RE: Extension packaging

[pjfarley3]

> -----Original Message-----
> From: arnold@skeeve.com <arnold@skeeve.com>
> Sent: Sunday, May 8, 2022 11:16 AM
> To: pjfarley3@earthlink.net; aschorr@telemetry-investments.com
> Cc: bug-gawk@gnu.org; arnold@skeeve.com
> Subject: Extension packaging
> 
> Hi.
> 
> I changed the subject line, since this is an unrelated topic.

Apologies, I should have changed the subject line myself, but the mention of
making MPFR an extension earlier in the other thread kind of set me off on
this rant.

> <pjfarley3@earthlink.net> wrote:
> 
<Snipped> 
> As to the claim that the gawk distribution should just include all the
gawkextlib
> extensions: No, Thank You. The TeX Live distro doesn't include all of
CTAN, and
> the perl source tarball doesn't include all of CPAN.  I will not let the
gawk distro
> become a dumping ground for every extension anyone may write. (Not that
> people are bothering.)  I can't maintain everyone else's extensions and
there 
> are paperwork issues as well vis a vis the FSF.

I was not lobbying for gawk to distribute them, nor did I intend to lobby
for that idea, but I did not say so explicitly.  Mea culpa.

Why can't gawkextlib be like CPAN then?  AFAIK CPAN doesn't require the user
to recompile the main function code.  No one has to recompile perl when they
download a CPAN module they wish to use.

Perhaps the extension API architecture is the issue, apparently requiring
tight integration with the main gawk code?

Apologies for my ignorance in these matters if I have misunderstood how
gawk's extension API works.

Peter
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