From owner-freebsd-arch Mon Jul 8 7:55:45 2002 Delivered-To: freebsd-arch@freebsd.org Received: from mx1.FreeBSD.org (mx1.FreeBSD.org [216.136.204.125]) by hub.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 323DC37B400; Mon, 8 Jul 2002 07:55:42 -0700 (PDT) Received: from thuvia.demon.co.uk (thuvia.demon.co.uk [193.237.34.248]) by mx1.FreeBSD.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 119FB43E3B; Mon, 8 Jul 2002 07:55:40 -0700 (PDT) (envelope-from mark@thuvia.demon.co.uk) Received: from dotar.thuvia.org (dotar.thuvia.org [10.0.0.4]) by phaidor.thuvia.org (8.11.6/8.11.6) with ESMTP id g68Etcb10956; Mon, 8 Jul 2002 15:55:38 +0100 (BST) (envelope-from mark@thuvia.demon.co.uk) Received: from dotar.thuvia.org (localhost [IPv6:::1]) by dotar.thuvia.org (8.12.3/8.12.3) with ESMTP id g68EtcKC063765; Mon, 8 Jul 2002 15:55:38 +0100 (BST) (envelope-from mark@dotar.thuvia.org) Received: (from mark@localhost) by dotar.thuvia.org (8.12.3/8.12.3/Submit) id g68Etclk063764; Mon, 8 Jul 2002 15:55:38 +0100 (BST) Date: Mon, 8 Jul 2002 15:55:38 +0100 (BST) From: Mark Valentine Message-Id: <200207081455.g68Etclk063764@dotar.thuvia.org> In-Reply-To: Doug Barton's message of Jul 8, 12:32am X-Mailer: Mail User's Shell (7.2.6 beta(5) 10/07/98) To: Doug Barton Subject: Re: Package system flaws? Cc: Garrett Wollman , Sender: owner-freebsd-arch@FreeBSD.ORG Precedence: bulk List-ID: List-Archive: (Web Archive) List-Help: (List Instructions) List-Subscribe: List-Unsubscribe: X-Loop: FreeBSD.ORG > From: Doug Barton > Date: Mon 8 Jul, 2002 > Subject: Re: Package system flaws? > On Mon, 8 Jul 2002, Mark Valentine wrote: > > Compressing the "metadata + binary tarball" just lost you the ability to > > access the metadata without uncompressing the whole caboodle. > > Well, if people are dead set on having both things in the same package (I > still think two seperate files is a cleaner solution) My earlier suggestion actually said just about the same thing, with the _option_ of storing the two (or more) parts in an uncompressed archive instead of a directory, for ease of handling. In light of Wes' comments on storing the metadata, I'd modify my examples as follows. Example 1: simple package, not sub-packaged. $ ls /var/spool/pkg/foo-x.y base.bz2 package.xml Example 2: package with optional development and documentation components $ ls /var/spool/pkg/bar-m.n base.bz2 devel.bz2 doc.bz2 package.xml (In an archive, of course, package.xml would be the first member.) > then as long as the > binaries are compressed efficiently (using tar + bzip or some such) then > we can use a less efficient, though more friendly alternative to compress > the metadata + binary bit. Bingo! > > It isn't _all_ about space (but space helps a lot). > > Don't underestimate this factor. I should have said a _lot_. ;-) > There is also another reason to consider seperating the binary tarball and > the metadata that I haven't mentioned yet. And actually, now that I think > of it more it's another good reason to seperate the two things into > different files. If I have package A that depends on package B, under the > current system if we up the version of package B, we have to re-roll > package A altogether just to update the dependency data, even though > nothing about the binary has, or needs to change. By seperating the > metadata and the binaries we can just update the metadata with the new > dependency and push just that. Indeed. > > See my earlier suggestion which was basically "compress the binaries, > > then _archive_ the metadata plus binary tarball". > > Sorry to say I skimmed that too rapidly. It sounds like we agree roughly > on this point, although I'd love for us to use a non-GNU tool for this > (sorry, blatant prejudice there). Ideally you use POSIX archive formats and any tool which implements them. Cheers, Mark. -- Mark Valentine, Thuvia Labs "Tigers will do ANYTHING for a tuna fish sandwich." Mark Valentine uses "We're kind of stupid that way." *munch* *munch* and endorses FreeBSD -- To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org with "unsubscribe freebsd-arch" in the body of the message