[haiku-development] Re: Haiku, Inc. in Contempt of Its Community

  • From: Augustin Cavalier <waddlesplash@xxxxxxxxx>
  • To: "haiku-development@xxxxxxxxxxxxx" <haiku-development@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
  • Date: Tue, 17 Feb 2015 15:54:01 -0500

On Tue, Feb 17, 2015 at 3:43 PM, Pete Goodeve <pete.goodeve@xxxxxxxxxxxx>
wrote:
>
> One of the arguments I've kept hearing from those in favour of the current
> setup is that nobody has specified what has been broken.


No, that is one of the arguments of "why should we switch", and not "why
the current system is good". My overview is that the current system is good
because:
1. Reduced system complexity (less the package manager has to worry about,
less that can break because of that, less upkeep for sysadmins of large
systems [in the future], easy to fix a system broken by upgrades via a
recovery CD or another OS)
2. Easier to package software for it (really, has anyone here looked at
Ubuntu's package building system? it's a nightmare to learn or to adapt
your already-written software to it)
3. Fast install/uninstall times for packages.
4. Less disk consumption by packages.

This is all off the top of my head, and mostly what I find beneficial in
the new system. Of course, others might have different opinions.


> The problem,
> I think, is that the breaks are small and diffuse, but overall they add up
> to major pain.  They are felt, but are hard to detail.
>

You've spent a significant amount of time complaining and suggesting
alternatives, so can you please take some time to write these down instead
of arguing to change it first? It'd be very helpful to both of us, I think.


> One headache is for those of us who have been using BeOS/Haiku for
> a long time, and have built up an extensive, comfortable, personal
> environment.  As I just mentioned yesterday, I've been putting stuff
> in ~/config/bin etc for years (and more lately in /boot/common) so
> I can't just update my working system to PM.
>

Yes, you can. Copy ~/config/bin to ~/config/non-packaged/bin, and copy
/boot/common to /boot/system/non-packaged/. That's all there is to it. (If
there are a significant number of users who are going to expect Installer
to do this for them, we might be able to add that feature.)


> If ~/config had been left alone, and a packaged version introduced
> alongside it, there would be no disruption, and packages could be
> smoothly introduced as they become available.  It is a really silly
> argument to say that maintained stuff 'should' be packaged.


Why is it silly? Can you explain any usecases where having maintained
software be non-packaged (and not just "extract me anywhere") would be more
optimal?


> Yes,
> presumably it will be, eventually.  Meanwhile there is distress.
> Not everyone has the time or motivation to jump in and immediately
> update their old stuff.
>

Again, *please* take the time to list these things...

For similar reasons I think /boot/common should be restored.  It
> needn't actually have anything in it in a default system, but the
> search paths  should be there for access if needed.
>

This is what /boot/system/non-packaged is for, as mentioned above. It is
pretty much exactly what you describe, complete with empty directories
already in the PATH and whatnot.

-Augustin

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