Re: Generated GDB documentation have colliding files on a case insensitive files system

Torbjorn SVENSSON via Gdb-patches
2023-01-15T17:23:28Z

On 2023-01-09 13:24, Eli Zaretskii wrote:
>> Date: Mon, 9 Jan 2023 07:51:17 +0100
>> CC: <gdb-patches@sourceware.org>
>> From: Torbjorn SVENSSON <torbjorn.svensson@foss.st.com>
>>
>>>> I was considering if the redirect files could simply be removed from the
>>>> GDB documentation tree or if they are actually used for inter components
>>>> references.
>>>
>>> They are produced by makeinfo, and they are produced for a reason, no?
>>
>> According to the other thread, they are generated to easy cross linking
>> the documentation. There is nothing in the documentation that will
>> generate a link to any of these files, so hence the question if they are
>> needed by GDB.
>
> Maybe I'm confused, but don't you above answer your own question?
> "Easy cross linking" is the reason.

Well, cross linking from other manuals.
Does this requirement jump the need to actually have all the content? :)

>
>>>> Even if we get a solution merged in texinfo, it will take years for it
>>>> to get activity used, and in the mean while, we are stuck with this
>>>> issue in GDB.
>>>
>>> I still don't want to make any conclusions until the Texinfo
>>> discussion is completed. How do you know there's no solution with the
>>> existing Texinfo versions?
>>
>> As I understood it, it was proved that the redirect pages were colliding
>> and no way around that in current implementation, but maybe I
>> misunderstood the reply...
>
> AFAIU, it's a bug in Texinfo. I hope they will solve it at some
> point.
>
> But now let me turn the table and ask you why we as a project should
> care about HTML version of the manual being installed on MS-Windows?

I'm just seeing that there are toolchains out there that contains a
prebuilt GCC and GDB and that they contain documentation in the form of
HTML files. I suppose these packages could be seen as the bad part here,
but is it really so. Can't GDB improve the way the HTML manuals are
constructed in a way that would work regardless of where they end up?

> Having said that, I have no serious objections to changing the name of
> the anchor if it will solve the problem for you.

Looks like there will a warning emitted now when generating the HTML
files if there are more than one anchor/node with a unique name on case
insensitive files systems as long as the CASE_INSENSITIVE_FILENAMES
option is set with the next version of Texinfo.

As I see it, there are 3 different options for the documentation in GDB:

1. Leave everything as is and forget about all users extracting a cross
built GDB with documentation and let the users deal with duplicated files...

2. Set the CASE_INSENSITIVE_FILENAMES option and also change one of the
anchors to have unique files. This will require Texinfo >7.0.1 that is
not yet released.

3. Generate one single big HTML file. This should be supported with
existing versions of Texinfo, although I haven't tested this option.
What would be needed in GDB sources is to replace the command line
option --split-size with --no-split to avoid generating more than one file.

What option would you prefer?

Kind regards,
Torbjörn