[Installit-dev] Package categories

[Jannis Pohlmann]

Hi all,

I've thought long wether we should add categories the package list or
not ... well, I think we should. I also rethought Benny's idea of a tree
structure for listing the packages which I absolutely refused at first.

The question now is how far we go. Basically, I'd suggest to use a
rather simple XML structure for the package list:

  <packages>
    <package name="exo" group="Xfce Libraries" version="0.9"/>
    <package name="thunar" group="File Management" version="1.0"/>
    <package name="xfce4util" group="Xfce Libraries" version="4.4"/>
    ...
  </packages>

Here, the internal name of the group would be the same as it's displayed
title.

Another idea would be to use a <group/> element:

  <packages>
    <group name="Xfce Libraries">
      <package name="exo" version="0.9"/>
      <package name="xfce4util" version="4.4"/>
    </group>
    <group name="File Management">
      <package name="thunar" version="1.0"/>
    </group>
  </packages>

or

  <packages>
    <group name="xfce-libraries" title="Xfce Libraries"/>
    <group name="file-management" title="File Management"/>

    <package name="exo" group="xfce-libraries" .../>
    <package name="xfce4util" group="xfce-libraries" .../>
    <package name="thunar" group="file-management" .../>
  </packages>

The last idea which comes to my mind would be a separate groups.xml
file. But in my opinion this would only make maintaining more difficult.

We also should not use nested categories, this just made everything
unnecessarily complex. And - most probably - a directory structure
representing the category structure (like /files/file-management,
/files/xfce-libraries etc.) isn't a good idea as well. Categories should
 just be used to list the packages in a more user-friendly and concise way.

How do you think about this topic?

Regards,
Jannis