Re: [Plplot-devel] [steven.robbins@videotron.ca: Bug#185677: Non-numeric characters in version string upset Tkinter]

[Alan W. I. <ir...@be...>]

Steve reported to Rafael who forwarded it here....:

The version string "5.2.0.cvs.20030320" causes Tkinter to choke, viz:

steve@riemann{steve}python
Python 2.2.2 (#1, Jan 18 2003, 10:18:59)
[GCC 3.2.2 20030109 (Debian prerelease)] on linux2
Type "help", "copyright", "credits" or "license" for more information.
>>> import Tkinter
>>> root = Tkinter.Tk()
error reading package index file
/usr/lib/plplot5.2.0.cvs.20030320/pkgIndex.tcl: expected version number but
got
"5.2.0.cvs.20030320"

I have confirmed the problem.  If you follow the cookbook in
examples/tk/README.tkdemos the following error shows up with my March 17th
version number.

wish
% lappend auto_path /usr/local/plplot_at/lib/plplot5.2.0.cvs.20030317
/usr/lib/tcl8.3 /usr/lib /usr/lib/tk8.3
/usr/local/plplot_at/lib/plplot5.2.0.cvs.20030317
% package require Pltk
error reading package index file
/usr/local/plplot_at/lib/plplot5.2.0.cvs.20030317/pkgIndex.tcl: expected
version number but got "5.2.0.cvs.20030317"
can't find package Pltk

That error message is essentially the same that Steve found.  The problem
here is that we are assuming that the package version and plplot tcl script
version should be identical.  However, man package says the version used for
the tcl package command must be numerical (e.g., 5.2.0) with no alphabetic
characters allowed in the version. A change in the major number indicates an
incompatibility in the associated tcl scripts, but the rest of the numbers
should just be increasing with time with no special signficance attached to
them.  This is one more version number we must keep track of for PLplot with
different requirements to the package version (where we do, in general, want
to be able to include alphabetic version information in the string).

For now, I have have solved the problem by defining a new symbol
PLPLOT_TCL_VERSION=5 in configure.ac which is used to configure the
various pkgIndex.tcl files we have (and which are concatanated to form
the installed $prefix/lib/plplot5.2.0.cvs.20030317/pkgIndex.tcl.

I have tentatively assigned this version to be the same as the major version
number of our package (5).  This works on my Debian woody machine where I
have a local prefix other than /usr. Steve, could you quickly try simply
editing /usr/lib/plplot5.2.0.cvs.20030320/pkgIndex.tcl and change *only* the
version numbers that occur on the lines starting with package ifneeded ....
(The other version numbers must remain identical to what they are now.)
Subject to Steve's verification, I believe this fix should stop plplot
gratuitously breaking Tkinter for every Debian unstable user (which should
subtantially improve our Debian public relations....;-))

**BTW, I am no expert on assigning TCL script version numbers (and don't
want to be).** Thus, the tcl experts here should thrash this out and decide
on what is best for PLPLOT_TCL_VERSION each time we make a new release of
plplot based on the script changes that have been made since the previous
release.  For example, Maurice, if you want to change PLPLOT_TCL_VERSION to
5.2.0 rather than 5 (presuming no script changes since 5.2.0), that is fine
with me.

Alan
__________________________
Alan W. Irwin
email: ir...@be...
phone: 250-727-2902

Astronomical research affiliation with Department of Physics and Astronomy,
University of Victoria (astrowww.phys.uvic.ca).

Programming affiliations with the Canadian Centre for Climate Modelling and
Analysis (www.cccma.bc.ec.gc.ca) and the PLplot scientific plotting software
package (plplot.org).

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