Re: fndir introspection, site-packages documentation

[Roman Neuhauser <neuhauser@sigpipe.cz>]

# schaefer@brasslantern.com / 2015-03-15 12:14:47 -0700:
> This really doesn't belong on zsh-users any more, in fact it probaby should
> have started out on zsh-workers to begin with.  I haven't changed the list
> target yet for this reply, but I suggest follow-ups go there.

but then i'm bound to miss replies.  i don't want to subscribe to
zsh-workers (yet)...

> Aside:  I don't suppose there's any point in again begging people to stop
> attaching patches as "text/x-patch" or "text/x-diff" or other silly MIME
> types that half my email clients [...]

i recon it'd be easier to reconfigure both halves of your email clients. :)
but, sorry to make your life difficult, it wasn't deliberate.

> On Mar 15,  3:14am, Roman Neuhauser wrote:
> }   ./Src/zsh -fc 'print -l "$ZSH_SITEFNDIR"'     
> }   /omg/share/zsh/site-functions
> 
> I don't have any strong objection to this although it seems like putting
> this value into every shell is overkill for the specialized purpose to
> which you propose to use it.  Can anyone give me a situation in which an
> oridinary user (i.e., not a software packager) would need this?

how about: a site admin wants to install a function for all users.

> Your doc change mentions
> 
> +tt(/usr/local/share/zsh/site-functions) is always included,
> +even if it does not exist, and cannot be configured away.
> 
> That's not quite correct: --disable-site-fndir turns it off, leaving
> only $prefix/share/zsh/$ZSH_VERSION/functions (or subdirs).

i described what i saw in testing.  what i haven't noticed is that
--prefix=/usr/local is a special case.  in fact, removing the hardcoded
failsafe neuters the purpose of the whole thing; you may treat this as a
bug report.

try it yourself:

  % ./configure --prefix=/omg --disable-site-fndir &&
    make &&
    ./Src/zsh -fc 'print -l $fpath'
  /usr/local/share/zsh/site-functions
  /omg/share/zsh/5.0.7-dev-1/functions

  % ./configure --disable-site-fndir &&
    make &&
    ./Src/zsh -fc 'print -l $fpath'
  /usr/local/share/zsh/5.0.7-dev-1/functions

the behavior with non-default --prefix is described in NEWS:

- The default $fpath/$FPATH is now designed always to include
  /usr/local/share/zsh/site-functions.  This directory does not need to
  exist.  Sites that set an explicit site directory can put that in
  /etc/zshenv as before.  The intention of the new path element is to
  increase the likelihood that locally added functions can be found with
  the shell running "out of the box", no matter how the shell was
  configured.

the behavior with *default* --prefix is, well, completely contrary to
the intent described: "no matter how the shell was configured" is blatantly
false thanks to this special case.

> Maybe the right thing is to throw all of this into a module (and doc
> for that module) that can be loaded by package maintainers to provide
> access to zsh's configure settings, but which other users can ignore.
> The more I think about it the more I like that idea.

zmodload or pkg-config?

-- 
roman