Re: [Bug-stow] Directories must not be symbolic

[Vivien Didelot]

Hi Adam,

Adam Spiers <address@hidden> writes:

> Hi Viven,
>
> On Fri, Dec 04, 2015 at 08:48:15PM -0500, Vivien Didelot wrote:
>> Hi,
>> 
>> I'm using Stow to manage my dotfiles as packages. I basically have the
>> following Stow directory in my $HOME:
>> 
>>     Stow
>>     ├── emacs
>>     │   ├── .emacs
>>     │   └── .emacs.d
>>     │       └── .placeholder
>>     ├── git
>>     │   └── .gitconfig
>>     └── mail
>>         ├── bin
>>         │   ├── mua
>>         ├── .emacs.d
>>         │   ├── notmuch-config.el
>>         ├── Mail
>>         │   ├── .notmuch
>>         │   │   └── hooks
>>         │   │       ├── post-insert
>>         │   │       ├── post-new
>>         │   │       └── pre-new
>>         │   └── work
>>         │       └── .placeholder
>>         ├── .mbsyncrc
>>         ├── .msmtprc
>>         └── .notmuch-config
>
> Cool!  I do something almost identical, except I call the stow
> directory ~/.STOW.  As an aside, did you see this which I linked from
> the homepage?
>
>   http://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/info-stow/2011-12/msg00000.html

I think I've seen that page before, yes.

>> The problem is that if a directory doesn't exist in the target directory
>> (here it is $HOME), Stow will create a symlink for it, instead of
>> creating a real directory.
>> 
>> This is bad and unlikely to be wanted, because you may end up flooding
>> your Stow packages with unwanted files.
>> 
>> For instance, emacs will add some files in ~/.emacs.d
>> (e.g. auto-save-list, elpa, ido.last), that I wish not to manage. Worst,
>> my email database synced in ~/Mail/work (about 2.3G) or the notmuch
>> database in ~/Mail/.notmuch (about 1.8G) got into my mail package.
>> 
>> To workaround this issue, I remember myself to type the following
>> command from within the Stow directory to ensure each (or a single)
>> package has the required directories in the target before stowing it:
>> 
>>     find * -mindepth 1 -type d | sed "s,^[^/]*,$HOME," | sort -u | xargs 
>> mkdir -p
>> 
>> IMHO, Stow must only symlink files, and create real directories. This
>> would ensure a simple and determinist behavior, and remove the need for
>> placeholders. What do you think?
>
> That's precisely why I added the --no-folding option:
>
>   
> https://www.gnu.org/software/stow/manual/html_node/Installing-Packages.html#tree%20folding
>   
> https://github.com/aspiers/stow/commit/ed12c787df985896c8ba1c188af45b9fb637b017
>
> ;-)  So your find pipeline is unnecessary.

Great! I tested it and indeed it removes the need for the placeholders.

> However personally I don't use --no-folding, because I want more
> fine-grained control over which directories are folded, and which
> aren't.  For that I use an ugly hack, which is a separate repo I call
> "ANTIFOLD", which contains empty hidden .no-stow-folding files in
> directories where I don't want folding.  I stow that repo to $HOME
> alongside the other ones, and the fact that there are two repos
> stowing to the same path causes Stow to ensure that that directory is
> unfolded (i.e. a real directory).
>
> And yes, it's on the TODO list to improve this:
>
>   https://github.com/aspiers/stow/blob/master/TODO

Do people use symlinks to directory a lot? Because of the flooding issue
I mentioned, I'd imagine --no-folding to be the default behavior, and
having a --folding or more explicit --symlink-dir option to change it.

Would that be acceptable?

Thanks for your time,

  -v