Subject: Re: [linux-audio-dev] Ardour : features page
From: Paul Barton-Davis (pbd_AT_Op.Net)
Date: Fri Oct 27 2000 - 05:31:27 EEST
>In this case the libraries really are separate packages, should
>definitely have their own versioning and may be easier to maintain
>as completely separate archives.
Well, this was my original belief. But my experience has belied that
belief.
>Even if people can only get the source out of CVS, the configure
>scripts will explicitly tell them what versions of what libraries
>they need so they can make sure to update each archive as needed.
Sure, this works, but almost everyone complains bitterly about having
to fetch the libraries separately. Everybody seems to want
a self-contained distribution. And I understand that. People end with
version skew - take the recent situation where I changed the API for
guileconfig but have still not updated SoftWerk to use the new
API. Find me more than 1 person who is willing to grovel with CVS tags
in order to extract the correct version of guileconfig for the current
version of SoftWerk. People's reluctance to do this is completely
reasonable, and it really shouldn't have been so intimidating to me to
switch to a system where a correct version of the libraries comes
along with the source to the application.
>going on. They can simply type "apt-get install ardour" or whatever,
>and everything happens. And you can keep your Makefiles simple and
>your source trees clean, and just concentrate on the code :)
well, for the apt system thats true. it doesn't work so well for RPM,
and it definitely doesn't work for tarballs. given that at the moment
i don't distribute binaries of any of my programs, this is sort of
moot anyway.
>Oh, and if your libraries were available as separate packages, other
>applications could make use of them too ...
They have always been, and they always will be. The change in plan is
to include the source and a make/build system to compile them in
*tarball* distributions of specific programs. There will continue to
be independent CVS repositories and occasionally even tarball/RPM/apt
releases for the libraries (if Joe M. sees fit :)
--p
ps. Conrad - I added support for multiple marks and an indepedent
cursor to GtkWaveForm today.
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