Re: Summary of KDE filesystem discussion
> > * Many people feel that KDE (and Gnome) is too large
> > a whole to be stuffed in /usr/bin, /usr/share etc
> > and would deserve a separate directory like X
>
> Define many. I also don't see what the advantage would be of moving
> it to a seperate directory. Without knowing what the actual problem
> is I don't see a reason for making any changes.
It's that they grow /usr/bin quite a lot faster than any "conventional" unix
tools and make it very hard to have multiple versions of the desktop on a
same computer. Unlike libc5/libc6 for example, KDE for example consist of
quite a few libraries and, what's worse, applications that are called from
other applications and cannot thus be version numbered properly.
Therefore it was suggested that kde and gnome would be moved to their own
directory., perhaps /opt My own view on this is that it's not good if you
have to change the path settings. Therefore I think a good tradeof would be
to have symlinks to for example /usr/kde/bin/qtcups/ (or even better IMHO,
/usr/kde/qtcups/bin/). Moreover, /usr/kde could be symlink to either
/usr/kde2.2 or /usr/kde3.
[BEGIN wild fantasy warning]
Of course, it would be better if that could be easily changed per user, but
unfortunately we can't(?) do a link like "-> /usr/$KDEVER/" on current
filesystems. That could possibly be solved with a system like in
java-compiler and java-vm packages, however. All the application symlinks
would point to a single .sh which would then delegate, based on the link's
name and an environment variable, bash to either /usr/kde2 or /usr/kde3. Of
course, KDE is just an example.
[END wild fantasy warning]
> > * Some proposed using /opt/kde3. Arguments:
> >
> > + Other distributions work like this, and better
> > compatibility with them could be beneficial
I don't have first hand experince on this; some people on the kde-list
mentioned at least Suse and RH if I remember correctly.
> Incorrect, other distributions do not work like this.
>
> > + FSH seems to permit this (possible
> > misunderstandings about phrase 'add-on package'
> > in it)...
>
> FHS does not allow it, /opt is for third party software which KDE and
> GNOME are not if the distribution contains them.
Perhaps. My phrase above meant that 'add-on' = 'third party' might have been
a misinterpretion in the first place. There was a rather interesting
discussion on that on the kde-list. Please note in any case that I'm not in
favor of /opt - please aim your whips elsewhere. ;)
- Jarno
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