Re: GNUSTEP_INSTALLATION_DOMAIN

[Richard Frith-Macdonald]

On 11 Oct 2006, at 10:18, Nicola Pero wrote:

> > a. the default installation location is the local domain
> > b. a makefile may override that to supply a package specific default
> > c. the command line overrides that.
>
> That's exactly my proposal. :-)
>
> Except that, of course, I'd like to discourage b. as a practice. ;-)
>
> The main reason being that all software should install consistently  
> in the
> same way.
> If every software author chooses a different default domain, there  
> is no
> consistency. :-/

On consideration, I think we should stick to current conventions ...  
GNUstep packages go in the System domain and on GNUstep (ie third  
party contributed) packages go in the Local domain.  I don't think  
we've ever suggested that every author should choose a different domain.

> Also it would be pretty bad to have software install by default in / 
> usr on
> a Unix type
> filesystem ... I would want the stuff to install following default
> conventions like
> any other Unix system (ie, stuff by default installs into /usr/ 
> local or
> /opt or whatever).

Sure ...
On a system where the traditional GNUstep filesystem layout is not  
used, the System domain should be /usr/local or /opt or whatever,  
unless the people managing a distribution want it to be /usr on that  
distribution of course.  I imagine that on such systems the System  
and Local domains might be the same place.

> Anyway I suggest as a reasonable agreement, we'll use b. to set the
> installation domain
> as System for the 4 core packages (make, base, gui, back).  All other
> packages should have
> no default set and so install by default in Local (packagers are
> encouraged to install them
> into System instead when they package though).  Makes sense ?

No ... not really.  The System domain is for all system packages, not  
just a few core libraries.
That means by default, all packages which are part of the GNUstep  
project ... though people putting together distributions or adding  
GNUstep stuff to other systems would of course have their own policy  
(overriding the defaults) about what packages go where.

I would like to see *more* packages brought into GNUstep and the  
System domain rather than having things excluded from it, as I feel  
that it would be good to have a complete environment.  For instance,  
it would be nice if GNUMail was part of GNUstep.

> PS: would gnustep-base work if you install it in Local ?

Yes, afaik.