bug#13351: [IMPORTANT] Dropping support for split '.info' files in mainline Automake

[Paolo Bonzini]

Il 03/01/2013 21:53, Stefano Lattarini ha scritto:
> Severity: wishlist
> 
> [This is posted also to the automake and texinfo lists to ensure
>  a wider audience.  Discussion should continue exclusively on the
>  bug-automake list, to avoid a cross-posting flood]
> 
> Automake-generated have for a long time supported "split" info files:
> <http://www.gnu.org/software/texinfo/manual/texinfo/texinfo.html#Tag-and-Split-Files>
> 
> When I asked the rationale for this feature:
> 
>   <http://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/texinfo-devel/2012-08/msg00015.html>
> 
> Karl Berry confirmed that the reason for its existence was indeed
> "efficiency, especially memory size":
> 
>   <http://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/texinfo-devel/2012-08/msg00024.html>
> 
> He also added that "The Elisp manual is one of the largest ones around.
> Looks like it would be maybe 3.5mb as one file."  Not in any way big by
> modern standards.
> 
> OTOH, it appears that the use of split info files (at least in the way
> Automake-generated rules have been handling them for a long time) can
> cause real problems in some (admittedly quite corner-case) situations:
> 
>   <http://thread.gmane.org/gmane.comp.parsers.bison.bugs/3963>
>   <http://debbugs.gnu.org/cgi/bugreport.cgi?bug=12320>
> 
> So I believe we could follow suit with Automake-NG (see commit dd603e21,
> <http://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/automake-ng/2012-08/msg00147.html>)
> and have Automake-generated makefiles pass the '--no-split' option
> unconditionally to makeinfo invocations (starting from Automake 1.14).
> This would allow some nice simplifications in our Texinfo recipe
> (exemplified by the Automake-NG patch referenced above), and offer an
> automatic fix for bug#12320.
> 
> Another *very* good aspect of such a change is that it would be 100%
> transparent to the Automake users.
> 
> Thoughts, opinions, objections?

*This* is a change I support.

Paolo