[Nix-dev] Reorganization of the nixpkg file hierarchy

[John Altobelli]

I didn't know SVN could control links and tags, something to read
about.  Could it be set up to search for multiple tags (ie application
media) and put a link in the app-media for a package if it had both
(for the gentoo hierarchy)?  I agree having multiple trees is a good
idea.

I still don't really understand the os-specific folder.  "Application"
was meant as more of an example and I certainly would agree that not
every package that isn't a library should be considered an
application.  However, I don't feel that the organization should be
based on operating system or on a package's dependancies.  It should
simply be based upon the function of the code.

As for the default.nix and how to standardize how to write derivations
that really should be saved for another email, I probably shouldn't
have brought it up.

On Sat, Feb 7, 2009 at 12:28 PM, Michael Raskin <7c6f434c at mail.ru> wrote:
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> John Altobelli wrote:
>> Michael, that's a pretty interesting idea.  I see it almost like
>> keywords for each package and these tags could then automatically (via
>> a script) create syslinks in another file hierarchy.  Maybe a
>> pkgs_flat directory could be added alongside pkgs and contain all the
>> syslinks organized in the portage based system.
>
> I think there would be a few distinct symlink farms: Gentoo-like
> (Debian-like, Fedora-like) would be one of them. Simply links to the
> leaves with their paths (/ -> -) as names would also make sense. Or
> maybe only basenames.
>
>> A question would be where do these tags go?  Should they be in
>> all-packages.nix, the default.nix file, or as a .tags file within each
>> package folder?
>
> Package tags should (in my opinion) be maintained as SVN-contolled
> symlinks.
>
>> The problems I could see would be that someone makes a new package and
>> doesn't run the script, or doesn't manually add the syslinks.
>
> Well, the package will be untagged for a while. So tagging
> "classification leaves" becomes more important.
>
>> It's good to see a couple of people agree that the current system is
>> not perfect.  My biggest gripes with the system is that there aren't
>
> No one claims it is perfect. Most of people (including me), though,
> prefer to change it step-by-step as opposed to radically and at once.
>
>> enough division among the organizational structure, there are way too
>> many packages in misc, and I don't believe there should ever be be an
>
> Nearly everyone seems to agree that misc/ and development/libraries
> should be split up. It's just a consistent classification for them
> written down that is missing..
>
>> os-specific folder.  A windows application that runs the same function
>> as a linux application should be right next to each other.  The
>
> Once you say application, you missed the point. Now you have "a Linux
> kernel module for ..." or "a tool for setting up a ... via Linux ...
> extensions" there. Really, we'd better split them into drivers,
> configuration tools and low-level/misc, but again - the details should
> be discussed separately and just hopping to Gentoo system looks much
> worse than waiting and splitting while keeping its place in overall layout.
>
>> delineation should be within the package.  I think default.nix should
>> be changed to default_linux.nix and if the same package could be
>> compiled on windows there should be a default_win.nix.  But I have
>
> No. Two cases: if it is the same package (main part of source code is
> from the same team) - default.nix could check system type to apply
> OS-specific patches. If not - these are two packages in the same part of
> classification.
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