ditaa --svg option is missing when building doc/src/sgml/images

On Fri, Dec 19, 2025 at 5:52 AM Nazir Bilal Yavuz <byavuz81@gmail.com> wrote:

I am working on writing a meson.build file for doc/src/sgml/images,
but I ran into an issue when Meson tries to invoke `ditaa`:

...

This issue also happens on autoconf builds:

...

It appears that the --svg option was introduced in ditaa v0.11.0 [1],
while Debian ships ditaa v0.10.x [2], which does not support this
option.

Additionally, doc/src/sgml/images/README mentions: Ditaa
(http://ditaa.sourceforge.net/) but this website has an even older
version, v0.9.*.

If I am not missing anything, what do you think about updating this
URL with the github URL [3]?

[1] https://github.com/stathissideris/ditaa
[2] https://packages.debian.org/sid/ditaa

Nice archeology! I ran into this too when I was adding the images for
temporal PKs & FKs. It worked on a Mac with the brew ditaa, but not on
debian, until I installed it from github. Changing the link seems like
a good solution.

--
Paul ~{:-)
pj@illuminatedcomputing.com

Hi,

Thank you for looking into this!

On Fri, 19 Dec 2025 at 18:39, Paul A Jungwirth
<pj@illuminatedcomputing.com> wrote:

On Fri, Dec 19, 2025 at 5:52 AM Nazir Bilal Yavuz <byavuz81@gmail.com> wrote:

I am working on writing a meson.build file for doc/src/sgml/images,
but I ran into an issue when Meson tries to invoke `ditaa`:

...

This issue also happens on autoconf builds:

...

It appears that the --svg option was introduced in ditaa v0.11.0 [1],
while Debian ships ditaa v0.10.x [2], which does not support this
option.

Additionally, doc/src/sgml/images/README mentions: Ditaa
(http://ditaa.sourceforge.net/) but this website has an even older
version, v0.9.*.

If I am not missing anything, what do you think about updating this
URL with the github URL [3]?

[1] https://github.com/stathissideris/ditaa
[2] https://packages.debian.org/sid/ditaa

Nice archeology! I ran into this too when I was adding the images for
temporal PKs & FKs. It worked on a Mac with the brew ditaa, but not on
debian, until I installed it from github. Changing the link seems like
a good solution.

It looks like brew ditaa is also v0.11.0 [1]https://formulae.brew.sh/formula/ditaa.

After thinking a bit more, I think it would be better to add version
requirement information too; something like:

-- Ditaa (http://ditaa.sourceforge.net/)
+- Ditaa (https://github.com/stathissideris/ditaa) (version 0.11.0 or
+  later)

What do you think?

[1]: https://formulae.brew.sh/formula/ditaa

--
Regards,
Nazir Bilal Yavuz
Microsoft

On 22 Dec 2025, at 13:35, Nazir Bilal Yavuz <byavuz81@gmail.com> wrote:
On Fri, 19 Dec 2025 at 18:39, Paul A Jungwirth
<pj@illuminatedcomputing.com> wrote:

On Fri, Dec 19, 2025 at 5:52 AM Nazir Bilal Yavuz <byavuz81@gmail.com> wrote:

If I am not missing anything, what do you think about updating this
URL with the github URL [3]?

Updating a sourceforge URL with a Github repo abandoned 5 years ago, what a
time to be alive =)

It looks like brew ditaa is also v0.11.0 [1].

After thinking a bit more, I think it would be better to add version
requirement information too; something like:

-- Ditaa (http://ditaa.sourceforge.net/)
+- Ditaa (https://github.com/stathissideris/ditaa) (version 0.11.0 or
+  later)

Agreed, since we require a spefic version we should mention to assist users. I
will go make this happen in a bit.

--
Daniel Gustafsson