On Mon, Apr 07, 2008 at 09:40:42AM +1000, Michael Wybrow wrote:

On 07/04/2008, at 8:29 AM, MilesTogoe wrote:

...

Since pdf import is a key feature of .46, perhaps the lib-poppler-dev dependency should be noted in the Readme for compiling from source. Without it, Inkscape will still compile, and even show cairo-poppler okay in the config log but pdf import support won't be there (well at least in Gutsy anyway).

I was actually going to suggest that since the PDF support is being marketed as a major feature of 0.46, we should make make libpoppler a proper dependency, that is have the configure script fail it isn't present. This will prevent confusion from users who compile Inkscape without any errors but then find the PDF support is missing.

For 0.46 (which is out the door anyway), I don't think there's much advantage to this. Packagers should have no trouble (and much incentive) to enable it already. Indeed, there could conceivably be some platforms where this isn't available, so having it as an optional dependency may be helpful.

For 0.47, though, it probably would be fine to make it a hard dependency, especially if it being able to rely on its presence helps out in some tangible way (more than just user confusion).

Bryce