[gentoo-dev] Re: Collecting opinions about GLEP 55 and alternatives

[Duncan <1i5t5.duncan@cox.net>]

Richard Freeman <rich0@gentoo.org> posted 49B57409.5050406@gentoo.org,
excerpted below, on  Mon, 09 Mar 2009 15:54:49 -0400:

> If the developer of an ebuild prepares the manifest, then at least their
> package manager will know how to handle the ebuild and extract the EAPI.

Good point.  The dev's PM will presumably be updated to whatever EAPI 
he's committing, even if they user's isn't.  That does help some.

> However, end-user package managers wouldn't need to source the ebuild
> to figure out the EAPI.

If I've been paying attention, that isn't necessarily the case.  Ciaran 
can better answer why than I can, however.

> Potentially the developer could just manually put the EAPI in the
> manifest (or use a tool to do this).  Obviously this is an extra step
> when adding ebuilds to the tree, but that would completely address the
> issues with sourcing builds.

That's an interesting idea.  A "manual" method for putting the EAPI in 
the manifest, thus bypassing the chicken/egg issue of needing to need the 
EAPI to source the ebuild... to get the EAPI.

> Changing the manifest format of course creates backwards compatibility
> issues.

That's likely the biggest issue, potentially making this a "wait a year" 
solution.  But if we got in the PMs and started the clock now...

> So, I wouldn't dismiss this idea out of hand - it isn't completely
> equivalent to the other options.

True.  It may well be one component of a full solution, even if it 
doesn't on its own provide a full solution.

-- 
Duncan - List replies preferred.   No HTML msgs.
"Every nonfree program has a lord, a master --
and if you use the program, he is your master."  Richard Stallman