[Pkg-samba-maint] Bug#496203: samba-tools: package description overhaul

Justin B Rye jbr at edlug.org.uk
Sat Aug 23 12:56:18 UTC 2008


Package: samba-tools
Version: 2:3.2.1-1
Severity: minor

This is part of a set of related bugreports on the packages in the
Samba suite; I've already reported many of these issues (with some
suggested fixes) as a single bugreport on samba4 (see #486370), but
since that approach is a dud I'm trying the alternative of splitting
them up and targetting individual packages.

Current package description:         
# Description: tools provided by the Samba suite
#  The Samba software suite is a collection of programs that
#  implements the SMB/CIFS protocol for unix systems, allowing you to serve
#  files and printers to Windows, NT, OS/2 and DOS clients. This protocol
#  is sometimes also referred to as the LanManager or NetBIOS protocol.
#  .
#  This package contains tools such as smbtorture which may help
#  testing the performance of CIFS servers or clients.

Problems shared with other packages in the set:
* Samba is all about OS interoperability, so keep the OS names
	straight.  It's not just for "unix systems", it's also for
	GNU/Linux!  Likewise, "Windows, NT, OS/2 and DOS clients"...
	NT is also Windows, and Samba works for (smbclient on)
	OpenVMS too!
* the SMB/CIFS protocol is only referred to as "the LanManager or
        NetBIOS protocol" by people copying this text.
* and a wishlist item: WIBNI all the packages in the suite had
	consistently styled short descriptions.

Problems unique to this package:
* "tools which may help testing the performance of" sounds a bit
	cumbersome and/or evasive.

Incidentally, these binaries have no man pages, and when I invoke
smbtorture its help-text warns that I should be using the Samba 4
version (which isn't available even in Sid).  Is this package
already deprecated before it has reached Stable, or what?

Suggested replacement text:
| Description: Samba testing utilities
|  The Samba software suite implements the SMB/CIFS protocol, providing
|  cross-platform support for Windows-style network shares.
|  .
|  This package contains command line tools such as smbtorture for
|  performance-testing CIFS servers or clients.

-- 
JBR - please CC me (or the debian-l10n-english list) in replies





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