Packaging: Where to install demo apps to?

[Ralf Corsepius]

On Tue, 2004-06-29 at 10:59, Gérard Milmeister wrote:
> On Tue, 2004-06-29 at 10:51, Gérard Milmeister wrote:
> > On Tue, 2004-06-29 at 09:59, Ralf Corsepius wrote:
> > > Hi,
> > > 
> > > I am preparing a package for submission to Fedora.US/Fedora Extras. This
> > > package comes with a couple of demo applications I plan to put into a
> > > separate sub-package.
> > > 
> > > Where to install these applications to on FC?
> > > What do Fedora conventions recommend?
> > > 
> > > IMO, they should not be installed to bindir (/usr/bin), because these
> > > applications are "not really useful".
> > > 
> > > Installing them to datadir (/usr/share) or pkgdatadir
> > > (/usr/share/<package>) also does not seem appropriate, because these
> > > files are architecture dependent.
> > > 
> > > Remains $libexecdir/<package>.
> 
> $libexec only contains binaries that are never invoked directly, but
> only through another program. So this is not the correct place to put
> demos in.
Hmm, I see that using $libdir/<package> could be an approach, but ..

According to the FHS similar considerations as you outline for
$libexecdir apply to /usr/lib
[http://www.pathname.com/fhs/pub/fhs-2.3.html#PURPOSE22]

Using libdir also seems to be questionable with respect to the GNU
Standards, which say
[http://www.gnu.org/prep/standards_54.html#SEC54]:
`libdir'
        The directory for object files and libraries of object code. Do
        not install executables here, they probably ought to go in
        `$(libexecdir)' instead. 

However, both standards leave room for interpretation. The GNU Standards
don't cover $libdir/<subdir> and the FHS seems to leave room about their
understanding on "users" (Normal users normal don't execute demos,
developers will, and do expect to find demos at odd places).

Does anybody know what  other Linux distributors do?

>  If there is a large number of demo apps, you could put them
> into /usr/lib/<packagename>/demos, so as not to pollute /usr/bin.
That's exactly what I am trying to do. I don't want to pollute /usr/bin
with several dozens of tiny demos (ca. 100).

Ralf