[gentoo-science] RFC sci-mathematics/axiom

[gentoo-science] RFC sci-mathematics/axiom

[Thomas Kahle]

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Hi all,

I consider my tries of reviving sci-mathematics/axiom as failed. The
current version in the tree does not compile per
http://bugs.gentoo.org/show_bug.cgi?id=326575 . I tried to bump the
package, but as we found in
http://bugs.gentoo.org/show_bug.cgi?id=336789 the internal copy of gnu
common lisp that axiom tries to build (gcl is dead-upstream hard masked
in the tree) requires <dev-libs/gmp-5, otherwise it will try to build an
internal copy of gmp-4 which will fail, and is unacceptable. I don't
know if it is worth the effort to try to beat it to work with the
system's gmp. This would probably end up in reviving gcl ourselves.

What is a proper course of action here?  Should we last-rite it or at
least package.mask it to see what upstream does about their dead lisp
compiler ?

Cheers,
Thomas

-- 
Thomas Kahle

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Re: [gentoo-science] RFC sci-mathematics/axiom

[François Bissey]

> Hi all,
> 
> I consider my tries of reviving sci-mathematics/axiom as failed. The
> current version in the tree does not compile per
> http://bugs.gentoo.org/show_bug.cgi?id=326575 . I tried to bump the
> package, but as we found in
> http://bugs.gentoo.org/show_bug.cgi?id=336789 the internal copy of gnu
> common lisp that axiom tries to build (gcl is dead-upstream hard masked
> in the tree) requires <dev-libs/gmp-5, otherwise it will try to build an
> internal copy of gmp-4 which will fail, and is unacceptable. I don't
> know if it is worth the effort to try to beat it to work with the
> system's gmp. This would probably end up in reviving gcl ourselves.
> 
> What is a proper course of action here?  Should we last-rite it or at
> least package.mask it to see what upstream does about their dead lisp
> compiler ?
> 
Hi Thomas,

Have you tried to contact upstream (Tim Daly) to see if being packaged in
a distro is something they are interested in.
I personally would last rite it and possibly revisit the situation every so 
often. If it doesn't even build I am not sure there is a point in keeping it
in the tree.

Francois

Re: [gentoo-science] RFC sci-mathematics/axiom

[Thomas Kahle]

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Hi,

On 21:14 Sun 26 Sep     , François Bissey wrote:
> > What is a proper course of action here?  Should we last-rite it or at
> > least package.mask it to see what upstream does about their dead lisp
> > compiler ?
> > 
> Hi Thomas,
> 
> Have you tried to contact upstream (Tim Daly) to see if being packaged in
> a distro is something they are interested in.
> I personally would last rite it and possibly revisit the situation every so 
> often. If it doesn't even build I am not sure there is a point in keeping it
> in the tree.

I will do that, for now axiom is pmasked in the science overlay because
I caused some irritation when users tried to downgrade their gmp to get
axiom... :(

Cheers,
Thomas




> 
> Francois
> 

-- 
Thomas Kahle

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Re: [gentoo-science] RFC sci-mathematics/axiom

[Thomas Kahle]

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Hi Francois and everyone,

> Have you tried to contact upstream (Tim Daly) to see if being packaged in
> a distro is something they are interested in.
> I personally would last rite it and possibly revisit the situation every so 
> often. If it doesn't even build I am not sure there is a point in keeping it
> in the tree.

I'm in contact with Tim Daly now, who seems very interested in getting
axiom to work on Gentoo. The main problem that I see here, and also with
the developers of Macaulay 2, is that upstream often does not feel any
urge to unsplit their build systems. They just build internal copies of
whatever they need.  So here with axiom it is that the already internal
gcl builds an internal gmp and upstream would like it better to apply
our gentoo patches to that internal gmp instead of making it work with
system wide gmp.  I find it hard to communicate that internal copies are
evil(TM).  How do you guys handle that ?

Cheers,
Thomas




-- 
Thomas Kahle

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Re: [gentoo-science] RFC sci-mathematics/axiom

[Sébastien Fabbro]

Thomas Kahle wrote:

> I'm in contact with Tim Daly now, who seems very interested in getting
> axiom to work on Gentoo. The main problem that I see here, and also with
> the developers of Macaulay 2, is that upstream often does not feel any
> urge to unsplit their build systems. They just build internal copies of
> whatever they need.  So here with axiom it is that the already internal
> gcl builds an internal gmp and upstream would like it better to apply
> our gentoo patches to that internal gmp instead of making it work with
> system wide gmp.  I find it hard to communicate that internal copies are
> evil(TM).  How do you guys handle that ?

You can always point to one of the numerous flameeyes blog post [1]
against bundled libraries, but I'm sure you can come up with a more
concise explanation.

[1] http://blog.flameeyes.eu/2009/03/23/bundling-libraries-the-curse-of-the-ancients

-- 
Sébastien

Re: [gentoo-science] RFC sci-mathematics/axiom

[Donnie Berkholz]

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On 09:09 Fri 01 Oct     , Thomas Kahle wrote:
> Hi Francois and everyone,
> 
> > Have you tried to contact upstream (Tim Daly) to see if being packaged in
> > a distro is something they are interested in.
> > I personally would last rite it and possibly revisit the situation every so 
> > often. If it doesn't even build I am not sure there is a point in keeping it
> > in the tree.
> 
> I'm in contact with Tim Daly now, who seems very interested in getting
> axiom to work on Gentoo. The main problem that I see here, and also with
> the developers of Macaulay 2, is that upstream often does not feel any
> urge to unsplit their build systems. They just build internal copies of
> whatever they need.  So here with axiom it is that the already internal
> gcl builds an internal gmp and upstream would like it better to apply
> our gentoo patches to that internal gmp instead of making it work with
> system wide gmp.  I find it hard to communicate that internal copies are
> evil(TM).  How do you guys handle that ?

You may communicate that they are simply a requirement for many Linux 
distributions, and leave it at that. One way to satisfy both sides might 
be to have the bundled libraries optionally built. Many developers of 
packages with specialized dependencies want to make it easier to install 
their code, so they want to have the option available (and likely on by 
default). What I recommend the package should do is:

- probe the system to autodetect whether the dependency is installed
- allow manual overrides via configure flags
- if not found, then build/install the bundled version

-- 
Thanks,
Donnie

Donnie Berkholz
Sr. Developer, Science Team
Gentoo Linux
Blog: http://dberkholz.wordpress.com

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