upstream rpm specs (was Re: FC2 initial schedule posted

[Karl DeBisschop]

On Tue, 2003-12-16 at 12:54, Marius Andreiana wrote:
> On Mon, 2003-12-15 at 21:55, Michael K. Johnson wrote:
> > On Mon, Dec 15, 2003 at 02:35:05PM -0500, Eric S. Raymond wrote:
> > > I think you're making a bad mistake.  By encouraging the upstream
> > > developers to automate RPM submission, you would substantially increase
> > > the freshness of the updates you get.
> > 
> > That's really not a major problem; when things just build from
> > upstream, updating them isn't a problem.
> it's a problem when upstream packages don't have a rpm .spec file
> included. 
> Many applications not included in Fedora/RedHat don't have .spec files
> in their releases. Also, rpms from rpm-based distros don't usually work
> in Fedora as they have different file locations or different package
> names for libraries.
> 
> Maybe Eric's proposal will get more developers to build and maintain a
> rpm spec file with their applications.

This is as much an RFE for rpm, but as a developer and package
maintainer, I find that I lack a good mechanism for packaging for
different distributions.

For instance, the same build dep may have a different name depending on
whether it is a RedHat or Mandrake build. Personally, I slant towards
RedHat, but I do try to be compatible with other RPM distros as well. I
don't know if others are in the same position, but a good way to handle
those issues would help. If there is a good method for this, I don't
know it yet. And I don't feel like building some now hack for it into my
spec files - there should be a standard, well documented approach.

-- 
Karl DeBisschop <kdebisschop at alert.infoplease.com>
Pearson Education/Information Please