Re: [directory-discuss] guix tags that could be automatically extracted

[Tobias Geerinckx-Rice]

Quiliro,

[Not-cross-posting this to guix-devel.]

On 16/07/17 03:35, Quiliro Ordonez Baca wrote:
> Using:
> 'guix package --show=emacs'
> for example, it is possible to get a lot of information from a
> package. It could be used to include in the Directory. Or it could be
> the other way around: guix could extract information from the Directory
> in order to define packages.

This might make an interesting option to ‘guix import’, if only to give
packagers something to start with. I'm not sure if it would result in
enough useful hits to make it worthwhile. On the other hand, there's
only one way to find out.

I'll paste what I wrote in #guix, though:

  “I wonder what the copyright situation would be for that. If the
   descriptions are copyrightable, the individual contributors retain
   their copyright. On the other hand, the vast majority of
   descriptions are straight from the home page, Wikipedia, or both.”

I'm not a lawyer nor do I play one on TV, but assume this would apply in
both directions.

> Although it would be easier the former way.

From my limited experience with MediaWiki, I'd bet the opposite. I know
there's a machine-readable dump of the Directory database somewhere,
that's updated at least semi-regularly. I don't know if it's
comprehensive. The directory-discuss archives might.

Kind regards,

T G-R

> The output of the above command is:
> name: emacs
> version: 25.2
> outputs: out
> systems: x86_64-linux i686-linux armhf-linux aarch64-linux mips64el-linux
> dependencies: acl-2.2.52 alsa-lib-1.1.3 dbus-1.10.18 giflib-5.1.4
> + gnutls-3.5.9 gtk+-3.22.15 imagemagick-6.9.8-10 libice-1.0.9 libjpeg-8d
> + libotf-0.9.13 libpng-1.6.28 librsvg-2.40.16 libsm-1.2.2 libtiff-4.0.7
> + libx11-1.6.5 libxft-2.3.2 libxml2-2.9.4 libxpm-3.5.12 m17n-lib-1.7.0
> + ncurses-6.0 pkg-config-0.29.1 texinfo-6.3 zlib-1.2.11
> location: gnu/packages/emacs.scm:102:2
> homepage: https://www.gnu.org/software/emacs/
> license: GPL 3+
> synopsis: The extensible, customizable, self-documenting text editor  
> description: GNU Emacs is an extensible and highly customizable text
> + editor.  It is based on an Emacs Lisp interpreter with extensions for text
> + editing.  Emacs has been extended in essentially all areas of computing,
> + giving rise to a vast array of packages supporting, e.g., email, IRC and
> + XMPP messaging, spreadsheets, remote server editing, and much more.  Emacs
> + includes extensive documentation on all aspects of the system, from basic
> + editing to writing large Lisp programs.  It has full Unicode support for
> + nearly all human languages.
> 
> There are many ways to select each tag and filter by each tag. So it
> could be useful for the Directory.
> 
> I am a newbie with Guix. So I bet some Guix hackers on this list could
> supplement this idea. On the other hand, I learn quickly!

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