From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 Return-Path: X-Spam-Checker-Version: SpamAssassin 3.1.3 (2006-06-01) on yquem.inria.fr X-Spam-Level: * X-Spam-Status: No, score=1.0 required=5.0 tests=AWL,SPF_NEUTRAL autolearn=disabled version=3.1.3 X-Original-To: caml-list@yquem.inria.fr Delivered-To: caml-list@yquem.inria.fr Received: from mail4-relais-sop.national.inria.fr (mail4-relais-sop.national.inria.fr [192.134.164.105]) by yquem.inria.fr (Postfix) with ESMTP id AED3CBC6C for ; Mon, 4 Feb 2008 19:42:51 +0100 (CET) X-IronPort-Anti-Spam-Filtered: true X-IronPort-Anti-Spam-Result: AgAAAEbrpkfAXQImh2dsb2JhbACQJwEBAQgKKZZehG4 X-IronPort-AV: E=Sophos;i="4.25,303,1199660400"; d="scan'208";a="22170581" Received: from discorde.inria.fr ([192.93.2.38]) by mail4-smtp-sop.national.inria.fr with ESMTP; 04 Feb 2008 19:42:51 +0100 Received: from mail2-relais-roc.national.inria.fr (mail2-relais-roc.national.inria.fr [192.134.164.83]) by discorde.inria.fr (8.13.6/8.13.6) with ESMTP id m14IgovB016014 (version=TLSv1/SSLv3 cipher=RC4-SHA bits=128 verify=OK) for ; Mon, 4 Feb 2008 19:42:51 +0100 X-IronPort-Anti-Spam-Filtered: true X-IronPort-Anti-Spam-Result: AgAAAEbrpkfRVYT4kmdsb2JhbACQJwEBAQEHBAQJChaWYIRu X-IronPort-AV: E=Sophos;i="4.25,303,1199660400"; d="scan'208";a="6869982" Received: from an-out-0708.google.com ([209.85.132.248]) by mail2-smtp-roc.national.inria.fr with ESMTP; 04 Feb 2008 19:42:50 +0100 Received: by an-out-0708.google.com with SMTP id c24so502922ana.97 for ; Mon, 04 Feb 2008 10:42:47 -0800 (PST) DKIM-Signature: v=1; a=rsa-sha256; c=relaxed/relaxed; d=gmail.com; s=gamma; h=domainkey-signature:received:received:message-id:date:from:to:subject:cc:in-reply-to:mime-version:content-type:content-transfer-encoding:content-disposition:references; bh=79dimOuD+3Y3oqV8mZhOX+4ZGtuBk+x5dfORSMl9oPE=; b=svXkgE04NxRvWr1XeAOQ9si2CVaa6QguYOLt2mtqAtNVaU+NyoHF9LQ271TvehMstEnOa7PeAMcab7k6Z2x+WIjZCo5yzGujSNWCfFV4Cjd5rvsGwCVMpTg5jlNea/afr0ApmJCAgc1UK5Nn4dZc4pweKpHfOq97A1R8r2BFR4U= DomainKey-Signature: a=rsa-sha1; c=nofws; d=gmail.com; s=gamma; h=message-id:date:from:to:subject:cc:in-reply-to:mime-version:content-type:content-transfer-encoding:content-disposition:references; b=CDR5nBeUNP1IyafL7xizg96cFRnn/NUZMpqWcMW8Dg1Uj4cxpEb0EfaTllL2xPFLkShX4WrbZTlqPTZqu5f55OZMhjHziJIgkEtRbiLpSx5D2k9TaA1VGta2we70iTwEso0qGLTjuPdDInkY9RIoCXrF/s8RNbmtnnSqFoDMibU= Received: by 10.142.229.4 with SMTP id b4mr3675277wfh.158.1202150565800; Mon, 04 Feb 2008 10:42:45 -0800 (PST) Received: by 10.142.108.18 with HTTP; Mon, 4 Feb 2008 10:42:45 -0800 (PST) Message-ID: Date: Mon, 4 Feb 2008 10:42:45 -0800 From: "Nathaniel Gray" To: "Gerd Stolpmann" Subject: Re: [Caml-list] Re: [OSR] Ports-like package management system Cc: "Stefano Zacchiroli" , caml-list@inria.fr In-Reply-To: <1201878222.14203.19.camel@flake.lan.gerd-stolpmann.de> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Content-Disposition: inline References: <479F0664.2070706@exalead.com> <20080130123705.GA21900@pulp.rsise.anu.edu.au> <1201702034.9179.59.camel@flake.lan.gerd-stolpmann.de> <20080130133741.GB20725@takhisis.invalid> <1201705935.9179.102.camel@flake.lan.gerd-stolpmann.de> <20080131090228.GB1479@takhisis.invalid> <1201878222.14203.19.camel@flake.lan.gerd-stolpmann.de> X-Miltered: at discorde with ID 47A75CAA.000 by Joe's j-chkmail (http://j-chkmail . ensmp . fr)! X-Spam: no; 0.00; gerd:01 stolpmann:01 formalized:01 deps:01 deps:01 gtk:01 dependencies:01 packagers:01 cheers:01 wrote:01 maintainers:01 caml-list:01 dependency:01 dependency:01 data:02 On Feb 1, 2008 7:03 AM, Gerd Stolpmann wrote: > > - Are software maintainers willing to provide the information in a > formalized way? That would mean they had to understand the details > of the formalization, and also had to maintain these data (e.g. > respond to users who find errors etc.). Depending on how much detail > the formalization can express, this can be very easy or tricky. Personally, I would be enthusiastically happy to provide such a description. > - Is this so useful for the users that they really need it? I mean > the primary users would be the existing distribution systems > like GODI or Debian that already have formalizations for deps. > I expect that most end users won't directly install software, > and if so, it is likely that they run manually through the > the build package by package, so a description of deps in English > would be almost as useful as a formalization. I have seen many, many cases where the dependency information compiled by non-developers is just awful. I've seen packages that depend on Firefox (and want me to build it from source!) because the software uses HTML help files. I recently installed KOffice on OS X using MacPorts and got a chuckle when I learned that gtk2 was a dependency. It would be much better if dependencies were specified by the developers directly and the packagers used that info. Cheers, -n8 -- >>>-- Nathaniel Gray -- Caltech Computer Science ------> >>>-- Mojave Project -- http://mojave.cs.caltech.edu -->