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Hi all, |
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|
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I would like to improve support for alternative package managers in |
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Gentoo in any way possible and make a few points about why I think this |
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is important and useful. As the most important example right now, I will |
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talk about Paludis. |
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|
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Paludis is a multi-format package manager[0] supporting Gentoo and has |
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been around since 2006. Since then, it has been used by Gentoo users and |
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developers. |
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|
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Paludis supports all EAPIs and implements PMS[1] consistently. It has |
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been deemed stable on amd64 and x86 last year[2] and generally supports |
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the following architectures: alpha, amd64, arm, ia64, mips, ppc, ppc64, |
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s390, sparc, x86.[3] |
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|
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It is also well known for its rich configuration system and the |
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strictness properties of the dependency resolver which is what most |
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people value it for. |
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|
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Currently, there are not many support channels for people who combine |
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Gentoo with Paludis (only for both separately). Our main Gentoo support |
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channels are also a bit wary towards Paludis and I am hoping to not only |
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show that it is a very useful package manager, but that it also benefits |
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Gentoo as a meta-distribution to be open towards such innovative approaches. |
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|
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My aim would be that all our main support channels like #gentoo, the |
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user mailing lists, the forums and so on treat user discussions |
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regarding alternative package managers in (almost) the same way as Portage. |
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|
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That also means that we would have to integrate these alternatives in |
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our documentation, hopefully the official one. Because I think our |
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official documentation should discuss package managers in the same way |
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it discusses file systems. So, it is fine to recommend e.g. Portage and |
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ext4 as the main examples, but we should also mention zfs, btrfs, |
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Paludis, Pkgcore (when it catches up) and so on. |
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In the case of Paludis, the upstream documentation[4] is quite technical |
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and doesn't give a concise enough introduction for Gentoo beginners, who |
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want to follow a step-by-step guide. Because of that, I have written up |
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such a guide and proposed it to be included in the official Gentoo |
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handbook[5][6]. |
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|
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This could be the start of improving a number of things: |
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* introduce Gentoo beginners to useful PM alternatives |
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* improve support for these in all our main support channels |
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* users don't have to search hours for e.g. Paludis related guides, |
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which are scattered across ancient wikis and forum posts, any more |
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* raise awareness that Gentoo is different (and has a PMS for a reason) |
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* encourage other PMs (like Pkgcore[7]) by promising to treat them as |
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first-class citizens in Gentoo if they are able to support the full PMS |
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* make clear that we care about technology, no matter where it comes from |
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|
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What do you guys think about this? Do you see any other things that need |
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to be tackled in order to get there? Maybe create a project for this? |
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|
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I think we need to start somewhere and maybe the official documentation |
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is that place, because it is more than just a technical statement. And I |
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think we need such a statement. |
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|
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|
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[0] http://paludis.exherbo.org/index.html |
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[1] https://dev.gentoo.org/~ulm/pms/head/pms.html |
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[2] https://bugs.gentoo.org/show_bug.cgi?id=520874 |
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[3] https://gitweb.gentoo.org/repo/gentoo.git/tree/sys-apps/paludis/paludis-2.4.0.ebuild#n20 |
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[4] http://paludis.exherbo.org/configuration/index.html |
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[5] https://bugs.gentoo.org/show_bug.cgi?id=557324 |
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[6] https://wiki.gentoo.org/wiki/User:Hasufell/Test#Alternative:_Configuring_Paludis |
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[7] https://github.com/pkgcore/pkgcore |
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|
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-- |
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Best regards, |
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Julian Ospald |