[Date Prev][Date Next] [Thread Prev][Thread Next] [Date Index] [Thread Index]

Re: When to split a package?



On Mon, 03 Jul 2006, Luis Rodrigo Gallardo Cruz wrote:
> Creating more binary packages certainly has some sort of cost (The
> size of the packages file, at least). How do I estimate those costs? 
> How do I estimate the savings gained from splitting? 
> (number of archs) * (size of _all.deb)?

I recently split "tex4ht" into binary-arch and binary-all. The main
saving is that mirrors need to only copy the binary-all part once.
There could be another saving on the buildd's in that the binary-all
need not be rebuilt/repackaged for each architecture.

On Mon, 03 Jul 2006, Luis Rodrigo Gallardo Cruz wrote:
> /usr/share/man ?
> /usr/share/info ?
> /usr/share/locale/*/*.mo ?

I think these should go with binary-arch since the documentation for
a binary should accompany the binary. Same applies to localisation
strings which are presumably needed by the binary.

You should also note that while splitting a package you need to
give appropriate "Replaces: ", "Conflicts: " and "Depends: ". In
particular, both the new packages replace files from the older version
and conflict with the older version. Note that you do not need a
"Replaces: " or "Conflicts: " field for a newer package if it has
exactly the same name as the older one.

As far as depends is concerned you need one of the new packages to
depend on the newer version of the other new package. Usually the
binary-arch depends on the binary-all. Presumably the binary-all can
be read and used (if only for one's education :-)) without installing
the binary-arch. However, the situation may be different for you.

Hope this helps.

Regards,

Kapil.
-- 

Attachment: signature.asc
Description: Digital signature


Reply to: