Hi Lyos, Michel,
Thanks for your comments and interest in this. I've been thinking
about this continuously since i started the thread. I have also
packaged a few[1] rpms and created a yum repo. I have not announced it
yet, since I keep changing my mind about how best to create the rpms,
so the rpms are not consistent in naming or packaging conventions.
Anyways, here are my thoughts on the issue:
Quoting Michel Salim <michel.sylvan@xxxxxxxxx>:
On Wed, Feb 18, 2009 at 2:02 PM, Lyos Gemini Norezel
<lyos.gemininorezel@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:
I don't know about your system... but my system already has 349 folders in
/usr/share ... which would likely be overwhelming to John Q Public.
I'd suggest a different, perhaps dedicated, location if it is to be
system-wide.
If it's under /usr, it'd really have to be somewhere in %{_datadir},
i.e. /usr/share. And given that Fedora does not even use /opt, it's
hard to see it going somewhere else. Although perhaps
/usr/share/fedora-cc/{books,music,video,...} is less scattered than
/usr/share/{books,music,video,...}.
I like this idea and I was thinking along the same lines. In addition
to this, I was thinking about making the rpms relocatable, so that if
a user prefers, the rpm could be installed under
~/fedora-cc/{books,music,video,...}[2] ...etc.
There are 2 problem though:
a. Yum doesn't seem to have an option to support relocatable packages
(AFAICT, the '--installroot' option will assume a rpmdb under the
installroot, whereas relocatable packages just install to a different
directory but use the regular system-wide rpmdb, I could be wrong
tho', I haven't tried it yet)
b. You'd still have to be root to install these rpms. This however, is
not a major issue, IMHO, since most folk are likely to install such
content on boxes where they do have root access (eg: their
laptops/desktops)
One consideration would be to have a fedora-cc-menus similar to
games-menus, that would make sure any contents appear in a reasonable
place in a user's applications menu.
This is a good idea too ! Thanks !
Anyway, here is what I plan on doing:
- Create a set of packaging guidelines for myself, so that i am
consistent in creating the specs
- Explore the possibilities offered by yum (yum plugins ??) to be able to:
+ customize the install location of the content
+ pay attention to the 'Group' header for group installations,
instead of needing a comps.xml
- Create some rpms, buy a domain name (any suggestions ??), set up the
repo and announce a beta :) !
- These might be totally crazy ...they are just idle thoughts as of now:
+ Explore if rpm allows for customization of headers, so that we
may better describe the content
+ Understand the rpm format so that we can build rpms by just slapping a
rpm header to a (cpio ??) archive instead of ^building^ (ie: going through
the motions of %prep, %build, %install ..etc) an rpm.
However, my time being limited (and the fact that i'll be taking a 2
week vacation starting next Wednesday), I do not know when this will
happen. Of course I welcome comments, suggestions any any other help.
regards
- steve
PS: like i mentioned in my previous post, if people here think this
discussion is off-topic, we can move it someplace else.
[1] Just these rpms actually:
Advanced Linux Programming - alp-1.0-1.fc10.noarch.rpm
Code Listings from Advanced Linux Programming -
alp-listings-1.0-1.fc10.noarch.rpm
Comic book adaption of Cory Doctorow's book Futuristic Tales of the
Here and Now - corydoctorow-ftothan-pdf-1.0-1.noarch.rpm
Free Culture, By Lawrence Lessig - MP3 version -
freeculture-premix-mp3-1.0-1.noarch.rpm
Free Culture, By Lawrence Lessig - PDF version -
freeculture-premix-pdf-1.0-1.noarch.rpm
Linux Device Drivers, Third Edition - ldd3-pdf-3-1.noarch.rpm
[2] I am not quite sure whether we can call it fedora-cc if it is not
fedora endorsed. Also, since this content is not tied down to any
distro, methinks the rpm can be installed on any rpm based distro,
using any package manager.
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