Re: [Caml-list] opam and godi

[Yaron Minsky <yminsky@janestreet.com>]

Sigh.  I don't mean to get into a fight.  And the problems I've run
into with GODI, though, had nothing to do with the Core packages, so
that seems a bit off topic.

GODI surely has its uses, and in particular the Windows support is a
nice thing that OPAM still lacks.  That said, I very much prefer OPAM
(for the reasons echoed by others), and there's little doubt in my
mind as to which package manager I recommend to people who are working
on a UNIX or Mac platform.

y

On Mon, Jul 22, 2013 at 8:55 AM, Gerd Stolpmann  wrote:
> Sad to read such FUD here. The truth is that the company Yaron is working
> for never managed to create good Core packages. I don't know what the
> reason is, but I guess so it is within this company, since other people
> with fewer resources mastered similar tasks well. This is something I was
> always puzzled about, since initially there was good cooperation with this
> company.
>
> So far I've removed Core from GODI because it misses QA standards, and
> have no plans to add it again.
>
> Gerd
>
> Yaron Minsky wrote:
>> While I appreciate the work that Gerd has done on GODI, I do think
>> that OPAM is a significant improvement over GODI.
>>
>> From an end-user-experience perspective, I've found OPAM to be
>> considerably smoother than GODI.  In addition to having what I
>> consider to be a better user interface, upgrading of packages in OPAM
>> has been very smooth overall.  I found upgrades in GODI to be pretty
>> tricky, with many upgrades ending in failure for one reason or
>> another.  I suspect this has something to do with the system for
>> handling of dependencies in OPAM, which has taken quite a bit of work
>> to get right from what I understand.
>>
>> In addition, the ability to easily handle multiple compilers in OPAM
>> is also a big win, from my perspective.  I think it makes it much
>> easier to try out and give feedback on upcoming compiler versions,
>> which is good for the community as a whole.  (Plus, trying out
>> bleeding-edge compiler patches is fun...)
>>
>> With the arrival of OPAM, for the first time I feel good about
>> recommending that new users try out libraries with significant
>> dependencies like Core, since installing such libraries is now really
>> quite simple.
>>
>> y
>>
>> On Sun, Jul 21, 2013 at 10:20 AM, Anil Madhavapeddy
>> wrote:
>>> On 21 Jul 2013, at 14:54, "Gerd Stolpmann"
>>> wrote:
>>>>
>>>>> Hello,
>>>>> could someone explain please the relation between godi and opam ? Is
>>>>> it
>>>>> concurrent ?
>>>>> Godi has been there for some time, and works quite nicely. So what are
>>>>> differences ?
>>>>
>>>> Hi,
>>>>
>>>> both are independent projects. OPAM is a younger project, and I don't
>>>> really know what the motivation behind it is (in addition to the
>>>> generic
>>>> motication to hack something). There were initially claims to make it
>>>> is
>>>> easier to package software up, but what I've seen is actually not much
>>>> different from GODI (actually even worse now that GODI allows it to
>>>> fully
>>>> automate package releases).
>>>
>>> The answer's right there on the front page:
>>>
>>> "OPAM is a source-based package manager for OCaml. It supports multiple
>>> simultaneous compiler installations, flexible package constraints, and a
>>> Git-friendly development workflow."
>>>
>>>> The feature sets are not the same, and some stuff works better in OPAM
>>>> and
>>>> some in GODI. As I'm advocating the latter, let me point out some
>>>> features
>>>> where I think GODI is better:
>>>
>>> Feature minutiae aside, I'd say the biggest benefit of OPAM is the more
>>> open development workflow. It's easier for people to maintain their
>>> own branches and contribute changes to the central repository.
>>>
>>> Let's look at the stable repository "pulse":
>>> https://github.com/OCamlPro/opam-repository/pulse/monthly
>>>
>>> It tells us that in the last month, there have been 30 authors that have
>>> pushed 167 package updates. These have all come in as pull requests that
>>> can still be browsed.  For example, see the latest Core from Jane
>>> Street:
>>> https://github.com/OCamlPro/opam-repository/pulls?state=closed
>>>
>>> Several development groups also maintain their own remotes without any
>>> need to depend on the central repository. For example, see Citrix's:
>>> https://github.com/xapi-project/opam-repo-dev/tree/master/packages
>>>
>>> As Gerd points out, GODI is an older and more mature project. I find
>>> OPAM more useful for my own personal development workflow though. You
>>> should try both out and see which one you prefer.
>>>
>>> cheers,
>>> Anil
>>>
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>>
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>>
>
>
> --
> Gerd Stolpmann, Darmstadt, Germany    gerd@gerd-stolpmann.de
> Creator of GODI and camlcity.org.
> Contact details:        http://www.camlcity.org/contact.html
> Company homepage:       http://www.gerd-stolpmann.de
> *** Searching for new projects! Need consulting for system
> *** programming in Ocaml? Gerd Stolpmann can help you.
>