Re: Tcl/Tk source directories

[david@elo.ods.com (David Engel)]

>    In my Tcl/Tk packages, I have conformed to what I think is the
>    official Debian convention and renamed the source directories from
>    <package><baseversion> to <package>-<fullversion>.  Unfortunately,
>    this causes gratuitous changes in other packages which need to access
>    the Tcl/Tk source directories.  Since I try to make my Tcl/Tk patches
>    usable by other distributions (Slackware uses them and RedHat may
>    also, at least in part), this is very undesirable.  Would anyone
>    object, if I reverted back to the original names as distributed by
>    Dr. Ousterhout?
> 
> Could you describe the problem a bit further?

OK.  Some Tcl/Tk packages, such as TclX and others, need access to
various Tcl/Tk internals and expect to find the Tcl/Tk sources in
sibling directories.  This is generally discouraged, but unless and
until the required features are exported through public interfaces,
there isn't any other way.  Now, if I rename the Tcl/Tk directories,
the Makefiles and configure scripts of other packages which need this
internal access have to be modified accordingly.

This is very inconvenient for other distributors and users who roll
their own systems if they go to build a package that I haven't
provided.  They will have to figure out that I have renamed the
directories and then make the appropriate changes themselves when the
package probably would have compiled right out of the box.

> [a] is there a reason not to solve this with soft links?

Not cleanly, IMO.

> [b] is this an example of the "source as a development package" issue?

I don't understand.

> I'm not sure exactly what Dr. Ousterhout has set up, but it should be
> noted that the debian package guidelines are primarily oriented
> towards making it useful to have an automated (or easy) build process
> for the packages.  This is conceptually independent of what you have
> to do for exported sources.

This is one reason why I'd like to see us eventually move to something
like RedHat's rpm utility for building packages from source.  I
believe it has support for specifying in the build script where the
source directory is located.

> I think the linux kernel sources are our best model to date.

Again, I don't understand.

David
-- 
David Engel                        Optical Data Systems, Inc.
david@ods.com                      1101 E. Arapaho Road
(214) 234-6400                     Richardson, TX  75081