$RPM_BUILD_ROOT != %{buildroot} (was:Re: Prelink success story :))

[Mike A. Harris]

On Fri, 27 Feb 2004, Michael Schwendt wrote:

>> I haven't skipped any messages. I have however formed an opinion.  
>> 
>> My opinion is that a lot of people like to argue endlessly about 
>> very pointless and trive details of rpm packaging, to extreme 
>> pedantism.  
>
>Sorry to say that, but apparently you have misunderstood the
>messages. You make it worse by pushing it into a wrong
>direction.

I really don't want to push it in any direction though.  I'm just 
voicing an opinion that some of the debates people have over 
things are over very trivial things that don't really matter 
much.  ;o)  My own opinion may also be in that category.  ;o)

I myself use and prefer RPM_BUILD_ROOT over %{buildroot} due to
nothing more than personal preference and years of usage.  I 
wouldn't argue one was better than the other though.  I have read 
jbj's mails in which he claims people should use RPM_BUILD_ROOT 
because he may decide to change the meaning of buildroot some 
day, however I don't think it's a big problem either way 
personally, because I know despite any such warnings, there will 
be a large number of packages out there anyway which would break 
if %{buildroot} was to get changed.  A rather simple shell script 
can easily update such spec files some day down the road should 
Jeff come true on this.

I'm perfectly happy with packages that use either method, despite 
my personal preference.  Some packages even use *both*.  ;o)


Take care,
TTYL


-- 
Mike A. Harris     ftp://people.redhat.com/mharris
OS Systems Engineer - XFree86 maintainer - Red Hat