[MacPorts] #15447: inkscape: configure fails to recognize presence of ImageMagick

[MacPorts]

#15447: inkscape: configure fails to recognize presence of ImageMagick
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  Reporter:  db.evans at gmail.com  |       Owner:  macports-tickets at lists.macosforge.org
      Type:  defect              |      Status:  new                                  
  Priority:  Normal              |   Milestone:  Port Bugs                            
 Component:  ports               |     Version:  1.6.0                                
Resolution:                      |    Keywords:  inkscape ImageMagick raster effects  
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Comment (by db.evans at gmail.com):

 Replying to [comment:2 jmr at macports.org]:
 > The way you've done the variant means that inkscape will use ImageMagick
 if it happens to be present even if the raster_effects variant is
 deselected. If there is a suitable configure option like --[enable|disable
 ]-raster-effects, you should disable it by default and enable it in the
 variant. If there is no such configure option, you'll need to disable it
 with a patch in the default case and delete the patch from patchfiles in
 the variant.

 Well, this is the discussion I was hoping to provoke.  The overall style
 of inkscape's configure is to enable
 various extensions/optional features if the requisites for those features
 are detected but there are no
 switches to force them off.  This is normally visible to the builder as
 the output of configure which ends
 with a nice report of what has been included but unless the MacPorts user
 is running configure in the
 debug mode he never sees this and so has no clue as to what he is getting
 (missing) unless he is intimate
 with the varous extensions available.

 In the raster_effects case, a large Raster submenu appears under effects
 if ImageMagick is present. If libwpg is present, an option to open WPG
 files is present in the Open menu.  Otherwise not.  And the distributed
 binary for Mac OS X is built without these extensions.

 So my addition of the variant was not to enable the option per se but to
 make it visible to the user that
 there IS an option and help him make sure he has the dependencies if he
 wants it.

 I agree that it would be better if these things could just be turned on
 and off and will look at that
 but the main point of this ticket is to make it possible to build the
 raster extensions at all (or WPG
 support) at all which just can't be done with the unpatched port.

 So some options might be

 1) Further patch the configure code to add standard style enable-disable
 switches for these optional
 features (are there others I haven't noticed?).  But this adds non-
 inkscape options to their configure
 and will need constant updating in future releases. The current patch only
 back-ports code from trunk that will appear in a later release.

 2) Add a more brute force patch that just turns off the extensions unless
 the variant is selected. Again
 this adds an ongoing maintenance requirement independent of inkscape's
 development.

 3) Remove the variant and just let things work the way the Inkscape people
 have it -- you get it if
 you have the right prerequisites installed. And you need to know this.

 4) No variants and just add the dependencies so that the extensions are
 enabled.  Perhaps this is
 closest to the Inkscape concept.  We have the ports available so use them.

 What do you think?  In the interest of getting the configure bug with
 regard to ImageMagick committed,
 I propose removing the variant now if you are opposed to it (go with 3 or
 4).

 By the way, configure for the WPG extension worked ok as it was -- we just
 didn't have a port for libwpg available.

-- 
Ticket URL: <http://trac.macports.org/ticket/15447#comment:3>
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