Bug#444009: Vim with language plugins (python, ruby, perl, tcl) requires X11.

[James Vega]

On Tue, Sep 25, 2007 at 03:09:48PM +0200, Stefano Zacchiroli wrote:
> On Tue, Sep 25, 2007 at 01:15:57PM +0100, Benjamin A'Lee wrote:
> > Would it be possible for versions of vim-{python,ruby,perl,tcl,full} to be
> > built without GUI support? Currently, if I want the Ruby interpreter
> > support on a headless server, it's necessary to install 40+MB of X11/GTK+
> > and related libraries that will never be used.
> 
> Uhm, no, I would say that removing X11 support from vim-{python,...}
> variants is not an option since it has been like that for ages and users
> are accustomed to that. Also, going that way would mean that the only
> way to have X11 support will become install vim-full, while I believe
> that X11 support is a fairly common request.
> 
> Also providing pairs of vim variants with interpreter support and X11 or
> no X11 support is not desirable due to archive bloat.

Agreed.

> What I see as feasible would be to have a new variant which is basically
> vim-full but without X11 support, we could call it "vim-nox" (for "no
> X11") following the naming scheme that we can found in other packages.
> That would mean that you will still need to pull in libraries supporting
> the other interpreters you will not use, but diminish the need of X11
> libraries which I bet is the largest slice of the issue.

I've actually been thinking of something like this for a while now and
just hadn't had time to send out an RFC.  My idea was more along the
following lines:

  vim-gnome -- All currently supported language bindings, X11 w/Gnome
  vim-gtk -- All currently supported language bindings, X11 w/Gtk
  vim-full/nox -- All currently supported language bindings, no-X11
  vim -- Same as it is now
  vim-tiny -- Same as it is now

A little playing around in Python with the apt module gives some
interesting data.

My suggested vim-nox simply pulls 23M of dependencies over vim.  On the
other hand, moving from vim-nox to vim-gtk or vim-gnome pulls in 122M or
200M of dependencies, respectively.  As Stefano suggested, X is
definitely the larger component to worry about.

Popcon data also shows the individual vim-$language packages being far
less popular than vim-gnome, vim-gtk, or vim-full.  Of those 3, vim-full
is the least popular and is ranked 1679 whereas the most popular
vim-$language package (vim-python) is ranked 2386 with 6 times fewer
intalls and a little under half as many "recent" votes.

James
-- 
GPG Key: 1024D/61326D40 2003-09-02 James Vega <jamessan at debian.org>
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