Re: [PROPOSAL] New Virtual Packages and way to handle Classpath
On Fri, Aug 29, 2003 at 06:58:46PM -0500, Ean Schuessler wrote:
> We must come to terms with the fact that a Debian Java policy cannot be
> built with proprietary VMs in mind. There is no "make it work" when it
> comes to proprietary software and Debian.
The problem, as I see it, is that Java core classes are grouped into
entities like "JDK 1.2", when, by and large, these groups are not
represented in Debian (or in free Java in general). Instead, they implement
some subset of this functionality. However, the classes are still grouped
this way in the JVM (rt.jar and such). So we can neither have useful
JDK-level dependencies (because they're never met), nor can we have useful
package- or class-level dependencies, because you can't mix and match core
classes.
The most practical solution at this point seems to be what everyone is doing
anyway, which is to use or-expressions which reflect what actually works,
and not an abstract idea of what is provided. For example, a package which
works with any java2 runtime, but also works with the interfaces provided by
kaffe, uses "java2-runtime | kaffe", etc.
--
- mdz
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