone numbers.
This message is digitally signed.  If your Microsoft mail program
reports problems, please read http://lemis.com/broken-MUA.php