[HEADSUP] Staging, packaging and more

Tue Oct 8 11:28:08 UTC 2013

On Tue, Oct 08, 2013 at 01:21:40PM +0200, Ulrich Spörlein wrote:
> 2013/10/8 Baptiste Daroussin <bapt at freebsd.org>:
> > On Sun, Oct 06, 2013 at 02:20:21PM +0200, Ulrich Spörlein wrote:
> >> 2013/10/4 Bryan Drewery <bryan at shatow.net>:
> >> > On Fri, Oct 04, 2013 at 09:01:58AM +0200, Baptiste Daroussin wrote:
> >> >> On Fri, Oct 04, 2013 at 08:57:53AM +0200, Erwin Lansing wrote:
> >> >> > On Fri, Oct 04, 2013 at 08:32:59AM +0200, Baptiste Daroussin wrote:
> >> >> > > > > > >
> >> >> > > > > > > Please no devel packages.
> >> >> > > > > >
> >> >> > > > > > Seconded.
> >> >> > > > >
> >> >> > > > > What's wrong with devel packages?
> >> >> > > >
> >> >> > > > It complicates things for developers and custom software on
> >> >> > > > FreeBSD. The typical situation that I see on most Linux platforms is a
> >> >> > > > lot of confusion by people, why their custom software XYZ does not
> >> >> > > > properly build - the most common answer: they forgot to install a
> >> >> > > > tremendous amount of dev packages, containing headers, build tools and
> >> >> > > > whatnot.
> >> >> > > > On FreeBSD, you can rely on the fact that if you installed e.g. libGL,
> >> >> > > > you can start building your own GL applications without the need to
> >> >> > > > install several libGL-dev, libX11-dev, ... packages first.
> >> >> > > > This is something, which I personally see as a big plus of the FreeBSD
> >> >> > > > ports system and which makes FreeBSD attractive as a development platform.
> >> >> > > >
> >> >> > >
> >> >> > > On the other ends, that makes the package fat for embedded systems, that also
> >> >> > > makes some arbitrary runtime conflicts between packages (because they both
> >> >> > > provide the same symlink on the .so, while we could live with 2 version at
> >> >> > > runtime), that leads to tons of potential issue while building locally, and
> >> >> > > that makes having sometime insane issues with dependency tracking. Why having
> >> >> > > .a, .la, .h etc in production servers? It could greatly reduce PBI size, etc.
> >> >> > >
> >> >> > > Personnaly I do have no strong opinion in one or another direction. Should we be
> >> >> > > nicer with developers? with end users? with embedded world? That is the question
> >> >> > > to face to decide if -devel packages is where we want to go or not.
> >> >> > >
> >> >> >
> >> >> > If we chose to go down that path, at least we should chose a different
> >> >> > name as we've used the -devel suffix for many years for developmental
> >> >> > versions.
> >> >> >
> >> >> > I must agree that it is one of the things high on my list of things that
> >> >> > irritate me with several Linux distributions but I can see the point for
> >> >> > for embedded systems as well.  But can't we have both?  Create three
> >> >> > packages, a default full package and split packages of -bin, -lib,
> >> >> > and even -doc.  My first though twas to make the full package a
> >> >> > meta-package that would install the split packages in the background,
> >> >> > but that would probably be confusing for users at the end of the day, so
> >> >> > rather just have it be a real package.
> >> >> >
> >> >> I do like that idea very much, and it is easily doable with stage :)
> >> >
> >> > +1 to splitting packages for embedded usage.
> >>
> >> -1 for the split, as it will not fix anybody's problem.
> >>
> >> On regular machines, disk space is cheap and having to install more
> >> packages is just annoying to users. Think of the time wasted that
> >> people are told to apt-get libfoo-dev before they can build anything
> >> from github, or similar.
> >>
> >> If you actually *are* space constricted on your tiny embedded machine,
> >> what the fuck are you doing with the sqlite database and all the
> >> metadata about ports/packages anyway? Just rm /usr/include and
> >> /usr/share/doc, /usr/share/man, etc. when building your disk image.
> >> But you are doing that already anyway, so this solves no actual
> >> problem for you.
> >>
> >> My two cents
> >> Uli
> >
> > You are totally misunderstanding the goal of sub packages. Right now people are
> > asking for nox11, noportdocs, noportexamples, etc and all sort of knob, when
> > building resulting in a nightmare for the package system, a given package might
> > or might not have a file depending on the knob, this is totally insane.
> 
> Yes it is, and I fully understand that part and have been advocating
> for one package that has everything, but might only extract 80%
> depending on OPTIONS, for some time now.
> 
> I just don't want us to have 20.000 ports now, and then 40.000 ports
> because we split things into user/dev ports/packages.
> 
> I'm totally cool with having a tweaked package here and there to fix
> several annoyances as you've outlined below. Seriously, make it
> happen!
> 
> A user should not care, if not installing headers for package X solves
> a conflict, do it! But please don't make it a default to not install
> headers because 3% of the FreeBSD system builders might find it
> useful.
> 
> It looks like a lot of the arguments are because there's a different
> understanding of what a -dev package is, and of course everyone just
> knows what they are in linux-land, and they suck. That's why you see
> some pushback on this list.
> 
> > Here is a list of things the sub package solves (among full other things):
> > - Stupid conflicts like libjpeg and libjpeg-turbo, that conflicts because they
> >   have the same dev files, meaning that people cannot end up with packages
> >   bringing both libraries where there are no technical restrictions about it. a
> >   more accurate examples is probably all the databases clients like pgsql or
> >   mysql etc.
> > - Allow to not split in tons of different ports things like qt and php.
> 
> Yes, please!
> 
> > - Not providing .h, .a, .la, etc files also makes it more complicated for
> >   someone to build something on a production server. Why the hell does a
> >   production would need a compiler and anything related to build? except making
> >   it easier for an attacked to build and run its own software easily that has no
> >   meaning imho.
> 
> That argument doesn't hold. If an attacker can upload source code to a
> machine, they can also upload
> binaries. But yeah, people might want to do this for whatever lock-down reasons.
> 
> > - Allow to bring cross compilation in the ports tree without too much headache.
> >   To get cross compilation working the more atomic the packages are the simpler
> >   it is. As we need for some build to have both native and target packages for
> >   example gettext: all the bin/* should be native one and are needed while
> >   building, whereas we need target version of libintl. Same goes for libxstl and
> >   xsltproc, it is very easier to flag them if they are small packages. (Yes I am
> >   really close to get cross buidling working in the ports tree and yes having
> >   splitted packages will help me a lot here.)
> 
> Ah, so they actually solve a big problem for the FreeBSD project, I
> wasn't aware of that.
> 
> > - Yes diskspace and bandwidth matters, Not everyone has a large bandwidth
> >   internet access, I have personnally setup a couple of FreeBSD servers in
> >   countries, bandwidth is not cheap at all.
> 
> All claims about this approach saving bandwidth should provide the
> numbers that a bin/dev package split will actually save them. I don't
> say it doesn't, but this is easy to measure and would make the
> argument that much stronger ...
> 
> > If you all want flat packages then stop asking for nox11 nonls nodocs etc.
> >
> > Some examples of weirdness because we do not split packages:
> > - glib2 bring python as a dependency (just because a developper only script is
> >   in python), and NO glib port has not to be fixed here it does what we should
> >   do.
> > - Lots of people complained about pkg-config being a run dep. But if we are
> >   consistent every single port bring .pc files should then run depend on
> >   pkg-config because .pc files are useless without pkg-config.
> > - People complain about having to depend on the full fat gcc46 just because of the
> >   fact that their packages is linked to on of the libraries part of gcc46.
> 
> But how would you save on bandwidth here? Will the gcc46 port result
> in packages gcc46-bin.tbz, gcc46-dev.tbz, gcc46-lib.tbz, or will it be
> one archive that selectively extracts things based on what the user
> needs?

Different packages selectively extracts will bring nothing useful.
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