[bug #58545] modularise software acknowledgments

[Boud Roukema]

URL:
  <https://savannah.nongnu.org/bugs/?58545>

                 Summary: modularise software acknowledgments
                 Project: Reproducible paper template
            Submitted by: boud
            Submitted on: Thu 11 Jun 2020 02:00:23 PM UTC
                Category: Software
                Severity: 3 - Normal
              Item Group: Enhancement
                  Status: Works For Me
                 Privacy: Public
             Assigned to: None
             Open/Closed: Open
         Discussion Lock: Any

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Details:

Here's commit d5d11865dd  to modularise the software acknowledgments section:

https://codeberg.org/boud/maneage_dev/src/branch/modularise_acknowledgments

While the list of software packages can be considered to
be `data`, the text to describe the lists is something the
authors should decide on. Authors of a scientific research
paper take responsibility for the full paper, including for
the style of the acknowledgments, even if these may well
evolve into some standard text.

With this commit, authors who do `not` modify
`reproduce/software/config/acknowledge_software.sh` will have the
default option, with only a minor English correction from earlier
versions of 'maneage; they will all produce papers with identical
copies of the text introducing and summarising the software
acknowledgments.

Authors choosing to use their own wording should be able to
modify the text parameters in
`reproduce/software/config/acknowledge_software.sh` in the
obvious way.

Systematic issues: the file
`reproduce/software/config/acknowledge_software.sh`
is an executable shell script, because it has to be called by
`reproduce/software/shell/configure.sh`, which, in principle,
does not yet have access to `GNU make` (if I understand the
bootstrap sequence correctly). It is placed in `config/` rather
than `shell/`, because the user will expect to find configuration
files in `config/`, not in `shell/`.

A possible alternative to avoid having a shell script as a
configure file would be to let
`reproduce/software/config/acknowledge_software.sh`
appear to be a `make` file, but analyse it in `configure.sh`
using `sed` to remove whitespace around `=`, and adding other
hacks to switch from `make` syntax to `shell` syntax. However,
this risks misleading the user, who will not know whether s/he
should follow `make` conventions or `shell` conventions.

For reasons why writing ${foo}_${bar} in shell is systematically
safer than writing $foo""_$bar, see:
https://stackoverflow.com/questions/8748831/when-do-we-need-curly-braces-around-shell-variables





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