Bug#747132: libreoffice: The metapackage libreoffice should not recommend liberation fonts

["Karl O. Pinc" <kop@meme.com>]

On 05/06/2014 12:58:49 AM, Rene Engelhard wrote:
> severity 747132 wishlist
> found 747132 1:4.1.5-2
> thanks
> 
> On Mon, May 05, 2014 at 03:21:37PM -0500, Karl O. Pinc wrote:
> > The libreoffice metapackage (in wheezy and experimental)
> > recommends the liberation fonts.  These fonts should
> > instead be recommended by the individual libreoffice
> > components.  The components need them, even when
> > installed individually.
> 
> If you have stuff using Arial, yes. So you suggest every component
> doing anything with fonts (so everything except Base recommend it)?

Yes.  Although, as you say, you could fudge if you cared to and
have core recommend it.

> Will think about it: if we did it it probably should be -core
> recommending
> it (as it does all the font stuff.)
> 
> > Installing just the components and not the metapackage
> > (and, I presume, not the ttf-liberation fonts or whatever
> 
> Yes, but doing that should be done by people who know what they do.

Whether people who don't know what they're doing
should be "allowed" to install individual libreoffice components
is, to me, the crux of the matter.  Are the components,
writer, calc, etc., available stand-alone or not?

The typical computer user (most people out there)
don't use all the components.  The most basic user
(the proverbial grandmother) gets confused by having too
many choices in their menus.  If they only use writer
and calc that's all that should appear in the menus.
It is for all of these people, the ones who perhaps know enough
to install only what they'll use and the ones who
need somebody else to manage their computer and need
the simplest possible setup, that it's important
that the component packages be independently installable.

Further, there's a big "middle" group of people between
the typical users, above, and the people who are able
to actually figure out what the problem is when
things break because just a few components are installed.
If it looks like you should be able to install just, e.g.,
writer, then you should be able to do so without having
a system you can't fix.  I can't say how you might go
about doing so but if the individual components don't
stand on their own then most people really need to be
discouraged from installing them.

(The people I support fall into the latter category,
those who get confused by too many menu choices.
They get the web, email, and writer.  And a printer.
Adding anything else creates problems.)

Thanks for considering this.

Regards,

Karl <kop@meme.com>
Free Software:  "You don't pay back, you pay forward."
                 -- Robert A. Heinlein