[Fwd: setup.ini - some points]

[Robert Collins <robert dot collins at itdomain dot com dot au>]

-----Forwarded Message-----

> From: Robert Collins <robert.collins@itdomain.com.au>
> To: cygwin-developers@cygwin.com
> Subject: setup.ini - some points
> Date: 01 Nov 2001 22:16:04 +1100
> 
> What is the consensus on the meaning of the 'base' category?
> 
> Is it a) the _absolute minimum_ to run shell scripts and invoke
> programs, or b) is it the core install for a comfortable environment?
> 
> if a) then
> IMO [bash, diff, possibly findutils, gdbm, possibly libncurses5&6, man,
> possibly ncurses, possibly readline, possibly terminfo, textutils and
> which ] should not be listed as 'base'. 
> 
> if it's b) then I propose we have the 'Required' category reinstated,
> and the current base members (minus the list above) are added to
> Required.
> 
> Second, we need a policy, that _no_ pre or post install scripts are
> needed for the packages in the (if a) base else Required) category.
> 
> Whats this in aid of?
> pre/post install scripts will fail if everything needed to run them
> isn't installed. Dpkg has a neat capability to defer running the
> configuration scripts until everything needed is installed, but we don't
> have that yet. I'm not sure if rpm has that capability or not (I don't
> recall seeing it, things used to simply fail to install).
> 
> So, to prevent this, the core needed tools to run pre-post install
> scripts need to be always present, and themselves cannot have those
> scripts. (for now).
> 
> Rob
>