[blfs-support] [BLFS 8.2] pango broken by help2man?

[Stephen Berman]

I tried to build pango-1.40.14 with all required and recommended
dependencies but it failed:

[116/127] Generating pango-view.1 with a custom command.
FAILED: pango-view/pango-view.1
/usr/bin/help2man --no-info --section=1 '--help-option="--help-all"' '--name="Pango text viewer"' --output=pango-view/pango-view.1 /sources/pango-1.40.14/build/pango-view/pango-view
Unknown option: help-option
`help2man' generates a man page out of `--help' and `--version' output.

Usage: help2man [OPTION]... EXECUTABLE

-n, --name=STRING use `STRING' as the description for the NAME paragraph
-s, --section=SECTION use `SECTION' as the section for the man page
-i, --include=FILE include material from `FILE'
-I, --opt-include=FILE include material from `FILE' if it exists
-o, --output=FILE send output to `FILE'
-N, --no-info suppress pointer to Texinfo manual
--alt_version_key=KEY use specified flag instead of --version
--help print this help, then exit
--version print version number, then exit

EXECUTABLE should accept `--help' and `--version' options.

Report bugs to <bug-***@gnu.org>.
[117/127] Linking target tests/test-pangocairo-threads.
ninja: build stopped: subcommand failed.

The help2man Perl script was installed with lsb-release-1.4; this
version is from 2000 and indeed lacks `help-option'. This appears to be
a bug in BLFS 8.2.

In the development version if BLFS help2man is an optional dependency of
pango with an external link to the GNU ftp server. So I downloaded the
latest version of help2man from there (help2man-1.47.6 from February 28,
2018) and this version does have that option. Then I replaced the old
version with the new one and rebuilt pango, but it failed again:

[115/127] Generating pango-view.1 with a custom command.
FAILED: pango-view/pango-view.1
/usr/bin/help2man --no-info --section=1 '--help-option="--help-all"' '--name="Pango text viewer"' --output=pango-view/pango-view.1 /sources/pango-1.40.14/build/pango-view/pango-view
Unknown option: no-info
Unknown option: section
Unknown option: help-option
Option name does not take an argument
Unknown option: output
Usage: /usr/bin/help2man [--quiet] [--stdout] [--with-gettext] [--name] [--version]
[116/127] Compiling C object 'tests/test-pangocairo-***@exe/test-pangocairo-threads.c.o'.
ninja: build stopped: subcommand failed.

I don't understand the "unknown option" messages here because these
options are present in this version of help2man.

After these failed attempts, I removed help2man from /usr/bin and
rebuilt pango again, this time without failure.

So can pango be built with help2man and if so, how, and why did it fail
as above?

Steve Berman

[Bruce Dubbs]

Post by Stephen Berman
The help2man Perl script was installed with lsb-release-1.4; this
version is from 2000 and indeed lacks `help-option'. This appears to be
a bug in BLFS 8.2.

Yes, we need to address this. We haven't had time yet.

Post by Stephen Berman
In the development version if BLFS help2man is an optional dependency of
pango with an external link to the GNU ftp server. So I downloaded the
latest version of help2man from there (help2man-1.47.6 from February 28,
2018) and this version does have that option. Then I replaced the old
So can pango be built with help2man and if so, how, and why did it fail
as above?

Try removing help2man completely. The link creates a binary executable
and the lsb-release version is a perl script. Make sure both are
removed and also check /usr/lib/pkgconfig.

-- Bruce

[Stephen Berman]

Post by Bruce Dubbs

Post by Stephen Berman
The help2man Perl script was installed with lsb-release-1.4; this
version is from 2000 and indeed lacks `help-option'. This appears to be
a bug in BLFS 8.2.

Yes, we need to address this. We haven't had time yet.

Ok.

Post by Bruce Dubbs

Post by Stephen Berman
In the development version if BLFS help2man is an optional dependency of
pango with an external link to the GNU ftp server. So I downloaded the
latest version of help2man from there (help2man-1.47.6 from February 28,
2018) and this version does have that option. Then I replaced the old
So can pango be built with help2man and if so, how, and why did it fail
as above?

Try removing help2man completely. The link creates a binary executable and
the lsb-release version is a perl script. Make sure both are removed and also
check /usr/lib/pkgconfig.

While removing help2man is a workaround (as I noted in my previous
post), I just did configure --prefix=/usr && make && make install on
help2man-1.47.6 and it installed the Perl script to /usr/bin, not a
binary executable. Then I went ahead and rebuilt pango-1.40.14, and
this time it succeeded. What I had done before was to more or less
blindly copy the file help2man.PL from the help2man-1.47.6 source
directory to /usr/bin, thinking it was the help2man script; but it's
actually a self-extracting script which needs to be run to install the
help2man script, that's why it didn't work as I had expected. So one
way to fix the Pango build for BLFS is to make it depend on this (or
a sufficiently recent) version of help2man.

Steve Berman

[Thanos Baloukas]

Post by Stephen Berman
I tried to build pango-1.40.14 with all required and recommended
[116/127] Generating pango-view.1 with a custom command.
FAILED: pango-view/pango-view.1
/usr/bin/help2man --no-info --section=1 '--help-option="--help-all"' '--name="Pango text viewer"' --output=pango-view/pango-view.1 /sources/pango-1.40.14/build/pango-view/pango-view
Unknown option: help-option
`help2man' generates a man page out of `--help' and `--version' output.
Usage: help2man [OPTION]... EXECUTABLE
-n, --name=STRING use `STRING' as the description for the NAME paragraph
-s, --section=SECTION use `SECTION' as the section for the man page
-i, --include=FILE include material from `FILE'
-I, --opt-include=FILE include material from `FILE' if it exists
-o, --output=FILE send output to `FILE'
-N, --no-info suppress pointer to Texinfo manual
--alt_version_key=KEY use specified flag instead of --version
--help print this help, then exit
--version print version number, then exit
EXECUTABLE should accept `--help' and `--version' options.
[117/127] Linking target tests/test-pangocairo-threads.
ninja: build stopped: subcommand failed.
The help2man Perl script was installed with lsb-release-1.4; this
version is from 2000 and indeed lacks `help-option'. This appears to be
a bug in BLFS 8.2.
In the development version if BLFS help2man is an optional dependency of
pango with an external link to the GNU ftp server. So I downloaded the
latest version of help2man from there (help2man-1.47.6 from February 28,
2018) and this version does have that option. Then I replaced the old
[115/127] Generating pango-view.1 with a custom command.
FAILED: pango-view/pango-view.1
/usr/bin/help2man --no-info --section=1 '--help-option="--help-all"' '--name="Pango text viewer"' --output=pango-view/pango-view.1 /sources/pango-1.40.14/build/pango-view/pango-view
Unknown option: no-info
Unknown option: section
Unknown option: help-option
Option name does not take an argument
Unknown option: output
Usage: /usr/bin/help2man [--quiet] [--stdout] [--with-gettext] [--name] [--version]
ninja: build stopped: subcommand failed.
I don't understand the "unknown option" messages here because these
options are present in this version of help2man.
After these failed attempts, I removed help2man from /usr/bin and
rebuilt pango again, this time without failure.
So can pango be built with help2man and if so, how, and why did it fail
as above?
Steve Berman

This sed
sed '/--help-option=/d' -i pango-view/meson.build
worked for me with help2man by lsb_release-1.4