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On Thu, Aug 09, 2001 at 12:44:46AM +0200, Mikael Hallendal wrote: |
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> Hi! |
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> |
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> The problem with xml is that it's hard to read without a tool, we |
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> could however easily write such a tool that we use for viewing those |
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> files. So I'd say that an xml-file describing the package would be |
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> nice since it can then be used on the web for browsing available |
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> packages. |
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The problem with not using XML is that we have to make yet another file |
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format parser, which we will have to maintain. |
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What's more, for other people to be able to make use of the description |
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files, they'll have to concoct their own parsers or use ours. If we want |
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them to use ours, we will have to make bindings for it to Perl, Python, |
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C, C++ and Java, preferrably other languages as well. |
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We get all this for free when using XML, since it's widely supported by |
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all non-trivial (and many trivial) languages. |
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However, it's a pain in the butt to write/edit and to some extend more |
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difficult to read than a format tuned for human reading. |
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This is a known problem with no perfect solution. In fact, XML (or S-exp) |
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is as close as we've gotten to date. |
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In my opinion, we really attack this problem from the completely wrong end: |
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we start by describing not only tools/technology we want to use, but also |
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the specific storage of the data before we even know what we want to extend |
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Portage with in the long term. |
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Better package descriptions is just one little part of it all. We also want |
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a graphical package tool, bug reporting, feature requests, regression testing, |
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an automatic package verifier that catches many of the nasty things (like ebuild |
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foo install installing in /usr instead of ${D}/usr), bindings/exports of the |
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package database to tools outside Portage, etc, etc. |
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We seem to be at a stage where our entire user population is extremely |
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well-versed in unix, have a lot of experience to bring to the table, and are |
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prepared to suffer some major restructurings in vital parts of the system (mainly |
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Portage). |
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If anybody have any thoughts on this, we should get them all out now. I'll try to |
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maintain them in some form for design document on the gentoo.org. |
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Regards, |
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Karl T |
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