On Thu, 05 Jun 2008 17:01:00 -0400 Doug Goldstein <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
> Marius Mauch wrote: > > On Thu, 05 Jun 2008 15:42:24 -0400 > > Doug Goldstein <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > > > > > >> All, > >> > >> Here's a GLEP for the addition of USE flag descriptions to package > >> metadata. It does not address any future ideas that others may have > >> had or suggested. It merely gives developers the necessary "tools" > >> to document their USE flag usage it better detail on a per package > >> basis. > >> > >> An clearly motivation explanation that I didn't add, which I'm > >> going to add once I send this is the fact that as per the QA > >> Project, use.local.desc can not contain a USE flag that already > >> appears globally in use.desc. This would allow a description for > >> that USE flag to be contained in the metadata. > >> > >> http://www.gentoo.org/proj/en/glep/glep-0056.html > >> > >> I encourage any and all _technical_ feedback. > >> > > > > Doesn't include any statement about compability with existing tools > > or how it's related to use.local.desc (replacement, extension, ...) > > > > Marius > > > It purposefully does not. XML is an extensible language that allows > for this type of expandability. Current tools should be able to > validate that adding these tags are valid if they appear in the DTD. > However, if those tools do not handle those tags they should not do > anything with them, hence the nature of XML. I was more talking about tools that process use flag information (equery, euse, ufed, ...). > The replacement of use.local.desc would necessitate a change to any > and all tools which use that file and require them to support the new > XML data. This of course introduces a chicken/egg issue. I have > mentioned to infra the possibility of having a pre-rsync process that > condensed all metadata.xml's into a use.local.desc that would be part > of rsync data but not part of CVS. This could be written as a CVS > hook to see when a metadata.xml was touched and run the utility > appropriately. > > But again, this is outside the scope of this GLEP, whose purpose > merely is to provide a way to document this. I disagree. At the very least state that the GLEP does not replace use.local.desc if that's the intention, and which location is supposed to take priority if a flag is defined in both. Otherwise different tools will use different rules and generating inconsistent results. And there are many tools affected by this ... Marius PS: I like the general idea, but as long as compability issues are completely ignored by the GLEP I have to oppose it. -- gentoo-dev@lists.gentoo.org mailing list
