#858039 lintian: Graph (SVG) files on https://lintian.debian.org/ lack tag name

Package:
lintian
Source:
lintian
Submitter:
Axel Beckert
Date:
2024-02-02 11:18:23 UTC
Severity:
wishlist
Tags:
#858039#5
Date:
2017-03-17 15:51:03 UTC
From:
To:
Hi,

today I was talking with a colleague about the result of some action
which had a severe impact on some lintian tag. Since it was irrelevant
which packages were affected and it was only relevant how the number
shrunk over time, I only sent him the link the graph:

https://lintian.debian.org/resources/beeef37b8e3ee13c9d12dc0374b1f60f3f16c2acec234986cdabc5d2ad429ef8.svg

He was totally confused by the graph and asked "What does «Tags» mean?
Is that good or bad?".

Only when I saw the graphic on his screen without the surrounding
context, I realized that the graph actually doesn't contain the tag name
at all. (Or said the other way round: Try to guess for which Lintian tag
the above mentioned graph is. I assume that a few Debianers will
recognize it, but also that it won't be too many people. See the hint at
the very end of this mail. :-)

So I propose to add at least the tag name to the SVG somewhere,
e.g. below the X axis, as a title or instead of "Tags". If we can afford
using more vertical space, I'd suggest to changing the legend as
follows:

Tags       ⇒ Tag <actual tag name> emitted
Packages   ⇒ Packages which emitted <actual tag name>
Overridden ⇒ Tag <actual tag name> overridden

(Maybe we need to use a smaller font, too.)

Another thing which is very similar is the file name of that images. Are
there reasons why the above mentioned graph file is named
"beeef37b8e3ee13c9d12dc0374b1f60f3f16c2acec234986cdabc5d2ad429ef8.svg"
and not "<actual tag name>.svg"? That would probably also provide
permanent URLs for passing links to just the graph around.

#858039#10
Date:
2017-03-17 22:11:00 UTC
From:
To:
Axel Beckert:

Agreed that is less helpful than it should have been.

I am very happy to receive patches for improvements.  I have attached
the underlying data file so anyone can play around with it.  To generate
a graph from it, you will need to do the following:

  cp -a $LINTIAN_GIT_CHECKOUT/reporting/graphs/tags.gpi .
  sed -i 's/^tag=.*/tag="hardening-no-pie"/' tags.gpi
  mkdir tags
  gzip -dc < hardening-no-pie.dat.gz > tags/hardening-no-pie.dat
  cat <<EOF > common.gpi
date_min=1458251889
date_max=1489787879
graph_dir="."
history_dir="."
EOF
  gnuplot tags.gpi

The result will be produced in tags/hardening-no-pie.svg.  The example
above omits the vertical version seperators. If you want to play with
those, then have a look in commands/reporting-html-reports.pm (look for
gnuplot), which has the logic for generating the common.gpi with the
version separators.


Any DD can extract newer versions of the data file (and any other data
set used for graphs) from lindsay.d.o at
/srv/lintian.debian.org/history/tags.  For non-DDs, I am happy to
provide other data files on request.
Patches to expose the data files on the website is also very welcome. :)

This is a trick that to enable aggressive caching while ensuring we can
push updates out when the image changes.  I admit it is not super user
friendly but I would like to keep the actual resources that way.
  I am happy to assist with patches to /also/ provide a "human readable"
URL that redirects to the current version of the resource.  Possibly by
reusing the concept of a redirect file (like the one that powers the
https://lintian.debian.org/source/lintian redirects)

Thanks,
~Niels

#858039#17
Date:
2023-02-06 12:50:34 UTC
From:
To:
I've submitted a PR to get this change in as proposed by Axel:

https://salsa.debian.org/lintian/lintian/-/merge_requests/455

#858039#22
Date:
2023-02-06 13:36:36 UTC
From:
To:
Hi Brian,

Brian Thompson (@brianrobt) wrote:

Thanks a lot for your contribution! Had to look into the bug report to
see that this actually was my own feature request from many years ago.
:-)

Unfortunately the code for the lintian.debian.org website has been
rewritten completely since then (by a Lintian maintainer after Niels
who replied back then) and the current website doesn't seem to sport
these SVGs anymore. At least I couldn't find them.

Additionally generating the website broke under the previous
generation of Lintian maintainers and nobody of the current generation
(including myself) knows how it works or how to even access it.

Fixing the lintian.debian.org website is on our TODO list, but only
with lower priority for after the Bookworm release (or at only after
it is frozen enough so that we can focus on other things).

It's also not high priority because we have
https://udd.debian.org/lintian/ as slower (because non-static)
replacement for the most pressing up-to-date statistics about lintian
tags and packages.

Because of all that and because of we're in the first stage of the
freeze for Bookworm, I'll though merge your merge request only after
the Bookworm release as it does not bring any advantage for Lintian in
Bookworm.

(And yes, I'll merge it even though the feature is not used as of now.
I still have hope that we can bring it back. :-)

		Regards, Axel

#858039#27
Date:
2024-02-02 06:42:10 UTC
From:
To:
Greetings.

I'm writing to you because I have a humanitarian request that I believe
could be incredibly impactful. I'm reaching out about the recent
devastating storm that tragically claimed many lives and affected numerous
individuals in Libya, including one of my clients. I would like to discuss
a proposal with you that could enable us to extend a helping hand to these
victims.

Looking forward to discussing this further with you.

Warm regards,
Mrs. Nathalie Herolds