[Gnu-arch-users] file and directory restrictions

[Zack Brown]

On Thu, Aug 28, 2003 at 02:23:35PM -0400, Jason McCarty wrote:
> Zack Brown wrote:
> > On Thu, Aug 28, 2003 at 06:36:50AM -0700, Robert Anderson wrote:
> > > On Thu, 2003-08-28 at 03:45, Maksim Lin wrote:
> > > > Exactly.
> > > > Software (even scm) should be making life as easy as possible for users 
> > > > not harder.
> > > 
> > > Easier over the next 5 minutes, the next 5 months, or the next 5 years? 
> > > That's the issue, and it's not a simple one ("just make life easier").
> > 
> > People seem to be talking around the issue. Exactly what restrictions on
> > directory tree structure are we talking about here? Could someone please
> > post some examples?
> 
> Projects that build inside the source tree can be problematic with tla.
> With explicit or tagline tagging, all the .o files are considered
> unrecognized, and other generated files are treated as untagged source,
> so many commands fail (including what-changed) if you don't clean up the
> tree first. The result is that tla strongly encourages building outside
> the tree (or in a precious-tagged directory in the tree, like tla's
> =build). Note that this can be overcome, especially when the tagging-
> method changes go in.

So once those changes go in, this particular problem goes away?

> 
> This was one of my early gripes about tla (larch behaved differently),
> but now that I've transitioned my few projects to an out-of-source
> build process, it doesn't bother me. This is one of the things I'm
> thinking about when I say that (some of) arch's restrictions lead to
> better software, but it's initially painful. And as Miles pointed out,
> it's much more of a hassle for pre-existing projects.

It kind of introduces the concept of 'porting a package to arch'.

I know that some of the LNX-BBC bootable business-card people (
http://www.lnx-bbc.org/ ) are considering using arch (they currently use
CVS), and this particular restriction would probably cause them problems. As
a distro, they automate the compilation of a wide variety of upstream
packages. They won't be able to port all those packages to arch, so
they'd have to root around for some way to finesse it, or else just give
up on arch.

> 
> Another restriction is the set of characters allowed in filenames. Lots
> of people don't like this, although I don't recall seeing a practical
> problem being observed yet.

LNX-BBC would also be likely to trigger that as well, because of the great
variety of packages they include. (as an aside, David Roundy, the darcs
maintainer, plans to support all characters in project filenames).

Be well,
Zack

> 
> The use of multi-tree projects isn't a restriction, but it's been
> advocated as a solution to the (soon to be addessed) problem of arch's
> speed on huge projects like the linux kernel. It's a good idea in
> general, as it promotes modularity, but it may not be appropriate for
> all large projects.
> 
> I believe all of these issues will become moot points in the
> not-too-distant future, but they sometimes present difficulties in the
> early stages of a project. We'll see what other items people come up
> with.
> 
> Jason
> 
> 
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-- 
Zack Brown