[Pkgutil-users] package map file

[<ma...@pr...>]

Started new thread (was 'patch to support non-standard VERSION entries').

Attached, again, is my (amended) suggestion for a mapping file.

As suggested earlier, a file like this could be automatically generated if run on a system that already had the software stack installed.

The intention is to have a file where the version/revision that goes into the catalogue, and/or the catalogue name, and/or package dependencies can be tweaked without having to tamper with the package itself.  The reason we want to leave the package alone is to cater for third party software where the vendor will not officially support it if it has been altered.

This pkgutil.map file would have to be part of a number of changes to pkgutil, namely:

a) catalogue format changed so that dependencies are listed by catalogue name, not package name -- the rationale behind this change is to stop the practice whereby to support different versions of the same software you need to rename the packages (this way you just need a different catalogue name and filename)
b) catalogue names automatically generated by 'bldcat' on non-CSW packages (as per my earlier bldcat patch) unless an entry in the pkgutil.map file explicitly provides the name
c) some automatic logic for handling version numbers without a REV component on non-CSW packages (as per my earlier pkgutil patch) unless an entry in the pkgutil.map file explicitly provides the version string to use in the catalogue
d) dependencies automatically generated by 'bldcat' as today unless an entry in the pkgutil.map file explicitly provides the dependency list.

Thoughts?

Peter - could all this be done via a module, as per your suggestion, so that people could choose to "plug-in" these capabilities, or unplug them if they want to do it the CSW way?

Best regards,
Mark.