Re: package system: questions, suggestions, alien
|--==> "UB" == Uwe Brauer <oub(a)ucmail.ucm.es> writes:
UB> 1. I want to download a new (let's say even a official) package to a
UB> temporary directory and install/update it from there. So I thought
UB> (pui-add-install-directory "~/tmp") would do the job, in the sense
UB> that pui-list-package would list my all the package contained in
UB> this directory and flag them as uninstall. This was not the case.
For that to work you also needed to download the
'package-index.LATEST.pgp' (.gpg if using XEmacs 21.5) as well. And
then you could:
M-x pui-add-install-directory RET ~/tmp/ RET
M-x package-get-update-base RET /path/to/package-index.LATEST.pgp RET
M-x pui-list-packages RET
Iff the packages in ~/tmp/ are listed in 'package-index.LATEST.pgp'
they will show up in 'pui-list-packages'. The central part of the
whole package system is the package-index file. Without that, you've
got nothing.
UB> 2. I want to list 3 party packages via pui-list-packages
[...]
UB> Maybe 3d party package are not meant to be controlled by pui? If
UB> so I consider this as a severe disadvantage!
At present, the XEmacs package system doesn't support 3rd party
packages (those not distributed by us). And I agree with you, it is a
huge disadvantage.
If it's any consolation, implementing support for 3rd party packages
is on my todo list. I'm not sure when I'll get it done, at this point
it is just a few random thoughts floating around the dark recesses of
my mind. :-)
UB> 3. Version numbers: couldn't the package numbers coincide with the
UB> version numbers of the maintainer? vm now does :), but auctex and
UB> others do not. Yes pressing I will give this information, but
UB> anyhow the convenience would be greater if the numbers coincided.
There are two problems with trying to keep the version numbers in
sync...
1) Sometimes we'll make a change to a package that'll force
our version number up before the upstream maintainer
releases a new version.
2) Quite often the upstream version number is incompatible
with our version numbers. Ours are "x.xx" of type float,
and as you could imagine, there are almost as many
variations of a version number/string as there are
packages.
Besides, version numbers are such an arbitrary thing anyway.
UB> 4. May be that has been asked already, but are there plans to write a
UB> tool, which allows to convert an already compiled package to to the
UB> xemacs package standard?. I am thinking of something equivalent to
UB> ALIEN for tgz2rpm.
Not that I'm aware of. I have talked about just such a tool with
someone, but I don't think it ever got past the "wouldn't it be neat
if..." stage.
--
|---<Steve Youngs>---------------<GnuPG KeyID: 10D5C9C5>---|
| XEmacs - It's not just an editor. |
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