[debhelper-devel] Bug#838538: dh_installdocs: look for README.foo

[Niels Thykier]

Control: tags -1 moreinfo

On Wed, 21 Sep 2016 17:40:03 -0700 Sean Whitton
<spwhitton at spwhitton.name> wrote:
> Package: debhelper
> Version: 10
> Severity: wishlist
> 
> Dear maintainers,
> 
> Lots of upstreams include a readme called 'README.md', 'README.rst',
> 'README.markdown' etc., rather than just 'README'.  It would be nice if
> dh_installdocs would install these automatically, as it currently
> installs plain 'README'.
> 
> Markdown and reStructuredText are designed to be readable without
> knowledge of the markup language, so these files are equally suitable
> for installation to /usr/share/doc/*/.
> 
> Thanks.
> 
> [...]
> 

Hi,

Thanks for the report.

I am a bit confused that your report suggests that dh_installdocs
install "README" by default.  I cannot find any evidence in the
dh_installdocs(1) manpage nor in the code that it does this.  The best I
can find is that the "debian/package.docs" example includes the README file.

This proposal is based on the assumption that the READMEs are generally
of interest.  However, as I recall, the upstream READMEs were often not
always relevant (e.g. focused on build/install instructions), which is
why they were previously not installed by default.

Thanks,
~Niels