Re: [gentoo-dev] Re: [PATCH] sys-devel/autoconf: Convert from eblits into an eclass, #586424

[Joshua Kinard]

On 03/20/2017 15:25, Ulrich Mueller wrote:
>>>>>> On Mon, 20 Mar 2017, Alexis Ballier wrote:
>
>> What makes me wonder more are the proposed solutions: So far the
>> only proposals I've seen are either inlining *all* the code or
>> moving *all* the code into an eclass. Having a quick look at
>> autoconf, it seems to me an intermediate solution would work
>> perfectly fine for the above goals/rules: Put main.eblit into an
>> eclass. The loading code then would access $FILESDIR only in src_*
>> phases. This would likely work better for all parties and would
>> allow to focus on better specifying this gray area of PMS instead.
>
> But is it desirable as a goal, that all packages in the tree use
> regular eclasses, but two packages (autoconf and glibc) use something
> else that is a "grey area"?
>
> Also, can somebody please point me to the discussion that preceded the
> introduction of eblits. AFAICS they appeared sometime in 2007, but I
> cannot find anything in our mailing list archives.
>
> Ulrich

I believe the other working name this idea of ebuild code-reuse went under was
"elibs".  There was a partial GLEP written, enough that it was granted a
number, but I forget that number off the top of my head.

That said, I think a key problem here is the use of the word "eblit" has become
poisoned for various reasons, and this makes the continued use of the term and
its current implementation untenable.

In general, the concept of code-sharing common blocks of logic between multiple
ebuilds in a specific package directory that is not a top-level eclass is not
entirely without merit.  But the only way this idea can be realized in a
suitable manner and be used by far more consumers than today's eblits are, is
to either find and finish the old elibs GLEP or start one over from scratch,
submit whatever needs submitting via patches to at least PMS and Portage, work
through whatever processes are required for approval, and then deploy it in the
next EAPI.

If anyone is game for working something up or discussing further, let me know.

-- 
Joshua Kinard
Gentoo/MIPS
kumba@g.o
6144R/F5C6C943 2015-04-27
177C 1972 1FB8 F254 BAD0 3E72 5C63 F4E3 F5C6 C943

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