Re: [Chicken-users] Arch User Repository packages

[Matt Gushee]

Hi, Dan + all--

On Fri, Jan 9, 2015 at 3:44 PM, Daniel Leslie <address@hidden> wrote:
> I've never liked the duplication within the system package manager.

I agree that duplication is undesirable. However ...

> Ensuring
> Eggs are available and installed could be done as part of the tools' install
> script.

That would be problematic for a couple of reasons. One is that it is
generally considered good practice to separate software that is
managed by the package manager from that which is not. Most Linux
distributions reserve the /usr hierarchy for the former, and
/usr/local and/or /opt for the latter. Not all distros adhere
rigorously to that practice, but I would guess that Debian, for
example, does. Maybe configuring the Chicken package to set the
default egg repo to /usr/local/lib/chicken would help handle that
situation, but I know from experience that having eggs under a
different prefix from the Chicken executable can be messy.

Also, in my experience with various Linux tribes, there is a general
expectation that binary packages should depend only on other binary
packages. Indeed, there is a potential security issue in that (at
least in principle) official binary packages are tested and
security-audited by the dev team of any given distribution, so
allowing a package to install other software outside the
distribution's procedures would be frowned upon if not prohibited in
most distributions.

Finally, the fact that many Linux distros (though not Arch) package
header files in separate '*-devel' packages, and some of the more
'user-friendly' distros don't install developer tools by default,
would make it difficult to distribute Chicken-based applications aimed
at non-technical users (though I don't know that any such applications
currently exist).

I have a feeling it wouldn't be terribly hard to semi-automate the
process of making AUR packages of eggs. I'm an Arch user, so I'll
think about how that might be done.

--
Matt Gushee