From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 Received: (from majordomo@localhost) by pauillac.inria.fr (8.7.6/8.7.3) id CAA15330; Fri, 24 Aug 2001 02:26:40 +0200 (MET DST) X-Authentication-Warning: pauillac.inria.fr: majordomo set sender to owner-caml-list@pauillac.inria.fr using -f Received: from concorde.inria.fr (concorde.inria.fr [192.93.2.39]) by pauillac.inria.fr (8.7.6/8.7.3) with ESMTP id CAA15368 for ; Fri, 24 Aug 2001 02:26:39 +0200 (MET DST) Received: from moutvdom00.kundenserver.de (moutvdom00.kundenserver.de [195.20.224.149]) by concorde.inria.fr (8.11.1/8.10.0) with ESMTP id f7O0QcH09616 for ; Fri, 24 Aug 2001 02:26:38 +0200 (MET DST) Received: from [195.20.224.209] (helo=mrvdom02.schlund.de) by moutvdom00.kundenserver.de with esmtp (Exim 2.12 #2) id 15a4o2-0004Mu-00; Fri, 24 Aug 2001 02:26:38 +0200 Received: from drms-3e364b94.pool.mediaways.net ([62.54.75.148] helo=ice.gerd-stolpmann.de) by mrvdom02.schlund.de with esmtp (Exim 2.12 #2) id 15a4o1-00073J-00; Fri, 24 Aug 2001 02:26:37 +0200 Received: from localhost (localhost [[UNIX: localhost]]) by ice.gerd-stolpmann.de (8.9.3/8.9.3) id CAA14575; Fri, 24 Aug 2001 02:08:13 +0200 From: Gerd Stolpmann Reply-To: info@gerd-stolpmann.de Organization: privat To: Miles Egan , caml-list@inria.fr Subject: Re: [Caml-list] standard regex package Date: Fri, 24 Aug 2001 01:55:25 +0200 X-Mailer: KMail [version 1.0.28] Content-Type: text/plain References: <3750.998602056@saul.cis.upenn.edu> <01082400035105.02716@ice> <20010823151135.B8952@caddr.com> In-Reply-To: <20010823151135.B8952@caddr.com> MIME-Version: 1.0 Message-Id: <01082402081307.02716@ice> Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit Sender: owner-caml-list@pauillac.inria.fr Precedence: bulk On Fri, 24 Aug 2001, Miles Egan wrote: >On Thu, Aug 23, 2001 at 11:49:50PM +0200, Gerd Stolpmann wrote: >> Because these questions are difficult, findlib does not include versioned >> dependencies (but it includes versions as such, and dependencies as such). So >> it requires still an intelligent operator that helps finding the right versions. > >One danger in developing such a system is that you'll wind up duplicating the >rather extensive functionality of existing package management systems. RPM and >DEB both handle these kinds of dependencies and are fairly complex systems for >it. CPAN has its shortcomings, but it also works suprisingly well most of the >time. I think you should at least consider taking a "worse-is-better" approach >and build something that works and leave the delicate dependency management to >the distribution packagers. As far as I know, RPM/DEP focus on binary installations, and source packages exist only to conveniently make binary packages. This means: Someone already has reviewed the package and decided which versions to take. For a CPAN-like system, the primary goal is to simplify installations from source. This is far more complicated because typically nobody has checked which package versions (reliably) work together. As pointed out in my last mail, there is no definite algorithm, and at most it would be possible to find some heuristics working in many cases. But this doesn't mean that CPAN isn't possible for Caml. It only means: Don't begin with a fully automatic installation routine, and lower your goals. It would be already great if we had a standard package format and a standard procedure to install packages, even if we would have to call it manually (at the beginning). Gerd -- ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- Gerd Stolpmann Telefon: +49 6151 997705 (privat) Viktoriastr. 45 64293 Darmstadt EMail: gerd@gerd-stolpmann.de Germany ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- ------------------- Bug reports: http://caml.inria.fr/bin/caml-bugs FAQ: http://caml.inria.fr/FAQ/ To unsubscribe, mail caml-list-request@inria.fr Archives: http://caml.inria.fr