Re: [Scrollkeeper-devel] Handling relocatable packages

[Nik C. <ni...@no...>]

On Fri, Nov 17, 2000 at 10:46:20AM -0600, Dan Mueth wrote:
> Before I get into my idea, I wanted to ask people who actually supports
> and uses relocatable packages?  Apparently all of Red Hat Linux and GNOME
> are non-relocatable.  Nick has indicated that *BSD at least sometimes uses
> relocatable packages.  I'm curious which operating system / packaging
> system / distributions actually support and use relocatable packages.

You *absolutely* have to support relocatable packages.  

The BSD ports/packages systems support it, as does RPM.  I'd be incredibly
surprised if Debian's format didn't.

For example, suppose I want to install a Debian administrator's guide
on to my FreeBSD system (perhaps I want to learn more about Debian).

If I read the Debian docs properly, it's going to want to install somewhere
under /usr/doc. 

Sorry, on a FreeBSD system that's a no go area -- /usr/doc is reserved for
documentation that comes with the OS (in fact, it's not even /usr/doc anymore
it's /usr/share/doc/, because /usr/share/ is where architecturally neutral
files live).

Since this is a local addition to the system, it would (on FreeBSD) live 
in /usr/local/share/doc/<mumble>.  Of course, I might not be root on this
box, in which case I'm probably going to want to install it somewhere
under $HOME/share/doc/, or similar (or maybe even $HOME/public_html, so
I can browse it easily from elsewhere).

> My suggestion:
> 
> For non-relocatable packages, everything stays exactly as it is now and
> was described in proposal #3.

There should be no such thing as a non-relocatable package.

For FreeBSD, this means that some of the guys that produce the ports do
actually go through the code, substituting "/usr/bin" with "$PREFIX/bin"
(or whatever) so that the application can be installed outside of it's
expected directory hierarchy.

N
-- 
Internet connection, $19.95 a month.  Computer, $799.95.  Modem, $149.95.
Telephone line, $24.95 a month.  Software, free.  USENET transmission,
hundreds if not thousands of dollars.  Thinking before posting, priceless.
Somethings in life you can't buy.  For everything else, there's MasterCard.
  -- Graham Reed, in the Scary Devil Monastery