Debian and ISO C++ package management conversations
Hello,
I have been involved in the conversations in the ISO WG21 (C++) SG15
(Tooling Study Group). Particularly in the context of trying to get a
story straight on how C++ modules will interact with package managers.
Over the past two months, I have released a couple[1] papers[2],
trying to outline the requirements on how C++ modules could be
consumed in non-monorepo environments. Particularly, I think that
affects how GNU/Linux distributions will have to deal with C++.
During early discussion in the SG15 mailing list[3], it became clear
that some folks are interested in getting a bit further in the package
management side. During cppcon last week I managed to sit down with
some of those folks, and got to an agreement to explore the
possibility of moving the C++ language a bit ahead in the package
management space, instead of just "accepting defeat" and making
modules behave like headers in the way they are distributed.
So I recently started another conversation[4] where I am trying to
summarize what are the different requirements on how package managers
and build systems need to cooperate in the context of C++.
The main thing, however, is that we're not getting a lot of input from
folks involved in the package management side. So I'm reaching out to
folks that have experience maintaining C++ libraries in Debian --
although, realistically, this applies to C, C++ and Fortran.
This is particularly important because the main risk for any
conversation in that area is that we can come up with a spec that
"doesn't stick". So in a sense, we need to think about this in terms
of "here's an additional thing that folks packaging C++ code will need
to do in order to make them consumable by other build systems".
Do folks think there's space for us to create more interoperability
between package managers and build systems? What are the requirements
that should drive an effort on that space?
Daniel
[1]: https://isocpp.org/files/papers/P2409R0.pdf - Although it is
written from Bloomberg's perspective, our understanding is that it
matches the requirements for most distributions (in fact, bloomberg
uses dpkg for its internal libraries deployed as a "partial
distribution" into /opt/bb)
[2]: https://isocpp.org/files/papers/P2473R0.pdf - This is a "let's
make modules look like headers" proposal.
[3]: https://lists.isocpp.org/sg15/2021/10/1083.php
[4]: https://lists.isocpp.org/sg15/2021/10/1145.php is where I try to
summarize things into a coherent document.
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