Re: [gentoo-dev] Summary: Install CD Bloat thread

[Stuart Herbert <stuart@gentoo.org>]

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Hi Alec,

First off - great summary!

On Friday 22 August 2003 1:08 am, Alec Berryman wrote:
> Install CD Bloat Thread Summary:

[ snip ]

> Another culprit for the increase was the inclusion of Perl 5.  No one
> could figure out a good reason for it to be on there.

pptpclient requires it.  

There are a number of packages that pull in Perl 5 during the process of 
creating the CD image, but pptpclient is the only package that survives 
through to the actual CD image that genuinely needs Perl 5.  See the 
attachment for all the gory details.

The only way to leave Perl 5 off the CD is to drop pptpclient.  I couldn't 
find any alternative on Freshmeat, and I suspect that many people who install 
Gentoo Linux have ISPs who use PPTP.

Best regards,
Stu
-- 
Stuart Herbert                                              stuart@gentoo.org
Gentoo Developer                                       http://www.gentoo.org/
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Analysis of perl-5.8 on the basic install CD
--------------------------------------------

In Alec's recent summary of the discussion on bloat on the basic
x86 install CD for Gentoo 1.4, the point was made that no-one is
really clear as to *why* perl-5.8 is part of the image.

So I decided to find out

I decided the best way to do this would be to work from first principles,
and find out what it would take to build a basic install CD image from
scratch without perl.

Summary
-------

Do we need perl-5.8 on the final CD install image?  Yes, for pptpclient.

The Gory Details
----------------

1. default-1.4-x86 profile

'emerge system' is the command run at stage 2 of the Gentoo installation
process.  This automatically pulls in perl-5.8, because it is listed
in the 'profile' for Gentoo 1.4 on x86.

Solution: create a new profile, listing the packages required for the
basic install CD.  Make sure perl-5.8 isn't included in the list of
packages in the new profile.

This solution has the advantage of 'documenting' (well, sort of!) the
list of packages that make up the basic CD image.

2. Vim

Even with USE="minimal", building vim pulls in perl.  There's no real
need to use vim on the install image; app-editors/vi is sufficient
for the purposes of installing Gentoo.

Solution: remove 'vim' from the install CD, and add 'apps-editors/vi'
instead.

3. openssl

openssl uses perl as part of its compilation stage, but doesn't (as far
as I can tell) need perl once installed.

Solution: allow openssl to install perl as a dependency, and then remember
to remove perl ('emerge -C perl') later.

4. sys-apps/help2man

help2man is a dependency of diffutils.  help2man requires perl as a runtime
dependency.  We don't need help2man on the basic install CD; is there a way
to get rid of it?

Solution: by adding the 'build' USE flag, we convince diffutils not to
build its documentation, and not to DEPEND on help2man at all.

5. sys-devel/autoconf

autoconf is a perl script.

Solution: remember to remove autoconf and perl when we're done building
the software for the CD image.

6. sys-devel/automake

Like autoconf, automake is a perl script.

Solution: remember to remove perl when we're done.

7. sys-apps/util-linux

util-linux lists perl as a runtime dependency.  However, unless I've missed
something, our util-linux ebuild does not install anything that requires
perl at all.  It would appear that the ebuild needs fixing.

Solution: remember to remove perl when we're done.

8. net-misc/openssh

Like the autoconf and automake ebuilds, the ebuild for openssh uses perl
to perform search and replace; something that can also be done using sed.
Unlike the autoconf and automake ebuilds, openssh doesn't need perl at
runtime.  This ebuild needs fixing.

Solution: remember to remove perl when we're done.

9. net-irc/irssi

irssi is an excellent text-mode IRC client; it's my personal favourite.
It uses perl for scripted extensions - a feature we're not going to miss
on a minimal boot CD image.

The weird thing is, the ebuild very clearly only depends on perl if the
'perl' USE flag is set.  So, why is perl being pulled in?  Well, the
irssi ebuild inherits the perl-module eclass, and *that's* where the
dependency comes from.

Solution: fix the ebuild to only inherit perl-module if the perl USE flag
is set; until then, ensure -perl is set in the USE flags, and remember to
remove perl when we're done.

10. net-dialup/pptpclient

pptpclient is used to connect to ISPs that use the PPTP protocol.  PPTP
is a tunnelling protocol apparently credited to Microsoft, and is
documented in RFC 2647.

This package includes perl scripts, and probably (definitely?) cannot work
without perl.

Solutions:

1) Drop support for users who need PPTP support.  Not very sociable.
2) Find a PPTP package that doesn't use Perl.  Gentoo doesn't seem
   to have an ebuild for an alternative, and a quick search on Freshmeat
   doesn't look too promising.
3) Produce two install CD images - one with PPTP support, and one without.
4) Find another way to reduce the disk size (like -nls in the USE flags?)

11. sys-apps/xinetd

xinetd is a dependency of the net-ftp/ftpd server that's included in the
list of packages for the basic CD install image.  xinetd includes a perl
script called xconv.pl, which appears to translate traditional UNIX inetd.conf
files into xinetd's own format.

Solution: we don't need xconv.pl working on the basic install CD image, so
perl can be safely removed (along with the xconv.pl script)

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