Packaging xfwm/ce4; WAS Re: How to create a package

[Daniel Whitener]

IMHO, one package would suffice.  You could do something similar to the way 
apache2 is setup... with [default]--enable-module=xffm  or 
--disable-module=xffm for those who don't need/want it.  I think having one 
"./configure && make && make install"  would be great - plus it would 
greatly simplify the install instructions and the current "order of 
installation" that we have to go through.  And for folks like Matthew who 
don't want to use xffm or xfdesktop, they could simply leave that out of 
their .xinitrc.  I don't think a few extra binaries on the system will hurt 
anybody - besides, today's OS installs are huge (almost 5 gig for full RH9) 
- what's 4 extra unused binaries when you already have 1000 that you don't 
know exist?  (Example:  hit <tab><tab> on the console of a redhat 9 box and 
you get "Display all 4504 possibilities? (y or n)").

My vote- one package - default install is everything with ./configure 
options to disable certain things (xffm).

Great work by all of the developers - thanks for making an excellent desktop!

Daniel

Matthew Weier OPhinney wrote:
> -- Martti Kuparinen <martti.kuparinen at iki.fi> wrote
> (on Monday, 02 June 2003, 02:30 PM +0300):
> 
>>I'm maintaining the XFce3 package in NetBSD and I recently started to look at 
>>the new XFce4 stuff.
>>
>>Before I start creating the packages I'd like to know if you guys are going to 
>>bundle everything into one piece before the official 4.0 release? In other 
>>words, can I perform a single configure/make in the top-level directory (like 
>>in 3.8.18) or do I still have to perform several configures/makes in module 
>>directories in certain order?
>>
>>What I like to have is a single package called xfce and that would contain the 
>>complete system. However, right now I think I have to create separate 
>>packages for each libxfce* modules...
> 
> 
> There seems to be a lot of clammoring for a single xfce package with the
> complete system. I'd like to weigh in for a different vantage point.
> 
> Until recently, I was a blackbox user. I like blackbox. It has an
> incredibly small footprint, nothing to clutter up the screen except what
> you *choose* to put there, and it's clean. If you play around with it
> enough, it can even be quite pretty.
> 
> Add to blackbox ROX-Filer with a pinboard, and you've got a very nice
> minimalist desktop, complete with icons. If you want, you can even add a
> panel using ROX (I didn't, 'cause I feel it's too thick and you can't change the
> default icon size for it easily), or add gkrellm for a bunch of
> functionality that's easily themed.
> 
> Why am I talking about blackbox on an xfce list? Because I started using
> blackbox when I felt xfce3 was too big for my needs. I didn't *need* a
> panel, I didn't *need* desktop icons. Sure, I could run xfwm3 without
> the panel, but I still needed to have the panel installed to do this,
> which meant that while xfwm3 didn't take much memory footprint, it still
> took a bit of a storage footprint, more than it needed by itself.
> 
> The beauty of having xfce4 split into different packages is that you
> don't need to install the entire desktop. When I first started trying it
> out six weeks ago, I installed *just* the stuff necessary to get xfwm4
> running. I have since added the panel and taskbar to that configuration,
> and I'm *very* satisfied. I still use ROX-Filer for my pinboard and
> backdrop; I like that file manager, and I have a lot of utilities built
> around its functionality at this point.
> 
> So I *don't* have xffm, xfdesktop, or most of the extras installed. And
> I like the fact that I have that *choice*.
> 
> The only thing I would see changing in the packaging structure at this
> point is (1) to group the libraries into a single package, and (2) to
> put xfce4 and xfce-utils in a package together. 
> 
> As to (1), since xfwm4 and xfce4 are dependent on libxfceutil,
> libxfcegui, libxfcemcs, and xfce-mcs-manager, I'd suggest packaging this
> as 'xfce4-base' or 'xfce4-common'; I would also suggest placing the
> 'xfce-mcs-plugins' in that package, as they're pretty basic to how
> xfwm/ce4 work. My reasoning regarding (2) is that the description of
> xfce-utils on the website even says that the panel expects them to be
> installed. 
> 
> This would simplify installation, while still retaining the element of
> user choice. Choice is, of course, why we all use OSS, right? ;-)
> 
> I hope that those making binaries for the various distros will also keep
> this in mind as they package it all up; just because a person is using a
> particular distribution does *not* mean that they necessarily want that
> distro's maintainers to make their choices for them.
> 
> Just my opinion, of course.
>