Re: Core-utils 7.2; building only 'su'

[Bob Friesenhahn]

On Wed, 15 Apr 2009, Alfred M. Szmidt wrote:
>   The problem is that DESTDIR is not a mandatory standard and
>   packages may not adequately implement it even if Automake itself
>   does the right thing.  If INSTALL says that DESTDIR is supported
>   and a package blindly includes the INSTALL file, then package users
>   may end up with a very unpleasant surprise (e.g. damaged operating
>   system) if the package misbehaves with DESTDIR.
>
> This is already the case for INSTALL.  For example, `make uninstall'
> is often broken in many packages.  Same for --program-prefix.
>
> The INSTALL file is probobly the best place to document this.

In the autotools world, some packages are more equal than others. 
Some packages are created via manual 'tar' of a source tree, others 
are created by 'make dist', while others are created via 'make 
distcheck'.  If the package is created via 'make distcheck' then we 
have some confidence that DESTDIR and uninstall should work.

There are a lot of otherwise intelligent package developers who just 
can't seem to figure out how to properly use autotools, or just do a 
crappy job.  As a result, many packages do not survive 'make 
distcheck', properly support DESTDIR, or know how to uninstall 
themselves.

If there was a way that a package could be "blessed" when it is 
created so that the user knows that this package is endowed by its 
creator with correct operation then end-users could know if DESTDIR is 
likely to work and that if they use 'make DESTDIR=/foo install' as 
root that it is not going to overwrite files outside of /foo.

Perhaps someone here can figure out how to apply this blessing so that 
it is possible for the end user to know if the package will follow the 
rules.

Bob
--
Bob Friesenhahn
address@hidden, http://www.simplesystems.org/users/bfriesen/
GraphicsMagick Maintainer,    http://www.GraphicsMagick.org/